BL Companies offers glimpse at Science Park Garage

See rendering and description here.

Redesign of Bustling Yale Intersection Raises Traffic Safety Questions

Are the City of New Haven and Yale University doing enough to encourage pedestrian safety at one of Downtown New Haven's busiest pedestrian intersections (and one that will soon have an additional 800-900 or so students living right next to it)?

See reporting by the New Haven Independent, and article comments, on this page.

Update 7/30/08: An open public letter to the President of Yale University seeks, in part, to address this issue.

Pedestrians: Now Playing on Broadway

Today's New York Times features an article about the incredible new plan to convert New York City's oldest and greatest boulevard into an esplanade for walking and bicycling. It won't quite match what Seoul accomplished (by far the world's most impressive example of a highway to esplanade conversion in the heart of a major city), but will still be amazing to see. A New Haven Safe Streets Coalition supporter asks here: could this be a model for our state?

The City of New Haven, in partnership with Yale and HSNP Architects, received awards for redesigning New Haven's Broadway as a beautifully landscaped, more pedestrian-friendly zone in the mid-1990s. Although quite significantly improved from what was there before, at least aesthetically speaking, the area still suffers from highly problematic (many would say nonexistent) bicycle access, even though it represents the primary west to east route through all of Downtown New Haven. It also has been plagued by speeding traffic rushing around the bend near York Street leading into Elm, which has on several occasions led to serious injuries among local pedestrians and will no doubt result in more until the street configurations are modified. The incredibly wide stretch of Elm Street from Broadway to State is particularly worrisome, but significant pressure on the city and state - perhaps coming from neighboring institutions and employers like Yale and New Alliance Bank - will be needed to influence the Connecticut DOT to allow major changes.

In order to make the area truly walkable and bikeable, which would result in a massive increase in property values and retail sales in the district, traffic speeds along this street (and the section of Whalley Avenue leading into it, in particular) must be strictly moderated to 15-20mph through improved design. Perhaps it is time to bring Jan Gehl to New Haven's Broadway?

Farmington Canal Greenway Gets Rolling

According to this report in the New Haven Register, the City of New Haven has bid out Phase 3 of the Farmington Canal Greenway, which will connect from the trail's current end on Shelton Avenue up to the Hamden border. Simultaneously, Hamden has now begun construction on its last remaining section, which runs from Hamden High School to the New Haven border. This means that the linear park should be largely completed by mid-2009, providing a continuous off-road walking and bicycling trail from Downtown New Haven running about a dozen miles into Cheshire and then (with a few remaining gaps) a total of 84-miles to Northampton, Massachusetts. Now, if only the thing would show up on Google Maps.

Phase 4 of the trail, which is currently in design, will run from the current trailhead on Hillhouse avenue to Canal Dock Road on the New Haven Harbor. Yale University has done incredible work paving, lighting and maintaining the first half of the section of trail running through its campus, from Prospect to Hillhouse Avenue (also soon to be the home of two fantastic pedestrian bridges), and has provided close to a million dollars to complete the portion of Phase 4 which runs through another block or so of its campus.

Thanks to the design and site planning of Diana Balmori and Cesar Pelli, the multi-use trail helps provide a stunning setting for Yale's new Malone Engineering Center (see photo). Hopefully Mack Scogin and Merrill Elam's new Yale University Health Services building, which is under construction just a block up the street, will have a similar relationship to the adjacent path.

Trail greenways like the Farmington Canal have a massive impact on the local environment and economy. According to the National Association of Realtor's 2002 Consumer's Survey on Smart Choices for Home Buyers, trails ranked as the second most important community amenity out of a list of 18 choices. Studies have shown that trail proximity adds about 10% to the value of homes and that homes adjacent to greenways sell much more quickly. In an era when only 10% of children walk to school, these trails are also critical resources to promote recreation and public health. More Greenways are planned to connect with Downtown New Haven over the coming years: the Harborside Greenway running from Lighthouse Point (and points beyond) around New Haven Harbor to West Haven will connect with the Fair Haven and West River waterfront trails. All four of New Haven's rivers (counting Morris Creek) will then be connected to one another by a system of "green" biking and walking routes, essentially enabling any resident to get anywhere in the city without needing to travel on busy urban streets.

