Plans Move Forward for Red Lobster, Home2 Suites by Hilton

Two new businesses are a step closer to construction in Cranberry.

At Monday’s Planning Advisory Commission, officials gave the thumbs up to a proposed Red Lobster to replace the King’s Family Restaurant on Route 19.

Also gaining approval were plans for a Home2 Suites By Hilton to be located at The Summit of Cranberry Woods along Route 228 near the Westinghouse headquarters.

Up next, the plans will move before the Cranberry Board of Supervisors for final approval.

Red Lobster

Owned by GMR Restaurants of Pennsylvania LLC—a subsidiary of Darden Restaurants, Inc.—the Red Lobster will be about 5,880 square foot and seat 220 people. The restaurant will employee about 100 workers.

Located in the Cranberry mall, the King’s restaurant would be torn down. The new Red Lobster would be built from the ground up in its place.

As part of Cranberry’s required streetscape enhancement ordinance, the restaurant will feature extensive plantings and crosswalks, including decorative stamped concrete sidewalks.

Jim Colella, chairman of the planning advisory, said he was pleased by renderings of the Red Lobster exterior, which showed bleached shake siding.

“I’m pleasantly surprised,” he said.

In addition to its own parking lot, the restaurant would share parking with the Cranberry Mall, according to Ron Henshaw, Cranberry’s director of community development. Pole lights will illuminate the crosswalks leading between the parking lots, he said.

For now, the King’s restaurant remains open. Attorney Mark Kozar has said construction for the new restaurant could begin by January. The proposed opening date for Red Lobster is July 2013.

At last week’s supervisors meeting, Cranberry officials also unanimously approved an inter-municipal liquor license transfer for the seafood chain.

Home2 Suites by Hilton

Also getting the green light was Home2 Suites by Hilton.

Described on the Hilton website as a “hip, extended stay hotel experience,” the building would be located just below the Westinghouse Electric Company headquarters at the intersection of Longtree Way and Cranberry Woods Drive.

Creative Real Estate Development in Cranberry is the developer for the project.

Developer Don Rodgers Jr., has said the Home2 Suites is a fairly new concept from Hilton. Like the Hilton Garden Inn that opened just up the road at the corner of Franklin Road and Longtree Way in Cranberry in May, the 46,604 square-foot Home2 Suites would be operated by Vista Host, Inc. 

Rodgers Jr., also has said the four-story, 79-room hotel would feature all suites, with a small breakfast area in each room. There would be no restaurants or bars inside the hotel.