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Potsdam planners get first look at Hampton Inn proposal, small brewery

Posted 12/7/12

POTSDAM – The Potsdam Planning Board Thursday received its first presentation of plans for a 95-room hotel on Market Street and listened to a site review of a proposed mini-brewery and tasting room …

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Potsdam planners get first look at Hampton Inn proposal, small brewery

Posted

POTSDAM – The Potsdam Planning Board Thursday received its first presentation of plans for a 95-room hotel on Market Street and listened to a site review of a proposed mini-brewery and tasting room on Maple Street.

Amy DeFranco of engineering firm Clough Harbour and Associates presented the preliminary plan on behalf of Vision Hotels, a Corning-based hotel management firm that is considering building a $6 million to $7 million multi-story Hampton Inn on lots on Market Street now occupied by Scoopuccino’s and Ton’s Sports Bar south of McDonalds.

The board had questions about lot coverage, or the amount of the land that will be covered either by buildings or pavement. The concern is runoff, and how to direct or contain it. Alternatives were discussed, such as permeable pavement and underground storm water management tanks, as opposed to plain runoff into the street or fenced-in retention ponds.

The next step for the hotel developers is refining their plan and presenting it to the St. Lawrence County Planning Board, which would review the plan before the village planners take another look at it, according to Ted Prahl, chair of the village Planning Board.

Prahl said the project would be within 500 feet of a state highway, and that and other considerations will require the county planners to review the proposal.

“They will have to review it first. They will probably want to do a full review.”

Prahl said that would probably put the village’s next review of the plan at their February meeting at the earliest.

The proposed mini-brewery and tasting room is being developed out of a brewing hobby by a Canton-Potsdam Hospital emergency room physician.

Good Medicine Brewing Company at 43 Maple St., formerly Angelo's Seafood Restaurant, will take three or four more years before it is where Dr. Jason Lorenc would like it to be, he told the board.

He plans a small brewery where people could taste a few small samples of beer, thus not requiring a liquor license, Prahl said.

There was a question of whether or not the lot had adequate parking space, but “the present parking is more than adequate for its intended use,” Prahl said.