Unfortunately, despite their obvious benefits and relatively low cost, these trails have been taking more than two decades to complete. Part of the reason is the fact that over 60% of our state's transportation funding is spent on highways, whereas less than 1% goes to bicycle and pedestrian projects. Call all of your elected officials today and ask them to keep these projects moving along!

Van Gogh's Starry Night and Cypresses: together for the first time

Original Post, 5/12/08: The Yale University Art Gallery in Downtown New Haven is pleased to exhibit side by side, for the first time ever, two of Vincent van Gogh's most renowned paintings: Cypresses and The Starry Night. Completed in June 1889, during his yearlong confinement at the asylum in Saint-Rémy, in southern France, these two paintings exemplify the work of this modern master at the height of his creativity. On view June 15–September 7, 2008. To ensure an unrushed visiting experience, free timed tickets will be available beginning May 29.

Update, 6/18/08: The Stamford Advocate has published a review of the show: "With a new art installation in "an intimate setting" in New Haven, museum-goers have the opportunity to view three masterpieces by one of the most beloved artists of the modern era."

OffManhattan: Nix Hamptons for New Haven

From Manhattan's green weekend travel blog comes an earth-friendly itinerary for Downtown New Haven attractions. Aside from all of the transit-accessible, walkable downtown attractions, like the New Haven Green and retail operations, however, the article fails to point out one of the best things about a summer escape to New Haven - the excellent waterfront areas and public parks with hundreds of miles of hiking trails within a short walk or bicycle ride of the city center.

Of course, the idea of New Haven being a perfect compromise between thriving city and rural escape is nothing new: on February 12, 1842, Charles Dickens wrote:

"New Haven, known as the City of Elms, is a fine town. Many of its streets (as its alias sufficiently imports) are planted with rows of grand old elm-trees; and the same natural ornaments surround Yale College, an establishment of considerable eminence and reputation. The various departments of this institution are erected in a kind of park or common in the middle of town, where they are dimly visible among the shadowing trees. The effect is very like that of an old cathedral yard in England; and, when their branches are in full leaf, must be extremely picturesque. Even in the winter-time, these groups of well-grown trees, clustering among the busy streets and houses of a thriving city, have a very quaint appearance: seeming to bring about a kind of compromise between town and country; as if each had met the other half-way, and shaken hands upon it; which is at once novel and pleasant."

Cycling Activity vs. National Gas Prices

Looks like the number of posts per day on the ElmCityCycling listserv, a forum for making New Haven more accommodating to bicyclists and pedestrians, is highly correlated with the national price of unleaded gasoline (click on chart to enlarge). Who would have thought?

With gasoline predicted to hit $6-10 per gallon as soon as a few months from now, the number of nonmotorized trips to work in New Haven is only likely to continue to increase. As a relatively flat and compact city, Downtown New Haven is already perfect for bicycling and walking, as evidenced by the fact that the city has one of the highest percentages of bicycle commuters in the United States (1.8%, versus 1.2% in Boston, 0.9% in Providence, 0.6% in New York City, 0.4% in Hartford, 0.1% in Bridgeport and 0.0% in Waterbury, according to the Census Bureau's 2006 ACS). During rush hour, there are already occasional bicycle "traffic jams" on the popular Orange Street bicycle lane. New Haven was also recently named one of the 20 most walkable cities in the United States.

