Sleeping beauty: Developer breathing new life into old University Inn hotel Larry Tabor plans to turn the old The University Inn Hotel on Highway 12, which closed on Jan. 1, into condominiums. / Kelly Tippett
As Larry Tabor walked through the hot, empty halls of The University Inn Friday, little had changed since the hotel closed Jan. 1.
The lobby of the three-building complex off Spring Street was still furnished; the restaurant was filled with tables and chairs; and even the kitchen still contained many of the appliances used throughout The University Inn's 35-year run.
Beds, tables and other furniture filled each of the 120 guest rooms, while the once-functioning swimming pool played host to standing water and insects.
The three buildings which make up The University Inn are in disrepair and need to be gutted and renovated, Tabor said as he walked through one guest room and entered another, where holes in the wall exposed beds and furniture in the next quarters.
"It's in pretty rough shape," Tabor said.
Tabor's company, TCD Investments LLC, is trying to turn The University Inn's two rear buildings into 50 one-bedroom condominiums, dubbed University Club Condominiums, which will be marketed toward Mississippi State University alumni. Every two hotel rooms will be renovated and converted into one condominium, Tabor said. Each condo also will be outfitted with a kitchen and appliances, like a washer and dryer, he said.
"It's quite a project to undertake," he said.
Tabor is not yet sure what will happen to the front building, which houses the lobby, kitchen, banquet room and 20 guest rooms. According to Tabor, "other parties" have shown an interest in putting a new hotel and restaurant in the 20,000-square-foot space.
But the city first must approve the project as a conditional use in a C-2 general business district before Tabor can move forward with his plans.
The Starkville Board of Aldermen Tuesday voted to send the conditional use application back to the city's planning and zoning commission due to deficiencies in the application and incorrect advertising. Tabor was disappointed in the Board of Aldermen's decision and said he is unsure when he will go back to the planning and zoning commission, which earlier this spring already approved the application.
"Unfortunately, after a unanimous 7-0 vote in favor of this project by the planning and zoning commission, the Board of Aldermen has sent us back to the same committee due to an advertising error and application deficiencies," Tabor said. "Hopefully we will be approved again by the planning and zoning commission and the Board of Aldermen."
A planning consultant for the CottonMill Marketplace project, proposed on land bordering The University Inn, spoke out against Tabor's University Club Condominiums project Tuesday at the Board of Aldermen meeting, citing the application deficiencies and lack of proper notification to neighboring property owners.
Tabor said Tuesday and again on Friday that University Club Condominiums would complement the CottonMill Marketplace project, even though CottonMill developers also included condominiums in their development plans.
"We were very surprised by the objection of the CottonMill group," Tabor said. "We feel our project would complement their development."
If the city approves University Club Condominiums this summer, Tabor hopes to have several model units open by the middle of football season. He hopes construction of the 50 condominiums will be complete by the end of the year.
