Courtyard Marriott got approval from the local zoning board to begin construction on a nine-story hotel next to 1959 E Street earlier this month.

The Colonial Parking Garage, located on 20th Street between E and F streets, will be demolished in order to build the hotel. The proposed hotel will have 147 rooms and an indoor swimming pool, according to documents from the D.C. Board of Zoning Adjustment.

Whayne Quin, the attorney for the group that owns the garage, said that the sidewalk on the east side of 20th Street would need to be closed during the construction because it’s too narrow to allow for safe pedestrian traffic. Quin said in an interview earlier this year that the parking garage would be razed in early summer.

Community members thought the BZA had not properly considered the area’s zoning.

“This funky zoning down here is called a special purpose zone,” Foggy Bottom resident Elizabeth Eliot said. “It’s supposed to be a buffer between the business district and the residential zoning, (not a hotel).”

Advisory Neighborhood Commission 2A Commissioner Dorothy Miller, who represents the district the parking garage is in, said she cannot appeal the decision but will bring it to the attention of authorities.w