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Future of the Majestic Hotel site now unclear

In 2014, the historic Majestic Hotel in Hot Springs burned down. Recently, plans were made to build an amphitheater in its place— until they reached a setback.

HOT SPRINGS, Ark. — The crumbled ruins of the old Majestic Hotel, feel anything but that— unless, of course, you're Bill Burrough, one of the men tasked with building the gap from past to future.

"The Majesty was an iconic property in Hot Springs," Burrough, City Manager of Hot Springs, said. "It still resides at the end of one of the most iconic streets in North America."

In 2014, a fire swept through the historic hotel, resulting in its demolition and leaving nothing behind but brick and rubble.

However, new plans began to form after the property was bought last year, and arrangements to build an amphitheater were made.

It's something Burrough was glad to see.

"It is my hometown, I have generations of family here," Burrough said. "To see Hot Springs thrive, you know, I take a lot of pride in that."

Unfortunately, those plans are no longer going to be part of the future – they're now a part of the site's past.

"There was just simply no way to know if we could accommodate it until we went through all of the appropriate design phases of due diligence," Rick Wilson of R.A. Wilson Enterprises, the developer who bought the property, said.

That amphitheater – 5,000 seats worth – simply didn't have the space.

That wasn't the only issue.

"Standout being the delay from the state of Arkansas Highway Department, and certainly not being able to reach our minimum," he said.

Wilson said if they couldn't fit the 5,000 seats, then the property wasn't feasible to be built. Additionally, the highway department wanted at least a year to do their own surveys, which spelled disaster for the building site.

"If we get to 7,500, 8,000 capacity, we estimate this can quite easily break $50 million," Wilson said.

It was a setback for Burrough's hometown—  an iconic piece of property seen slipping through the cracks.

There is, however, a silver lining.

"No, no, no, this isn't the end," Wilson said. "This is just a new beginning."

Wilson said he still plans on building an amphitheater somewhere else in the city.

For Burrough, he still has hope of another revival of the Majesty site.

"We'd love to see something there, we would have loved to see something there five years ago," Burrough said. "The right project will come along at the right time, and we'll have something that we can all be very proud of."

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