Walking by the Landmark Hotel, you might wonder if construction has really stopped: Sounds of clanging steel on steel continue as dust rises.
But it has been about eight months since construction crews set foot on the grounds of the would-be luxury hotel. Halsey Minor’s Landmark Hotel has now become a long-term problem. The question, in material terms, is how much longer can it remain as one.
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The Landmark Hotel is at the center of a legal dispute between owner Halsey Minor and former developer Lee Danielson. Minor fired Danielson and later sued him for breach of contract and fraud, among other things. In March, construction workers removed the hotel’s scaffolding on Second Street. Since then, the ground of the hotel has gone undisturbed. |
At the heart of the issue is the stability and safety of the edifice itself. UVA Civil and Environmental Engineering Professor Thomas Baber says that the Landmark Hotel, a reinforced concrete structure, faces no serious degradation from water exposure, among other things. “Water per se does not damage reinforced concrete,” says Baber in an e-mail. “The Portland cement that goes into concrete is ‘hydrated’ by water, and once concrete has set … further water will not weaken the concrete, but will only strengthen it.”
Stephen Barber, consulting structural engineer with Dunbar Milby Williams Pittman & Vaughan, agrees that the structure poses no immediate risk to the community, but says that this might change as time goes on. “Over the long term, there is a potential for damage to the superstructure if left exposed to the elements,” he says in a statement. “Freeze-thaw cycles can be damaging to concrete that was not intended for long-term exposure.”
Professor Baber, however, says that structures in Charlottesville typically are not exposed to enough water for freeze-thaw cycles to cause major structural issues. “I’d say we’re talking about five to ten years before I’d even start to worry about it.” The Landmark Hotel may be a liability, but according to Baber the issue is “not structural, but aesthetic.” Like just about everyone else in town, he says, “I dislike the idea of an unfinished structure taking up space on the mall.”
Maybe the trouble with the Landmark is that it isn’t falling down?
In May, Atlanta-based Silverton Bank, the hotel financer that lent Minor $23.7 million to finance the Landmark Hotel, failed and shut down, but was seized by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC). Yet, a month later, the FDIC announced that it ceased to look for interested and eligible buyers for the defunct bank. Minor is also in a legal dispute with former developer Lee Danielson. On November 17, 2008, Minor sent Danielson a letter that their agreement is terminated effective November 28.—Chiara Canzi and Joey Pickert
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