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Developer and architect describe hotel expansion and 250‑yard harbor walk
Summary
Applicant team told the planning board the redevelopment will expand the Newport Harbor Hotel with a podium over parking, an elevated plaza above the floodplain, about 31 new guest rooms, retail/meeting space, and roughly 250 yards of new publicly accessible harbor walk linking Paraty Park to Bowen’s Wharf.
Attorney Peter Regan and Centerbrook architect Justin Heady walked the board through the master‑plan concept, saying the goal is to reincorporate the hotel property into the downtown waterfront and provide continuous public access along the harbor.
Justin Heady described designs that place much of the new program on an elevated podium (Elevation 15) to meet FEMA requirements, with meeting and retail space at the podium level and hotel rooms above. He said the new harbor walk would span roughly 250 yards and ‘‘provide approximately 30,000 square feet of public access.'’ The team emphasized contextual materials—brick, shingles and pedestrian‑scale elements—to align the new work with Bowen’s Wharf and Trinity Church sightlines.
The architects also showed renderings and a short virtual walkthrough to illustrate pedestrian connections from the ferry and Paraty Park through Market Square to Bowen’s Wharf. The design team said the project preserves the existing 168 parking spaces by reconfiguring parking below the podium and adds covered bicycle and scooter parking as part of a multimodal approach to downtown circulation.
