Tussle Over Presidio Luxury Hotel

A controversial hotel project has moved slightly closer to construction in the Presidio.

The Presidio Trust hopes to lure tourists to the national park, which until the 1990s was the property of the US Army. To that end, they've undertaken extensive environmental restoration projects, trail improvements, and building repairs. The park is steadily improving, and opened a brand new Walt Disney Museum last year.

In the future, the Trust wants to construct a 100-room hotel, upgrade a historic theater, and construct an archaeology lab to replace a dilapidated building that will be demolished as part of the Doyle Drive construction near Quartermaster Reach.

The hotel has caused plenty of tension between advocates for development and preservationists. It's already been scaled back by 25,000 square feet, but some opponents say that's still not good enough.

The hotel would occupy a former military parade ground that dates back over two hundred years. Prior to that, it was occupied by Spanish settlers, and for thousand of years before that by the Ohlone.

The Presidio Historical Association has asked its members to speak out against the hotel at a meeting on December 8.

It's unclear what the preservationists want to do with the land if the hotel isn't built. So far, nobody has proposed returning to the Ohlone.