"This is in the center of town, it's a substantial renovation and it's pretty complex because they're trying to keep the Inn open during construction," Hanover Town Manager Julia Griffin said in an interview with The Dartmouth. "This is a tight site in a tight corner, so it's not an easy project."
The anticipated renovations will change the Inn's capacity by approximately 20 additional guest rooms, 16 fewer restaurant seats, 85 fewer outdoor restaurant seats and 47 fewer meeting room seats. The project will add 11,963 square feet to the Inn, according to minutes from a March 22 Planning Board meeting.
"They are proposing to convert upper floor meeting rooms to guest rooms, enhance the downstairs meeting floor space and move the Daniel Webster room to Main Street and Wheelock Street," Griffin said. "They're reconfiguring the whole front of the hotel so when you drive by, you see the busy restaurants."
The availability of parking space both during the construction process and after its completion has been a point of controversy during Planning Board discussions.
"There are two levels of parking issues," Griffin said. "The immediate need is that of the project's construction crew. The other is theoretical maximum use. We need to make sure we have sufficient parking spaces in the downtown area for a bustling [Inn]."
The construction project will eliminate the parking spaces in front of the Hopkins Center, according to the meeting minutes. The College will pay for new parking meters in front of the Green to compensate, according to an email in the public files of the Hanover zoning office.
"The parking spaces in front of the Hop will be out of service and are not coming back," Griffin said. "We're trying to create ample space, and it's a process that requires collaboration."
The College will also allocate 20 of its 30 parking spaces in the town garage on Lebanon Street to the Inn, according to the meeting minutes.
While the meeting minutes show that representatives of the College rejected an "open-ended" requirement to invest in a downtown parking structure, Griffin said that the College and the town will work together to monitor and respond to changes in parking needs over the next few years.
Much of the Planning Board's concern over traffic stems from the difficulty in predicting how the Inn's business will increase after the renovations are complete.
"We want to know how many more cars will be coming into town?" Chair of the Hanover Planning Board Judith Esmay said in an interview with The Dartmouth. "It's a very busy corner, cars are coming and going all the time."
The College commissioned an "exhaustive" traffic study by Stephen Pernaw, a traffic consultant located in Concord, N.H., Esmay said. The Planning Board received the study's report in the last two weeks, she said.
Although the study's findings eased the concerns of the members of the Planning Board, the Board will continue to monitor changes in the town's traffic, Griffin said.
"It's going to be an ongoing process over the next few years," she said. "There's a little bit of an unknown as to what we expect for the future."
The College has also applied for an obstruction permit, which will allow it to close off public streets during the construction process, according to the building file in the Hanover Zoning Office.
Tuesday's meeting is expected to produce a formal agreement between the town and the College that will allow the Planning Board to approve the project.
Representatives of the Inn could not be reached for comment.
