Building on Chattanooga's Southside demolished after wall collapsed on car

Staff Photo by Ellen Gerst / A building at 27 W. Main St. is demolished on Tuesday. Part of a brick wall collapsed two weeks earlier, crushing a car parked on the street.
Staff Photo by Ellen Gerst / A building at 27 W. Main St. is demolished on Tuesday. Part of a brick wall collapsed two weeks earlier, crushing a car parked on the street.

A building on Chattanooga's Main Street is being demolished this week after part of its third-story wall collapsed and crushed a car earlier this month.

The three-story building at 27 W. Main St. underwent a partial demolition in 2021, which left most of the structure standing, city building permits show.

On Jan. 12, the day the brick wall collapsed while storms moved through Chattanooga, contractors filed for a complete demolition of the structure, according to permitting records. Chattanooga-based Grace Construction Consultants is leading the project, records show.

(READ MORE: Brick wall collapses, crushes car in downtown Chattanooga)

"Construction work has stopped on site due to the structural failure (partial collapse) of the existing building," one of the site's permit application forms said following the collapse.

The Southside site, along with an empty lot beside it, is set to hold a Hyatt hotel after construction is completed. In earlier stages of the project, developers said they planned to make the building at 27 W. Main into the headquarters for hotel management company 3H Group, whose offices are now on Broad Street.

(READ MORE: Chattanooga's first Hyatt hotel slated for downtown's Southside in $30 million project)

Work on the hotel, which would be Chattanooga's first Hyatt, was scheduled to start this year, the Chattanooga Times Free Press previously reported.

  photo  Staff Photo by Ellen Gerst / A building at 27 W. Main St. is demolished on Tuesday. Part of a brick wall collapsed two weeks earlier, crushing a car parked on the street.
 
 

"The demolition of the building will be complete this week, and we will begin construction on the Caption by Hyatt this spring with a completion date within 12 to 18 months," said Albert Waterhouse, a spokesperson for 3H Group, in an email Tuesday.

The structure was built in 1900, according to county property records.

The wall collapse closed part of Main and Long streets temporarily and tore down a power line, according to an incident report from the Chattanooga Fire Department.

A Chevy sedan parked outside appeared to be totaled in the collapse, the report says, and two other parked cars had minor damage. Three people were inside one of the parked cars, a release from the Fire Department said, but were not hurt.

Contact Ellen Gerst at egerst@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6319.


Upcoming Events