Kenmore hotels would add 763 rooms to a changing area

Boston’s hotel-building boom rolls on. Newest cases in point: Two big hotels proposed for Kenmore.

The owners of the Hotel Buckminster at 645 Beacon Street want to build a 19-story, 388-room hotel on the site of a parking garage and a smaller building they already own at 655 Beacon.

Meanwhile, across the street at 560 Commonwealth Avenue at what is currently a Citizens Bank branch, Wellesley-based Mark Development would construct a 24-story, 375-room hotel.

That is 763 rooms total. More portentously, each hotel would be rather tall for that stretch of Boston—the Citizens Bank is a single floor, for instance, and the tallest nearby buildings are around 12 stories—though Kenmore is changing.

Developer Related Beal plans to redevelop nine buildings that it bought in late 2016 from Boston University, including the one that the famed Citgo sign bestrides (the developer plans to preserve the sign after much hue and cry).

The city is reviewing the hotel projects, which have been filed jointly. Stay tuned.

• Is Boston’s building boom coming to Kenmore Square? [Globe]
• Boston’s Citgo sign will continue to loom over Kenmore Square ‘for decades’ [Curbed Boston]
• Largest Seaport hotel to add 1,000 rooms across from convention center [Curbed Boston]