Beverly Hilton landmarks, including Trader Vic’s restaurant, could be bulldozed to make way for high-end condos, according to a report obtained by the Business Journal.
The hotel, and its ballroom in particular, has gained international prominence as the home of the Golden Globe Awards and other entertainment industry events.
Though Trader Vic’s has lost much of its luster, the Polynesian-themed restaurant was a storied haunt of Frank Sinatra’s Rat Pack and a longtime entertainment industry hangout.
Community activists are already expressing skepticism at plans calling for a massive redevelopment of the 9-acre property.
“They are being overly ambitious,” said Rose Norton, a former Beverly Hills planning commissioner and a veteran community activist. “They are asking for a great deal more than they should be.”
Packard Bell co-founder Beny Alagem, who paid $130 million for the 569-room hotel two years ago from entertainment mogul Merv Griffin, wants to knock down Trader Vic’s, the Hilton Executive Conference Center, the Oasis Court and the hotel’s 514-space parking garage.
On those sites Alagem would build two 13-story buildings containing 96 condominiums; a 15-story, 104-unit condo hotel; and 96 hotel rooms in two three-story structures. The hotel’s parking would be put underground and increased to 1,422 spaces.
Alagem’s investment firm Oasis West Realty LLC is expected to announce its plans at a joint meeting of Beverly Hills’ planning commission and city council on Tuesday afternoon.
Oasis West declined to elaborate on its plans until after the meeting with city officials. Hilton Hotels Corp. executives didn’t return calls seeking comment.
Norton said the plans call for too little parking, especially given that the hotel’s famed ballroom can hold more than 900 people. She also is wary of the condo towers, which would be up to 150 feet tall even though the city’s height limit is set at 45 feet.
“What they are proposing goes against the city’s general plan,” said Norton, whose husband Ben Norton is a former member of the Beverly Hills City Council
Sources involved in the project provided the Business Journal with a copy of a master plan that Oasis West Realty distributed to city officials last month.
A price tag for the project which also includes a remodeled pool and traffic improvements wasn’t included in the report, but sources said the final cost could be in the $200 million range.
Though the main 353-room, eight-story tower designed by noted architect Welton Beckett would remain, the plans would result in a net reduction of 121 hotel rooms.
The reduction in rooms might not be popular with city council members, who have expressed concern in recent years about a loss of hotel rooms diminishing the city’s bed taxes.
Traffic will also be a major concern of the city, according to Norton. It’s unclear how residential units will be incorporated into the hotel, located at the heavily congested intersection of Wilshire and Santa Monica boulevards. State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Co. rates the corner as the fourth-most dangerous intersection in the United States.
The massive redevelopment plans of the Beverly Hilton’s 9-acre property comes on the heels of an $80 million renovation that Oasis West recently completed to the parts of the hotel that would not be razed.
Oasis West announced in December that it hired New York-based architecture firm Gwathmey Siegel & Associates LLC to design residential additions to the hotel.
There’s one aspect of the project that Norton said likely wouldn’t be contested: The loss of Trader Vic’s. “I get the sense people think Trader Vic’s has had its day,” she said. “It’s really slipped. Nobody will miss it.”
