BALTIMORE (AP) A $130-million waterfront hotel project is being touted by developers as an “urban resort.”

The 24-story Four Seasons luxury hotel is planned for a site next to the Baltimore Marriott Waterfront hotel in the city’s rapidly developing Inner Harbor East neighborhood.

The new hotel will have 200 guest rooms, 26 condominiums, 20 extended-stay suites, three waterfront restaurants and 25,000 sq. ft. of shopping. Construction is expected to begin in the spring and the hotel is scheduled to open in 2006.

The apartments are expected to appeal to families of international patients at Johns Hopkins Hospital and corporate executives visiting for extended periods, said Michael S. Beatty, principal and vice president of H&S Properties Development Corp.

The hotel, being built by local developers, will be managed by Four Seasons.

“We’re very excited,” Beatty said. “I started working on trying to bring a Four Seasons to Baltimore three years ago, calling them every quarter. Baltimore has just grown up a lot. When they looked at the success of the Marriott and the fact that Baltimore is still very under-hoteled, coupled with the specific location, it became an exciting venue.”

The Four Seasons hotel will be H&S’ third hotel in the Inner Harbor East area. The company, headed by bakery magnate John Paterakis Sr., has already developed the 750-room Baltimore Marriott Waterfront, which opened in February 2001, and the 205-room Courtyard by Marriott, which opened two months earlier.

Mayor Martin O’Malley described the hotel as a big opportunity to build on Baltimore’s growing Inner Harbor. The mayor said recently that the city has $1.6 billion in construction going on across the city.

“This is not an isolated phenomenon happening in one neighborhood, or just happening on the waterfront or just happening downtown,” O’Malley said. “The evidence of our progress is growing daily, and you can see it in the bricks and the mortar.”

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