30-Apr-17 – Complaints from neighbors and a curbside operation he calls “a failure” are among reasons 42nd Ward Alderman Brendan Reilly says he will not support an expansion of Dana Hotel and Spa.

The River North hotel wants to build another hotel next door to it. It would have been a 14-story 178-room hotel, as presented at a March 28 meeting of River North Residents Association, a meeting Reilly called “contentious.”

“A number of valid concerns were raised [at the meeting] about the impact that a significant increase in hotel room accommodations would have on this predominantly residential block,” said Reilly (left). “It was noted the Dana Hotel’s current curbside operation is a failure.” Photo by Sarah Matheson

Complaints included private charter buses and tour buses for music groups blocking traffic, driving the wrong way on a one-way street, and idling their engines for hours.

“Neighbors complained that the Dana Hotel is currently doing a ‘poor’ or ‘apathetic’ job managing its curbside frontage, resulting in taxicabs, UBER, limousines, trolleys, and charter buses backing-up traffic on both Erie and Dearborn streets.”

Residents told Reilly that when they shared with Dana Hotel what Reilly described as “chronic quality-of-life complaints,” the hotel showed “total indifference.”

“Frankly, reports of new quality-of-life abuses coming from the Dana Hotel property – at the very same time they are seeking community support for their significant expansion – do not surprise me at all,” says Reilly. “While the 42nd Ward is home to tens of thousands of hotel rooms…we have never received such unprecedented, negative feedback about the impact of one hotel’s operations on the surrounding neighborhood. This is truly a first.”

Reilly encouraged Dana Hotel to spend the next 12 months improving its operations and then consider other options for the site. He also says the hotel could improve its relationship with neighbors by closing its nightclub.