However, improvements to the city's bicycle-friendliness are needed before the average area resident will choose to ride to work, or even use his or her bicycle for short trips (e.g., a 4-block run to the corner store). Considering that bicycles are already widely-owned (and very inexpensive), the most frequently given reasons why Connecticut residents don't bicycle more often - infrastructure and safety - are fairly easy to solve. According to numerous studies, infrastructure such as bicycle parking, bike-friendly street design, multi-use greenways like the Farmington Canal Trail and accessibility at train stations raise land values by an amount much greater than the investment put into them (in part because they tend to calm traffic). Reckless and high-speed driving and driver education can be addressed through community-wide "safe streets" efforts and traffic enforcement, and through measures such as anti-dooring ordinances like those found in Chicago.

With the average American family devoting 20% or more of their annual spending towards automobile expenses - more than on health care, education, or food, farmers switching from tractors to pack mules, gasoline prices continuing to skyrocket, and of course, global warming (if everyone who lives within 5 miles of their workplace were to cycle to work just one day a week, nearly 5 million tons of global warming pollution would be saved every year, the equivalent of taking about a million cars off the road, not to mention that the energy required to manufacture a new car is 100+ times that of a new bicycle), American cities will likely need to start taking a Copenhagen-like approach as soon as possible. New York City is already heading that direction, with the hiring of Jan Gehl, Copenhagen's world-renowned planner and urbanist. By conservative estimates, the number of bicycle trips in New York has already increased by 50-75% in the past 10 years, even without major infrastructure improvements. Transit ridership is increasing rapidly as well, on systems all across the United States including those that serve Downtown New Haven.

In Connecticut, promoting bicycling and walking will most likely require a shift in funding priorities. According to the Tri-State Transportation Campaign, more than 60% of 2007-2010 highway funding is currently used to expand and build new highways (even as existing ones crumble), whereas less than 1% of the overall transportation budget is spent on bicycle and pedestrian projects (see PDF report here). If Connecticut's 169 cities and town centers are to compete in the 21st century, that equation needs to flip.

Update 5/23/08: According to this graph, bicycle sales are up too. NY Times factoid of the day: "Every one-cent increase in gasoline prices means Americans pay $1.42 billion more a year for gas, according to Stephen P. Brown, an economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. Nearly two-thirds of that goes to foreign producers." It is any surprise that we are $10,000,000,000,000 in debt?

Update 6/15/08: Chart updated - both gas prices and ECC listserv posts have risen more quickly than anticipated. Also, a couple of local news items today: according to a story in today's Hartford Courant, higher gas prices are now reshaping hiring practices. Not only have studies shown that commuters who walk or bike to work at least once per week more productive (because they are healthier), they are apparently becoming attractive to companies in other ways as well. Also today, an article in the New Haven Register talks about various options that commuters are turning to in order to reduce their gasoline use:

Probably the most ambitious rider at Friday’s event was Alienne Morrione of Bridgeport who bicycles 30 minutes from her home to the Metro-North train there. After the 25-minute trip to New Haven, she cycles to the Yale Medical School, where she works in the brain tumor center. Morrione, 31, a dedicated rider, has sometimes been blocked from peak-travel times on Metro-North, so she cycles almost two hours between the cities... “As a single mom, it’s the greatest way to save money,” Morrione said as she pedaled away to work.

And in the article, an interesting statistic on commuting mode share to Downtown New Haven's largest employer:

"Holly Parker, director of Sustainable Transportation Systems at Yale, said in a survey taken last November, she found that 44 percent of faculty, staff and graduate students, over 10,000 workers, drive alone to reach the Yale campus.... But this means that more than half already, even without the added incentive of rising gas costs, were walking (23 percent), taking public transportation (19 percent), sharing a ride (6 percent), bicycling (5 percent) or telecommuting (3 percent.) She is eager to compare figures from the second survey set for the fall."

Bike to Work: Bicyclist Appreciation Breakfast

Original post, 5/28/08: Free breakfasts for bicyclists, this Friday (5/30/08) from 7:30am to 9:30am at Phelps Gate on the New Haven Green. Helmet required. Click here for information on the Downtown New Haven event, which is being hosted by Yale University. Check ElmCityCycling for future Bike to Work breakfast announcements - they run throughout the year.

