New Holiday Inn on I-95 replaces formerly abandoned eyesore known for crime
For years, Gladys Vargas, 47, has kept a close eye on construction at the hotel just down the street from her house on the northern edge of Liberty City. As soon as the green Holiday Inn sign went up on the 10-story building late last month, she stopped by to see how she could apply for a job as a housekeeper.
Vargas has been cleaning rooms at hotels in Doral and near Miami International Airport for the past 14 years. Much of her $12-per-hour paycheck goes to gas.
“To have my kid’s school and work close would be a big benefit,” she said. “I’ve been watching the construction for so long.”
The new Holiday Inn Miami North, wedged between Interstate 95 and Northwest Seventh Avenue, has been six years in the making. In 2013, New York-based owner Neil Kukreja purchased the abandoned building for $4.3 million. After an investment of more than $30 million from Kukreja and $200,000 from the Northwest 7th Avenue Corridor Community Redevelopment Agency, the former eyesore has been transformed into a 174-room hotel fitted with sleek, dark wood accents and a new pool. It is now open for business and hiring around 70 full-time employees.
For Vargas and 200 others at a hotel job fair this month, the opening marks a rare opportunity at a job within walking distance.
History of robberies, car thefts and assaults
The intersection at Northwest Seventh Avenue and Northwest 79th Street was once a no-man’s land, known as a hotbed for crime best avoided. The addition of the mixed-income Pinnacle Park housing complex and renovation of the Northside Police Station have brought a decade of positive change that includes the new hotel.
In 2014, Miami-Dade Commissioner Jean Monestime, now running for county mayor, sponsored a bill to allocate $126 million for sewer expansion in business districts across the county, including Northwest Seventh Avenue, as an incentive for new investment. As of February 2020, less than $8 million has been spent, according to an accounting record from Miami-Dade County. Still, Monestime said the hotel’s comeback is another sign of the ongoing revival of Northwest Seventh Avenue.
“It’s a dream come true for this neighborhood,” he said. “It’s a sign of success and security when tourists can come and it’s a safe place to stay.”
That wasn’t always the case.
The hotel was built in 1969 as a Holiday Inn, around the same time that construction of I-95 began. Then, Northwest Seventh Avenue buzzed with small businesses fed by a middle-class neighborhood. Jumbo’s restaurant down the street was one of the few diners at the time serving both black and white customers, where public officials went to be seen.
But the I-95 construction displaced many residents and slowly drained traffic from the avenue. Businesses closed and poverty climbed. Then, in 1980, the area erupted in three days of violent protests after the acquittal of four white Miami-Dade police officers in the death of insurance agent Arthur McDuffie; 18 people were killed and property damage reached $100 million.
Still, the hotel stood. Ownership changed; in 1986, it rebranded as a Days Inn. That year, robbers forced a man to jump off his balcony after stealing $14,000 worth of gold jewelry and cash from him.
Several owner changes and two foreclosures later, the hotel was renamed City Inn in 2000.,but the name didn’t change its reputation. The robberies, car thefts and assaults continued. In 2004, a man strangled a sex worker to death with her own belt and shoe straps in one of the rooms.
Most recently the building served as shelter for Hurricane Wilma victims and a giant billboard for beer companies and politicians, in defiance of court orders to remove the advertisements.
Holiday Inn again
In the graffiti-covered walls and pest-infested interior, Kukreja saw an opportunity. The closest accommodations are small MiMo hotels on Biscayne Boulevard to the east, leaving a gap in the market for people who want to visit without paying the high rates in downtown and Miami Beach, Kukreja said. In 2013, he purchased the abandoned building.
Today, his rates start at around $140 per night.
“It’s the last hotel before you head toward downtown or toward South Beach,” he said. “It’s chic like the W, priced like the Holiday Inn.”
It took Kukreja six years to renovate and reopen the hotel, marked by “painful” permit delays and construction setbacks. Finally, he was able to reopen the hotel in mid-January with a skeleton crew of 30.
Willie Dixon, 27, began working as a bellman ahead of the opening. He lives 10 minutes from the hotel and previously worked at a hotel in Doral.
“This area wasn’t the best area years ago, but it’s up and coming,” he said. “It’s a great area. We have people all around the area who have been looking for jobs that they didn’t have the opportunities before.”
Dixon and his colleagues worked around the clock to get the hotel ready in time for Super Bowl weekend. Kukreja didn’t want to miss out on the chance to have the hotel filled to capacity, which it was. On the Saturday night before the game, all 121 rooms available were booked.
“It went seamless,” Kukreja said. “It worked like a well-oiled machine.”
Now, he’s ready to expand the workforce.
Jobs here start at $10 and $15 per hour with vacation and health insurance, said hotel manager Luis Huertas. Monestime said he hopes the hotel will increase its starting pay for workers to $15 an hour.
Area residents could use the boost: The median household income for the hotel’s ZIP Code is $27,231, according to the U.S. Census’ 2017 American Community Survey, far below the county median of $50,000. More than 40% of people aged 25 years or older have not graduated high school.
At the hotel’s job fair earlier this month, Vargas joined around 200 other applicants in the sparkling lobby waiting for their interviews; some held small children. Most live within walking distance of the hotel, like Vargas, but currently commute elsewhere to work.
Widline Joseph, 19, who lives five minutes away, said she heard about the job fair on the radio during her current commute to a Pollo Tropical in Aventura. She said she was applying for any job available.
“I’ve never worked at a hotel before,” she said. “I would get to meet new people, experience new things.”
This story was originally published February 17, 2020 at 4:58 PM with the headline "New Holiday Inn on I-95 replaces formerly abandoned eyesore known for crime."
