The $420-million development is planned for a 2012 opening and will total 58 stories at 670 feet. It will include 136 private residences starting at $1 million, while the hotel will have 175 guest rooms. Also in the works are a 14,000-sf spa, 11,600 sf of conference space and room for a 2,140-sf boutique shop and 7,000-sf restaurant on the ground floor.

Tim Mahoney, president and chief executive officer of Ardmore, PA-based development firm Mariner and Lenfest, who is chairman of communications firm NetCarrier, acquired the site in 2000. Dallas-based Gatehouse, which has invested in W hotels across the country as well as other brands, signed on to the development site last year.

The developers are lucky that the hotel isn't opening for a while, given the economy, Robert Fahey, executive vice president of CB Richard Ellis' investment properties institutional group, tells GlobeSt.com.