Update 6/12/08: Over 200 cyclists attended the first event. The next BTW breakfast takes place tomorrow morning from 7:30 to 9:30am in front of New Haven City Hall, with coffee provided by Koffee and the Mayor rumored to arrive around 8 or 8:30.

Update 6/13/08: Click here to launch the WTNH-8 news video about today's bike-to-work event. Also see a written version of the news story here. The Downtown New Haven event was also picked up on the national Bike Commute Blog and covered in the New Haven Independent and New Haven Register. Also see the 17 reasons why the bicycle is the most popular vehicle in the world.

Update 6/23/08: The next BTW breakfast takes place July 11th at City Hall.

Stem Cells for Dummies

The Yale Stem Cell Center Presents "Stem Cells: Everything You Wanted to Know But Were Afraid to Ask," a program given by Haifan Lin, Ph.D., Director of the Yale Stem Cell Center and Professor of Cell Biology and Genetics at Yale, and Robert Mandelkern, Connecticut State Coordinator, Parkinson's Action Network. The event takes place on Wednesday, June 18, 2008, at 12:00 p.m. at the Anlyan Center Auditorium, 300 Cedar Street, Downtown New Haven. Please bring anyone you know who would like to learn more about stem cell research in non-scientific terms. This is a brown bag lunch, but cookies and drinks will be served.

New Materials in New Haven Architecture

Original Post, 4/29/08: April 2008 photographs of new buildings currently rising in Downtown New Haven. Through their unique material expression, these new works offer a window into contemporary life in New Haven.

Pictures include: Gwathmey Siegel's Loria Center for the History of Art and Rudolph Building Renovation at Yale on York (zinc panels and limestone facade), Cesar Pelli's Arts and Humanities Magnet High School on College (glass with elm leaves motif and copper stair towers and roof details), Kuwabara Payne McKenna Blumberg's new Chapel Street hotel (glass curtain wall with color glass detail), Hopkins Architect's Kroon Hall at Yale (designed to be the most environmentally friendly building in the United States in terms of CO2 reduction, showing wood truss structure), and Studio ABK's historic renovation of a stunning building on the corner of Chapel and Orange (restored terra cotta and marble details at street level). Click to enlarge the photos.

With major new commissions such as the Yale School of Management New Campus (Sir Norman Foster), College Square (Robert A.M. Stern), 55 Park Street (Svigals + Partners and Behnisch Architects), Yale-New Haven Hospital's new 500,000 square-foot Cancer Hospital (SBRA), 360 State (Becker + Becker), University Health Services (Mack Scogin and Merrill Elam) and Gateway Community College (Perkins + Will) -- and many others -- currently in design or construction, the image of Downtown New Haven will be changing for years to come. Can New Haven sustain its longstanding reputation as a place for some of the nation's most groundbreaking architecture and design?

Update 6/2/08: Chronicle of Higher Education's Buildings and Grounds site has a great new article about the Loria Center, which explains some of its interesting material qualities in greater detail. The irregular stone box of the Loria Center seems like a proper formal response to the idea of Yale being a stone campus, with each building featuring some kind of unique element in that material. In that way it can be iconic, but contextual. One of our readers points out that "it is very difficult to find a material compatible with concrete.... this stone, with its colors shifting from oyster to rust does it well."

Update 6/6/08: Another article from the Chronicle asks, what would you have done?

Downtown Traffic Safety Event and Ride of Silence

All are invited to "Traffic Safety in Our Community," an event being held by the community this Thursday in memory of Mila Rainof.

• Thursday, May 22nd
• 4 to 5:30 pm
• Fitkin Amphitheater, 330 Cedar Street, New Haven, CT
• Speakers include Dr. Kimberly Davis, MD, FACS, Chief of Trauma, Surgical Critical Care and Surgical Emergencies, Yale University School of Medicine and Michael Piscitelli, AICP, Director, New Haven Dept. of Transportation, Traffic and Parking.

