Construction of small hotel on High Street downtown could begin this summer

More than a decade after a developer first proposed a hotel at 188 High St., another developer is set to actually begin construction of a seven-story, 24-room hotel this summer, its attorney told the Zoning Board of Appeal.

The board granted the sixth extension on the site since a hotel was first proposed in 2013, after attorney George Morancy assured the board that Cedarwood Development of South Boston had secured the required financing to get the project done.

Morancy ran down the reasons for ten years of delays on the project - which at one point was proposed as a 14-story building with 50 Japanese-style capsule rooms: Two lawsuits, the last of which was not resolved until last June, the pandemic, and the sale of the project by the Kansas developer in love with pods to Cedarwood, which drew up new plans for a smaller building with more traditionally sized rooms.