Two waterfront hotels are joining Weehawken, NJ's 200-acre, $2B Port Imperial. The mega master-planned community's developer, Mack-Cali subsidiary Roseland, recently announced that XSS Hotels will build a side-by-side 225-room Renaissance by Marriott and 154-room Residence Inn on top of Port Imperial's parking garage. They'll break ground this spring for a 2015 delivery and will both be managed by Colwen Management. The Rennaissance will include a 12k SF function space (perfect for conferences and conventions, says XSS partner Leo Xarras) and a 30k SF outdoor terrace overlooking the Hudson River and Manhattan skyline.

Leo, above, tells us that the area was underserved from a Marriott standpoint, with the closest branded hotel being 10 miles inland. Weehawken is also closer to Times Square by ferry than hotels in Downtown Manhattan, he says, so he hopes to appeal to those guests as well. And New Hampshire-based XSS is planning to expand further into the outskirts of Manhattan within a 15-mile radius, he tells us. Two weeks ago, it opened a new Residence Inn in Orangeburg, NY; it'll open a Courtyard in Edgewater, NJ; and it'll develop a Homewood Suites in Dobbs Ferry, NY. They're not the only new developments in Leo's life: He just welcomed a Jack Russell puppy named Max into his family.