For background information, see this post or join the Yale Traffic Safety Group email list here.

Update 5/20/08: On Wednesday, May 21st, at 7PM there will be a nationwide "Ride of Silence" to commemorate those injured or killed in traffic accidents over the past year. New Haven's silent bicycle ride leaves from the flagpole on the New Haven Green, and will be slow-paced and appropriate for all skill levels and age groups.

Update 5/23/08: New Haven Independent post-event coverage, and valuable information on what to do next, posted here. New Haven Register coverage here.

Update 5/29/08: The Yale Traffic Safety Group is one of the sponsors of the new citywide petition for safe streets.

Direct from London to New Haven

According to Variety, two very popular London plays - Happy Now and Scarborough - will have their American premieres in Downtown New Haven this coming season. In other, unrelated New Haven theater news, Yale University received a $3 million grant to establish a center for new theater commissions.

Updated: Pedestrian fatality highlights safety issues on Route 34 near Yale-New Haven Hospital

Mila Rainof, 27, was killed over the weekend of April 19-20 in a traffic incident near Yale-New Haven Hospital. Discussion continues today on the ElmCityCycling listserv and the Yale Daily News article comments about how to make the Route 34 & Frontage Road area a safer place for pedestrians.

Erica writes: "Mila was one of the warmest people I've ever met, and she was about to graduate and go into emergency medicine. ... Why do we continue to let this happen and call motor vehicle accidents "accidents"? Why don't people know and talk about all these "accidents"?

One anonymous commentor writes: "If it is found that the driver of the sports car was traveling even 1MPH above the posted speed limit, he or she should be tried for murder and sent to prison for 20 years. We need to rigorously enforce the speed limit, and one way to do that is to try speeders as felons if they kill or injure anyone while speeding."

Tom writes: "This is unacceptable. Despite the mounting number of fatalities, the NHPD continues to ignore traffic violations throughout the city. How many people have to be killed before the police decide that this is a problem? In collisions involving pedestrians, once vehicle speeds exceed 20 mph, the odds of a fatality increase exponentially. The speed limit in downtown needs to be reduced to 20 mph and the police need to enforce the traffic laws."

Anonymous writes: "Sweden has adopted a plan called Vision Zero which is taking steps to ensure that zero, imagine that - zero! - people will die in motor vehicle fatalities in 2020. ... why can't we adopt a Vision Zero for Connecticut? Traffic accidents are not a force of nature - even when no particular actor is "at fault", as here, there are ways of preventing the accidents: safer crosswalks, better traffic enforcement, speed bumps etc. etc. Take a look: the Connecticut General Assembly has taken a look at Sweden's Vision Zero and came up with this report... Let's get our state behind this. http://www.cga.ct.gov/2007/rpt/2007-R-0635.htm "

Because Route 34 is a major road, cars frequently exceed the posted speed limits. Another comment on ElmCityCycling notes that a 2006 petition with 646 signatures calling for pedestrian safety in this area has largely been ignored so far, a fact that the YDN highlights in an article today about the intersection. Could the situation be improved through traffic calming?

Coverage and discussion also continues in the New Haven Independent, Student Doctor Network forum, Hartford Courant, and elsewhere.

Update 4/30/08: An op-ed piece written by three members of ElmCityCycling about traffic safety and the Swedish "Vision Zero" program, "Why Tolerate 42,000 Traffic Deaths A Year?", appears in today's Hartford Courant. On a related note, about 30 members of the community met on Monday at the Yale Medical School, and are beginning to mobilize a response to the situation. Coverage of that meeting appears here and the first set of meeting minutes was posted on the ElmCityCycling listserv.

Update 5/19/08: A community traffic safety event will be held on May 22. Details here.

