Sunset Millennium Reportedly Gains Approval

WEST HOLLYWOOD, CA— The West Hollywood City Council has approved a revised plan for the long-delayed Sunset Millennium project proposed by Apollo Real Estate Advisors for a Sunset Strip site, a mixed-use project including hotels, retail space and residential units, according to recent reports. The development is slated for a parcel at Sunset and La Cienega boulevards, one of the busiest intersections in the city. Richard Ackerman, principal of New York-based Apollo, calls the new Sunset Millennium “a dramatic redesign” of the office-hotel-retail project that was approved by the West Hollywood City Council in 1999. In comparison to the previously approved project, the new Sunset Millennium creates fewer hotel rooms and less retail space, and it completely trades office for residential development, which means it generates less traffic and includes more open space, Ackerman explains. According to West Hollywood city planning documents, the project will occupy two city blocks on the south side of Sunset Boulevard, from Alta Loma Road to La Cienega Boulevard (the “Middle Parcel”) and from La Cienega Boulevard to Park Sunset Hotel (the “East Parcel”). The eastern parcel will now be the site of two hotels— a W and a J.W. Marriott— with 296 rooms in all to be developed by Wolff Urban Management. of Los Angeles. The middle parcel, which was to be developed with a 371-room hotel, will now be the site of a condominium complex containing 190 for-sale units, including a portion set aside as affordable housing. The project, to begin later this year, is expected to take 26 months to complete.