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Developer pitches big upstate resort with helipad. Will it fly?
R House Hotel Group wants to build 87 cabins, 91K sf lodge in Cairo
A photo illustration of R House Hotel Group founder R Henry Courtemanche and 54-67 Crow’s Nest Road in Cairo (Getty, R House Hotel Group, Friends of Round Top)
The idea of putting up a sprawling resort — complete with a helipad — isn’t landing well with all of the residents of one upstate New York community.
California-based R House Hotel Group is proposing to build a 91,000-square-foot lodge with a restaurant and spa, 87 cabins, 287 parking spaces and one especially controversial helipad, the Times Union reported.
The plan would clear 11 acres of forest on a 102-acre parcel in Round Top, a hamlet of the town of Cairo in Greene County. The site was previously home to Blackhead Mountain Lodge.
R House’s project, on Crows Nest Road, would be one of the largest in Cairo’s history. It would include a wastewater treatment plant and tennis courts, but the helipad — and the overall size of the plan, which is much larger than an earlier proposal for the site — has the townfolk up in arms.
Some of the 127 units would be condos, while the rest would be managed by a hotel brand. The hotel would also manage the condos when their owners are renting them out. Consultants on the plan, responding to rumors that luxury hotel brand Six Senses is involved, said a hotel operator hasn’t been chosen.
The developer filed the project plans in January. A 2022 proposal was much smaller in scope — billed as an update to what already exists on the site. That had the support of a now-opposition group, which was told it would be a boutique hotel with a nine-hole golf course.
More than 100 people attended the first public hearing for the updated project last week. Opponents say the project is too big, would ruin the hamlet’s character and harm the environment. Besides the forest to be cut down, daily water demand is expected to exceed 37,000 gallons.
Proponents cited the need to boost tourism in the area.
“I say, let’s do what we can to help fill our roads with what’s been missing for a long time: tourists,” Peter Maassmann, the former owner of Blackhead Mountain Lodge, said at the hearing, which will technically remain open until the project is fully reviewed, according to Planning Board chair Joseph Hasenkopf.