Update 6/3/08: The Yale Medical Traffic Safety Group is a member of the New Haven Safe Streets coalition.

Urban Poverty, Ethnography and The City

Conference this Saturday at Yale University, featuring an impressive roster of speakers. See this page for details on the program. For more information about featured speaker and Yale professor Elijah Anderson, see this article in the Yale Alumni Magazine.

Private equity firms, restaurants, biotechs, video game companies, marketing firms moving into Downtown New Haven

Residents, high-end business firms, and retail operations are increasingly drawn to Downtown New Haven's walkability and urban vitality. Class A office rents in New Haven are now approaching $30 as Yale University and other users continue to expand. An integrated marketing firm with clients including GE, IBM, Bic, Oxford Health, MasterCard and the New York Times recently leased the entire floor of a large building on Chapel Street. Venture Capital investments grew significantly in 2007, with a large proportion of the hundreds of millions of dollars in regional investment going to New Haven rather than elsewhere in Connecticut -- recipients include video game, marketing and biotechnology firms.

Check back later this week or early next week for details on these and other Downtown New Haven news items.

Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall! (updated)

A fantastic cover story appears in today's Yale Daily News about the proposal to tear down (or at least modify) sections of the wall surrounding downtown New Haven's Grove Street Cemetery, one of the nation's most historic burying grounds -- the first incorporated cemetery in the United States, and a National Historic Landmark.

Vincent Scully: “Yale is cut right through the liver by that cemetery,” the emeritus Sterling professor of the History of Art said with characteristic zeal. “It would make a great difference if the cemetery were more welcoming.”

Certainly, more local residents would be able to appreciate this incredible historical resource if a pathway were added through the site. Yale Professor David Cameron added an op-ed on this New Haven landmark in today's Yale Daily News. But would adding a simple new gate or portion of iron fence have an impact on the site's character? The proposal raises questions about the nature of historic preservation, such as the need to conserve the material and cultural qualities of a built place for future generations (since it is conceivable that improving visual access from both sides of the site could actually help the site be preserved over generations by making it more meaningful to them) and the nature of the site's original intent (an issue brought up in the article):

"Denison Olmsted 1813, a Yale science professor, speaking at the gateway’s dedication, expressed his hope that there would be strong interaction between New Haven’s residents and its burial grounds.

“Let us all come hither to think calmly but wisely on our own inevitable destiny,” he pronounced.

Townshend, in his [1947] speech, added a few words that are perhaps the perfect explanation of the importance of open walls to achieving the ideal of Olmstead’s lofty words."

In that vein (no historically-relevant cadaver puns related to the Yale School of Medicine intended), how about tearing down a section of wall and adding a museum about the cemetery? Perhaps a new community conference center or a bike path? Or a cafe, a la Boston? The view of the cemetery is certainly beautiful, especially given the landmark's extensive history of horticulture.

Paul (from YDN comments): "The concerns voiced here that providing more pedestrian and visual access to Grove Street cemetery would somehow intolerably disturb it and its dead fly in the face of many counterexamples. For example, Trinty Church in lower Manhattan has a lovely cemetery that is quite open to the public, physically and visually. Boston has many such cemeteries. The list goes on and on. Resistance to providing more pedestrian access to Grove Street Cemetery in the face of world wide counterexamples and changing needs is just reactionary."

Also, although the issue is raised by many commentators, would personal security concerns be any different from what they are now, assuming appropriate levels of patrol and continuing to limit access to daylight hours?

Record-low 2008 admission rates for downtown colleges

Colleges located in downtown areas - like Harvard, Yale, NYU and Columbia - continue to get more selective. Yale College's admissions rate hit 8.3% this year, breaking its former record of 8.6% in 2006 (which was, at the time, the Ivy League record-low); applications have increased by 91% since 1998. NYU received a record 37,000 applications, more than any other private university in the United States, and an increase of 51% since 1998.

