For more retail coverage, click GlobeSt.com/RETAIL.

ST. PAUL-Target Corp.'s bid to pay $8.6 million for the six-acre site that includes the Four Points by Sheraton hotel was approved by the St. Paul Port Authority's Board of Commissioners at a public hearing Tuesday.

The deal will likely mean the hotel will be closed and torn down to make way for a SuperTarget store on the site. Target has yet to publicly say what they plan to do with the site.

The land is on a high-profile property between University Avenue and Interstate 94 on the eastern edge of Hamline Avenue. An existing Target store is just north of the hotel site on Hamline.

More than 100 workers will lose their jobs when the closes, most likely this fall, once the sale is completed. Tom Collins, a Port Authority spokesman, says employees who stay until the hotel closes will be offered a severance package.

A SuperTarget, which combines groceries with the discount store and are typically about 177,000 sf and employ about 400 people, which is twice as many as now work at the existing store.

While the loss of the hotel and its jobs are unfortunate, Port Authority officials say they had little choice but to sell the land to Target as the highest bidder, since the sale will go to pay off bonds that helped build the hotel nearly a quarter of a century ago.

Instant Insights /

GlobeSt.com UPDATE: Port Approves Target's Bid For Hotel Land

Related Stories

Recommended For You