At the end of May, a Rodeway Inn quietly opened its doors for business on Webster Avenue, offering free Wi-Fi and complimentary breakfast. Built despite enormous community opposition, the new hotel’s opening has put skeptical local residents on guard.

According to staff, the 5-story 37-room Rodeway Inn, a sub brand of Choice Hotels, currently offers no hourly rates, unlike most so-called hot sheet motels that operate in the Bronx. Single rooms start at $109 a night; double rooms begin at $119. The inn has already hosted 20 to 22 guests, according to staffers, and they are hoping to attract Fordham University visitors and tourists looking for access to the New York Botanical Garden, Yankee Stadium and the Bronx Zoo.

Barbara Stronszer, a community board member and president of the Bedford Mosholu Community Association who vehemently opposed the hotel, said the community will be “up in arms” if the inn begins offering hourly rates. Stronszer vowed to take action if it becomes a “hot sheet” motel or a breeding ground for illegal activities.

Inside, plush purple and white couches line the small seating area in the front lobby. The rooms include freshly polished dark brown headboards, bright lime green comforters and new flat screen TVs. Outside, a man in a neatly ironed work shirt pulled a small suitcase from the hotel to his car across the street, a bag of dry cleaning draped over his arm.

Despite this polished appearance, some of the strongest opposition continues to come from concerned parents whose children attend nearby PS/MS 20.

“I thought it was for truckers, at first,” said parent Lynette Rivera. “It might attract prostitutes or crackheads, so I don’t agree with it being placed here, especially where there are so many kids.”

“It should not have been built,” said Marta Vazquez, a paraprofessional instructor at the school. “The majority of the hotel is going to be filled with night crawlers.”

Yet some feel less threatened. The owner of Green Live Poultry, directly across the street from the inn, said the hotel won’t pose any problems.

“I think it depends on who they let stay there,” said crossing guard Pauline Lonax. “People do need places to stay when they come here, so we’ll have to wait and see.”

A resident from a nearby apartment building agreed. “Some people need a place to stay,” she said.

Police at the 52nd Precinct, located just down the block from the new inn, wouldn’t comment, but a spokesperson for the NYPD said no incidents had yet been reported at the site.

Sam Chang, whose company, the McSam Hotel Group, has built over 30 hotels, began advocating for the project as early as January of 2005 when he purchased the 5,500-square-foot lot at 3070 Webster Ave. between 202nd and 203rd streets for $550,000, intending to construct a Comfort Inn on the site.

In 2007, Community Board 7 strongly rejected the plans. When contacted about the inn, an employee at McSam Hotel Group denied ownership of the property. But according to the Department of Finance, McSam Bronx LLC is listed as the current owner. A spokesperson for Choice Hotels did not respond to several requests for comment.

Virginia Hekimian, who grew up in and still lives in the house that borders the inn, adamantly opposed the project from the beginning. She said the new inn encroaches on her property line, causing extensive water damage to her home.

Hekimian wrote a letter complaining about the situation to Mayor Bloomberg and plans to visit the Buildings Department to file additional complaints.

“I’m going to have to pay $16,000 to fix the water damages,” Hekimian said, pointing to a broken bathroom ceiling and water-stained kitchen wall.

“When I was a little girl, all this used to be farm,” she added eyeing her dark kitchen window, which now looks out onto the stained red brick wall of the hotel exterior and may soon have to be closed off for good. “But then buildings started going up.”

CAP: The newly opened Rodeway Inn at 3070 Webster Ave. continues to face opposition from neighboring homeowners, members of Community Board 7, and nearby PS/MS 20.
Photo by Andrea Cetra

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Welcome to the Norwood News, a bi-weekly community newspaper that primarily serves the northwest Bronx communities of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. Through our Breaking Bronx blog, we focus on news and information for those neighborhoods, but aim to cover as much Bronx-related news as possible. Founded in 1988 by Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit affiliate of Montefiore Medical Center, the Norwood News began as a monthly and grew to a bi-weekly in 1994. In September 2003 the paper expanded to cover University Heights and now covers all the neighborhoods of Community District 7. The Norwood News exists to foster communication among citizens and organizations and to be a tool for neighborhood development efforts. The Norwood News runs the Bronx Youth Journalism Heard, a journalism training program for Bronx high school students. As you navigate this website, please let us know if you discover any glitches or if you have any suggestions. We’d love to hear from you. You can send e-mails to norwoodnews@norwoodnews.org or call us anytime (718) 324-4998.