Applications to colleges in urban settings, like Yale and NYU, have generally increased more rapidly than applications to their peers located in suburban or rural areas. For example, undergraduate applications to Stanford University have only increased by 27% over the past 10 years -- only slightly higher than the overall increase in college enrollment nation-wide. Reason? People are increasingly looking to live in walkable, dense, vibrant and diverse downtown settings with many 24/7 diversions -- where they don't need to spend 2 hours per day in their cars.

A University in a Small City

Great photos and commentary from:

http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=9840

No Finer Arts Around Than At These College Museums

Boston Globe article picked up here by the Yale Arts Library blog:
http://artslibrary.wordpress.com/2008/03/18/no-finer-arts-around-than-at-these-college-museums/

Downtown hotels going upscale

HOTELS GOING UPSCALE: WITH YALE AS A DRAW, DEVELOPERS LOOK TO FILL NEED FOR ROOMS IN NEW HAVEN

Hartford Courant, Eric Gershon, Dec 4, 2007

As Paul McGowan attempts to transform a bygone motor inn at 1157 Chapel St. into a glassy boutique hotel, he's got countless details to fret about, from the pace of construction to the brand of shampoo he'll leave on the bathroom sink. One thing he doesn't worry about is the location: It's square in the heart of Yale University, the city's main magnet for out-of-town visitors.

Yale refers visitors to several local hotels and licenses or lends its name to a few of them, including the Omni New Haven Hotel at Yale, a 306-room full-service hotel near the green that is generally regarded as the city's top hotel. But the Omni is often full and that has made it a prime target for emerging rivals.

"We'll be competing mainly with the Omni," said McGowan, a former Starwood Hotels and Resorts executive whose development and consulting firm, Hospitality 3, bought the no-frills Colony Inn a year ago for nearly $7 million, then closed it for a multimillion-dollar overhaul that will add two stories and put a sleek new face on the street.

The five-story, circa-1963 building sits directly across from the Yale School of Art and just west of the School of Architecture. The Yale Repertory Theater and the university's two major art museums are one block east. A slow walker could reach some of the city's most popular restaurants in five minutes or less, as well as several cafes and bookstores, a news shop and a haberdasher.

"That is a good starting point," said McGowan, who has hired KPMB Architects of Toronto to design the hotel. The firm handled renovations of Yale's Sprague Memorial Hall in 2003. The reinvention of 1157 Chapel is the most ambitious hotel project in New Haven in a decade and one sorely needed to meet demand, estimated to be at least 200 to 300 rooms above the 1,310 rooms now in the city, according to local real estate experts.

But McGowan's project, which will add 39 rooms to the 86 the Colony already had, for 125 in all, isn't even the biggest hotel project on the horizon.

Four blocks away, on College Street, Centerplan Development of Hartford plans to build a 19-story structure where it envisions a 250-room "four or five-star" hotel, 124 luxury condominiums and ground-floor retail. Robert A.M. Stern, dean of Yale's architecture school, has been hired as the designer. The project is expected to break ground next year and open in 2011.

Meanwhile, city officials are preparing to seek bids for redevelopment of the site occupied, until last January, by the demolished New Haven Coliseum. The city has studied the feasibility of a conference center and hotel complex for the site and officials anticipate some bidders to propose lodgings, although a conference center is now considered unlikely. Elsewhere downtown, at least one major hotel has sought approval to add nearly 50 rooms.

All the activity is really no wonder: "'Can you help me get some rooms?'" is a question Anthony Rescigno, president of the Greater New Haven Chamber of Commerce, says he hears often. And it's not uncommon that he makes referrals to hotels in the suburbs, where most of New Haven County's hotel development has happened in the last 10 to 15 years.

Finally, he said, "The pressure is starting to hit the boiling point where I think we're going to start to see some new hotels" in the city.

