By CRAIG FREILICH

CANTON -- The village board has approved the subdivision of the University Plaza property to allow for development of a new three-story, 13,000 square-foot, 82-room hotel on East Main Street.

Ordinarily approving a property subdivision is under the purview of the local planning board, said Mayor Michael Dalton, but due to a quirk in local law in Canton, the village Board of Trustees can make the approval, and did at the Dec. 12 meeting, he said.

At a meeting Nov. 21, the village board delayed action on the subdivision request after trustees heard from representatives of the two existing hotels in the village, University Suites and Best Western, who expressed concern over “fill rates” and the effect the new hotel could have on their businesses.

The development proposal, from David Muraco, would place the new hotel on 9.6 acres in a currently wooded area on the east side of the plaza land.

Muraco is the owner of development company New Venture Assets and of Empire Management Co., which holds the deed to University Plaza and the surrounding land.

The project has nearly all the approvals it needs to begin construction.

The plan next goes to the village’s Zoning Board of Appeals for discussion of parking at the hotel and whatever other questions might arise.

With 92 parking spaces for the 82 rooms, the plan doesn’t come close to the usual hotel standard in Canton of two spaces for each room.

“The code would call for two spaces,” said village Planning Board Chair Barry Walch, “but there are no meeting rooms, no special function space in this plan,” so he thinks the higher requirement could be waived. “But the board will decide,” he said.

Walch also noted that adding more parking, for which there is room on the site, would add to the amount of “impervious” covering on the lot, which would add to rainwater runoff requirements.

Walch said then only the state Department of Transportation approval of the curb cut from Main Street, U.S. Rt. 11, would remain before the builder can apply for a building permit and start work. “There have been preliminary discussions regarding access, but no final decisions made as yet,” said Michael Flick of the DOT in an email message Thursday.

When the county Planning Board reviewed the plan, they recommended three things.

They want all outdoor lighting be “downcast” to prevent light pollution, and that that the project maintain the vegetation buffer between the hotel and the plaza. They also believe the current plan for the hotel drop-off area at the main entry should be changed so it won’t be “choked off” from 26 feet wide at either end down to 13 feet wide in the middle, to allow for another lane of traffic there, according to St. Lawrence County Planning Office Director Keith Zimmerman. Otherwise it would preclude passing and possibly restrict emergency access, he said.

The county planners also recommended putting in a driveway from the hotel parking lot to the plaza lot next door to allow hotel guests easy access to amenities such as food, beverages and other groceries, and banking and laundry services, for instance.

But those recommendations are “non-binding. They’re up to the developer,” Zimmerman said.

And any signs not meeting local standards would require an area variance, he said.