Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Can Bedford Support Another Hotel?

With the recent closing of the Bedford Travelodge, a question that frequently comes up is: Should another hotel be built in Bedford?

Taking a look at current hotel rates in the Bedford area, it seems like there is high demand by business travelers. The full service hotels, Bedford DoubleTree and Burlington Marriott are currently over $300 a night during the week and $100-150 on the weekend. The other nearby hotels such as the Billerica Hampton Inn or Billerica Courtyard range from about $150-250 during the week and around $100 on the weekend. Further away from the business parks, the prices are lower for The Bedford Plaza and Bedford Motel (close to $100 during the week and a little lower on the weekends).

It might make sense to add a business oriented hotel near the Crosby Drive area. The challenge would be filling enough rooms on the weekend. If I had to pick a location, I would go with Burlington Road (MA62) between Crosby Drive and The Melting Pot where there are a couple of vacant office buildings. This is right off Route 3 but still very close to Crosby Drive and Middlesex Turnpike.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sadly abutting towns are more likely to get a new hotel since at Bedford Town Meeting three years ago the town doubled the local occupancy tax for staying in Bedford. The result is employers prefer to put employees out of town and hotels do not like having guests have to pay that much on top of room rate. Also, at same meeting they added 3/4% local meals tax to all restaurants in town. This hurts hotel food service, by driving up consumer price.

Anonymous said...

Our OWN TOWN makes it difficult to grow new business? Of course they should have that as their top priority and interest? Yes it appears to be much easier in adjacent towns to redevelop and grow new business. Lexington Center store fronts are filled again! Burlington strip mall is filled across from the Mall on Mall Road. Great for them!

Yes Adam I believe an extended stay type of a hotel (off of Rt 3) would be great. A beautiful hotel with a state of the art conference center. It would encourage more big business to come to town, revitalize Crosby Road and DeAngelo Drive. Oh yeh, where did PHARMALUCENCE relocate?(BILLERICA) Exactly did you get the point. Bedford needs to be more open and less rigid to allow us to expand and grow business. I believe our want to grow does not parallel the building inspector,town manager or zoning boards intentions/priorities. A REAL DISCONNECT. Frustrating.

Adam Schwartz said...

Hi Anonymous,

Thanks for your comments about the hotel and town.

There is a Selectman meeting on October 15th where we will be discussing economic development goals for the town of Bedford. I encourage you to attend.

Thanks
Adam

Anonymous said...

Adam , what is the structure of the meeting? Open minded? Or just reporting what has been approved? Before I invest precious time it would be nice how meeting is run. I am a business promoter, but have been exposed to wrong doings by the town personel, forcing a viable business out of our community. They went to the south shore and are thriving down there.thank you

Adam Schwartz said...

The agenda should be posted here by the end of the week - http://bedfordma.gov/index.php/component/docman/cat_view/113-agendas/148-selectmen-agendas

It should be one of the items on the agenda. I don't know how much time is allocated yet. These meetings typically allow comments/feedback from the audience. It is a public meeting.