Developers' interest in downtown New Haven as a place for hotels coincides with their interest in building new apartment and condominium projects there, some on a grand scale. Fairfield developer Bruce Becker is planning to break ground this winter on a 29-story apartment project at Chapel and State Streets intended to include 485 units, for example. When finished, it will be one of the city's tallest buildings. Smaller residential projects have already been built. Others are in progress.

Like the residential developments, the hotel projects are inspired by New Haven's renaissance, marked by its lively night life and restaurant scene. Unflagging demand from Yale-related visitors encourages hotel construction in particular.

"We may not have the corporate community that some other towns do, but the academic community also puts a lot of stock in face-to-face meetings," said Karyn Gilvarg, executive director of New Haven's City Plan Department.

Yale and affiliated institutions, such as Yale-New Haven Hospital, generate the largest share of hotel room stays, municipal and tourism officials said, though no one could say how many room-nights that equals in a year. Bruce Alexander, Yale's vice president for New Haven and State Affairs and Campus Development, said the school does not centralize record-keeping of this information.

Nonetheless, Alexander, who has met with developers to discuss the city's hotel market, predicts that a "200-300 room hotel would do very well in New Haven."

While the 1157 Chapel and Centerplan projects stand to remake the hotel scene in New Haven by expanding the number and variety of high-end accommodations, some less ambitious but welcome improvements have been made already. Several hotels have changed hands in the last couple of years; the Whalley Avenue Holiday Inn became a Marriott, an upgrade Yale appreciated enough to bestow its name on the operator. The hotel is called the Courtyard New Haven at Yale, and it is preparing to add rooms.

So far, local upgrades have added precious few rooms to the net hotel stock and no large hotel has challenged the Omni as the lodging of choice for consumers not preoccupied with price. (The Omni's standard corporate rate is $209 per night, before taxes, though promotional rates are sometimes available. Suites typically cost $399. By contrast, the average hotel room in greater New Haven costs between $90 and $100, according to tourism agency figures.)

Located on Temple Street, just off the New Haven Green, the Omni opened in late 1997, after a roughly $30 million renovation of the former Park Plaza Hotel. Since then, the Omni has been regarded as the city's premier hotel. But rooms can't always be found there, especially on the two dozen or so nights a year when New Haven is flooded with visitors, often for Yale-related events, such as graduation, reunions and the Yale-Harvard football game.

So McGowan, a Woodbury resident who was deeply involved in the creation and expansion of the W Hotels brand while with Starwood, saw an opening: "You've got a highly intellectual, pretty affluent community here, in terms of alumni and families of students and graduates of the university, visiting professors, dignitaries, friends. I think the need for upscale lodging is pretty evident."

Thomas Sullivan, the Omni's general manager, said he welcomes other hotels to New Haven.

"It means the city's growing and that benefits everybody," he said. "We don't look at new competition as a threat. What it does is it gives us a new opportunity to be sure that we're also on our game."

By the time McGowan's as-yet-unnamed hotel opens next summer, it should have two extra stories, 125 guest rooms, 100,000 total square feet, a penthouse lounge with views of Yale's spires and courtyards, a ground-floor restaurant, a coffee kiosk, meeting spaces, new elevators - and a glass exterior embedded with small pieces of amber, blue and green.

McGowan declined to discuss the cost of the "top-to-bottom" overhaul, and has not yet announced room rates. The developer, who is simultaneously working on a W Hotel in Hoboken and a residential development in Woodbury, envisions his future New Haven patrons as "highly intellectual but not necessarily pretentious." The interior and furnishings will be tailored to meet the approval of their needs and tastes, he said.

The main lobby will have floors of walnut and granite and will evoke a "modern-day library," with pockets of seating to invite lingering, for example. Rooms will be decorated in "warm" tones and outfitted with wide desks facing the windows, ergonomic desk chairs and leather reading chairs with ottomans.

"We want this hotel to have soul," said McGowan. "We want people to feel something different when they stay with us. We're trying to create a place."

Contact Eric Gershon at egershon@courant.com.