The Duluth City Council voted recently to inter into an intergovernmental agreement with the city’s Downtown Development Authority to transfer 1.839 acres along Hill Street and Ridgeway Road for the development of a public parking deck with a limited service hotel.

The approved agreement restricts the development to a two-story hotel over a two-story parking structure. The building to be developed on the property must be a nationally franchised “transient lodging” chain hotel. No extended-stay hotels or hotel units containing kitchens or kitchenettes or an apartment hotel, residential hotel, or serviced apartment complex that uses a hotel-style booking system can be built under this agreement.

The two-story parking deck will have at least 320 parking spaces. The DDA will purchase 215 of those designated spaces for public parking for $4,400,000. The developer will retain ownership of 105 spaces of the upper story for exclusive use of the hotel.