Sep 30, 2007 11:44 pm US/Central
Dallas Neighborhood Cheers As Hotel Torn Down
by Brooke Richie
DALLAS (CBS 11 News) ―
Neighbors called it an eyesore and a den for crime. Sunday night a Dallas neighborhood was celebrating as a motel is reduced to rubble.
The hotel, or Scyene road near Fair Park, is a gone after a bulldozer knocked it down Sunday afternoon.
South Dallas resident Bonnie Divens told CBS 11 "I'm so happy, I'm so happy tears are in my eyes. I've got joy that this is finally happening, and I'm so glad to see this gone."
It took a long battle; the American Inn hotel was infamous for housing drug dealers and renting rooms by the hour. Neighbors say at least one murder too place there.
"You didn't feel safe, so you would always be fear of coming outside, working in the yard because of all the traffic that places like that would bring to you" says Willie Mae Coleman, President of the Bertrand Neighborhood Association.
Developers with Frazier Revitalization say this is a new beginning. It's one that will eventually lead to stores, apartments and offices on four to five acres of land. A DART rail line is already in the works.
Neighbors have a simple hope for the demolition, driving out the unwanted residents drawn to the hotel, and to bring home the welcome ones.
(© MMVII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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