A 14-floor addition and new hotel for the Financial District?

Work (slowly) continues at 24 and 26 John Street in the Fiancnial District. At the former site of the Casual Grill and the Seh Ja Meh Korean restaurant. And just what is going into this space?





According to the permit on file with the city:



A 14-floor addition to create a hotel. The architect is the busy, Queens-based Gerald J. Caliendo. Hmm, what to think of this? For starters, there doesn't appear to be another need for hotel here. (The Hotel Reserve opened in December around the corner. And there's the luxury boutique hotel Gild Hall not far away.) And, as the Observer noted last summer, "Over the past 6 1/2 years, Gerald Caliendo ... had 1,604 individual new residential buildings permitted by the Department of Buildings, more than any other architect in the city."