New hotel wants site by Schaumburg convention center

The 500-room Renaissance Hotel which adjoins Schaumburg's four-year-old convention center may soon see some new competition on its own doorstep.

Schaumburg's community development department this week received a proposal for a 260-room Aloft Hotel on the site that formerly housed Ron Santo's American Rotisserie at the northeast corner of Meacham Road and Thoreau Drive.

The 15-story building would include a parking deck and two restaurants all within the same structure.

"It's actually a beautiful design," Schaumburg's Economic Development Coordinator Matt Frank said.

Aloft is the business traveler's affiliate of the Sheraton and Westin hotel companies, Frank explained.

The plan is for the 2.5-acre site that Ron Santo's restaurant occupied during the '90s. That building was briefly taken over by other operators early in this century, but has been gone for several years already.

Though the last decade has seen some ups and downs in the hotel industry, the new proposal from Kingsdale Enterprises not only anticipates a rebound in the market but validates the importance of the Schaumburg convention center as an economic stimulus, Frank said.

The village of Schaumburg is already home to 25 hotels.

John Breugelmans, president of Kingsdale Enterprises, declined to comment until the formal review process with the village begins.

Frank anticipated about a month or two of staff reviews before the proposal would be ready for village's review panels and village board.

He said the developer has expressed interest in breaking ground by the late summer or early fall for an early 2012 opening.

The plan comes after hotels in Arlington Heights and Des Plaines closed at the end of last year, unable to survive the economic downturn. And plans for four new hotels in Des Plaines near O'Hare International Airport have variously been abandoned or put on hold.