Plans for Cuyahoga County's new convention hotel in downtown Cleveland, shown here in an iteration from last November, now call for a bar on the 32nd floor.

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- In a design shift prompted in part by public response to plans for a new convention hotel downtown, Cuyahoga County is thinking very seriously of adding a publicly accessible bar to the building’s 32nd floor.

At a public meeting in August, Clevelanders told architects of the new convention hotel – to be built adjacent to the Global Center for Health Innovation and the city's new convention center – that they wanted the building to have a rooftop bar.

Jeffrey Appelbaum, the Cleveland lawyer managing the project for the county, said Tuesday that although the bar had not been considered a serious possibility in earlier stages of the design, now it is.

“This is a work in process,” he said, adding, “we’ve made the determination that this [a bar] is a desirable feature of the hotel.”

Appelbaum described the bar and other potential design changes in a 3 p.m. briefing to the Cuyahoga County Council.

The council is reviewing final agreements needed to trigger construction on the hotel in late April, including a hotel management agreement, a guaranteed maximum price agreement with the design-builder, and project financing. It will take action on those items later this month.

The $260 million, 600-room hotel, to be completed by 2016, will be called the Hilton Cleveland Downtown, Appelbaum said.

Initially, architects from Cooper Carry, the Atlanta-based firm designing the hotel, said they couldn’t include publicly accessible amenities such as a bar or restaurant near the top of the hotel because it would require adding additional elevators and stairwells, which would eat into space available for guest rooms through the entire hotel tower.

Appelbaum said Tuesday in an interview that the county and the hotel operator, Hilton, now consider the bar not only feasible, but a big plus.

“These things are extraordinarily desirable,” he said. “These are hot venues now.”

Having a publicly accessible space at the top of the hotel is also symbolically important, he said, because the building is to be publicly financed through certificates of participation involving county and the Cleveland-Cuyahoga County Port Authority.

“The idea that this [the bar] can be accessed by the public is important so everyone can share in this venue,” Appelbaum said. “Hilton has agreed this can actually be a good revenue generator, which is obviously important -- just the wow factor in bringing people to the hotel.”

Initial plans show that the enclosed portion of the space would include approximately 58 seats plus a 14- or 15-seat bar. On the east side of the space, tables next to windows would appear to look directly down to the downtown Mall far below because the building cants out at that point, he said.

An outdoor terrace at the northern end of the bar would have room for 25 seats in addition to those inside. One possible variation would be to make the space usable year-round by enclosing it during the winter.

Conceptually, the county’s architects and planners, along with Hilton, refer to the watering hole by the working name "sky bar," although Appelbaum said an official name and theme for the bar would be developed. Themes could include the bar's potential specialization in wine, for example, or bubbly drinks.

When asked how likely it is that the proposed bar will be included, Appelbaum said: "I would say it is the working plan. It is the focus, unless something happens that derails it, but right now it's pretty definite."

Other design changes under discussion include moving the hotel’s health club and pool to a level near the base of the tower where the pool would have a view overlooking Lake Erie.

The architects are also considering including a number of rooms with their own cardio-exercise equipment or yoga exercise areas. This would reinforce the health theme appropriate to a hotel next to the Global Center for Health Innovation, Appbelbaum said.

As for the bar, Appelbaum said the idea resonated with the hotel's designers after the public meeting in August, one of two sessions in which Clevelanders were allowed to weigh in on the design in process.

“There was a guy [at the August meeting] that said, ‘I, Joe Public, want to make sure there’s a rooftop bar, and I want to go to the top of the building and buy a drink,’ ” Appelbaum said. “And you know what? We thought a lot about that. The public comment resonated, and I think we’re going to be able to satisfy that gentleman.”