New stayAPT opens in Mount Vernon next month. Photo by Mike Salmon.
In early October, a new stayAPT Suites hotel will open one of their first U.S. locations in the place of the old Quality Inn on the corner of Richmond Highway and Mount Vernon Memorial Highway, bringing new life to this area just outside Fort Belvoir.
The new stayAPT Suites three-story building will feature 73 rooms, each with an average of 500+ square feet. The open-concept living room includes a sleeper sofa, lounge chair, and a wall-mounted 55-inch television. The kitchen features a full-size stove, oven, dishwasher, microwave, and refrigerator.
“We strive to provide an unmatched experience with the space and in-room amenities that make life much more comfortable, while away from home,” said the franchise owner, John McConnell.
This stayAPT Suites location in Woodlawn is the debut of its all-newly constructed hotel brand, offering a concept within long-term lodging, which could be convenient to outside companies doing business with Fort Belvoir, as well as families visiting the Mount Vernon Plantation. The new hotel is one of the very first of 40+ locations currently in development from the hotel chain, which plans to complete 100 corporate-owned and 200+ franchised locations throughout the country within the next 5 years.
The stayAPT Suites joins the Candlewood and Hampton Inn as the third hotel on this corner in Woodlawn, which also has food, a gas station and a check cashing service. The new hotel will take the place of the old Quality Inn which was damaged in a fire. After the fire, the site was not cleaned up in a timely fashion. The faded Quality Inn sign is still up.
This new addition to the area will fit in with the EMBARK project that is planned to spruce up parts of the Richmond Highway area although the stayAPT Suites was built independently of those plans.
The EMBARK Richmond Highway initiative is focused on creating a multimodal future for the Richmond Highway Corridor where residents, workers and visitors can walk, bike or drive to the places they want to go. Across the Jeff Todd Way-Richmond Highway intersection, there has been talk of a pedestrian-friendly plaza, and a tourism facility.
One component is to assess and connect from Huntington to Accotink Village, Fort Belvoir. This includes looking at the land use, density and mixed-use, for the areas within a one-half mile radius of proposed stations, corridor wide transportation systems, urban design, public facilities, and other elements.
The StayAPT Suites will provide additional job opportunities on the corridor and additional amenities to support the local tourism industry.
This article was revised September 22, 2020.