The San Diego developer told city officials it will go ahead with the project, despite the Coastal Commission's rejection of the city's request for changes to the local coastal plan to accommodate the resort.

The rejection came despite Manchester's offer to build a scaled-down, $80 million version, cutting the number of rooms to 300 and trimming a couple of floors from the 12-story twin towers. The project was first proposed as a 400-room, $200 million hotel.

The original plan was under commission consideration at its recent meeting in Long Beach. Either the revised plan or another with no impact to coastal bluffs -- possibly only six stories -- will be re-submitted to the city, Manchester officials say.