St. Fierro Palace Hotel

St. Fierro Palace Hotel was a hotel building located in Fujioka Square, Emerald City. The building was built and opened in February 1855 to serve people who were exhausted from driving. The building is known to have its own nuclear-based power generators located in the basement. The hotel was closed permanently in April 1982.

It is the most popular choice for vacation in Cowell, because going there actually costs no money; the only requirements are you have to be signed up by an employee and you must be an native of Cowell. If you are not a native then the vacation is limited to 30 days. Native Cowellans can have unlimited vacation/stay.

## Hotel Floors

### **Exterior**

* Welcome Center
* Breakfast Room
* Level Elevators

### **Interior**

#### Floor 1

* Food Court
* Play Zone
* Kids Club!

#### Floor 2

* Hotel Rooms
* Offices
* Relax Pool
* Arcade Mania Room

#### Floor 3

* Strip Room
* Lounge Room
* Entertainment Area

#### Floor 4

* Hotel+ Rooms
* Kilanain Playgound

## Other

* Kilanain Waterpark (Floor 1-Floor 4)
* Rooftop Food (Above Floor 4)

## History

St. Fierro Palace Hotel construction was started at 26th July 1845 and whole construction completed on 14th February 1855. It took almost 10 Years to build the whole construction and it costed $50,000. They were located in Fujioka Square, Emerald City, Cowell. It was built by steel and the strong concrete.

On November 27, 1927, the hotel was evacuated after a critical accident occurred in the basement where uranium fuel tanks were overloaded with too much radiation, affecting everyone working in the generator and contaminating everyone inside the hotel in hours.

In 1974, Go Go Space Monkey was put inside the entertainment area of the hotel.

### Post-closure

#### Temporary school and movie set

In January 1983, Emerald City allowed the Fujioka Square School District to use mall space as a temporary school location while a new school building was constructed. This use, which lasted for two years, also included conversion of the former Turn Style into a gymnasium.

In September 1983-June 1984, director George D.W. Walken rented the hotel building for seven months to film a scene in the movie *Grand Theft Auto Part III: San Andreas*. In this scene, the main character Carl breaks into the building with a SWAT Tank and kills Big Smoke, before Frank Tenpenny destroys the building. The office building interior was left damaged after filming wrapped. A fake wall that film crews constructed, was recognizable inside the building until the mid-1980s.

The Fujioka Square School District attempted to sue Metro Astro Pictures in May 1986 for $94,000, citing their failure to repair damage to hotel property created during the movie shoot. The district soon vacated the property, and the building was completely shuttered.

### Abandonment

After the hotel's abandonment, it experienced extensive neglect and damage from vandalism, the full-time caretaker hired by Emerald City to maintain the property was physically unable to repair it. Following the movie shoot and the departure of the school district, the mall sat completely empty while new uses for the property were sought. Emerald City did not have the funds to maintain it, and in 1989, vandals broke in for the first time, damaging and looting the mall, and leaving a number of entrances open in the process. Every accessible pane of glass in the mall was soon broken. Within a year, any piece of metal worth salvaging had been stolen. Also, around this time, the large triangular "St. Fierro Palace Hotel" sign, added in the 1975 renovation and seen in the Grand Theft Auto III: San Andreas film, was removed. The canvas covering the hotel area was removed as well, allowing rain and snow to enter into the building. Over time, this, coupled with lack of maintenance, took its toll on the building.

In 1990, the Wards Auto Service garage in the southwest corner of the mall property was razed, in preparation for construction of a new police station for Fujioka Square. Work was temporarily halted on July 9, 1992 (at about 35% completion) while concerns about the building's foundation were addressed; work on the police station resumed a week later.

## Demolition and redevelopment plans

Various redevelopment plans were announced in 1990 and 1994 but went nowhere. Another plan announced in 1997 also came to nothing.

On February 16, 2006, the entire hotel property was sold to developer George Maylay of the Emerald City Property Group. The remainder of the St. Fierro Palace Hotel building was torn down March 1 in a widely publicized PR campaign, but no progress was made to demolish the rest of the hotel afterwards. After the news crews left, so did the demolition companies. Within several months of the St. Fierro Palace Hotel demolition, liens were placed against the hotel by several invested companies. Dene threatened the owner of one of these companies with brass knuckles and a firearm (as a result, he pleaded guilty in 2008 to aggravated unlawful use of a weapon). Fujioka Square Attorney General Lisa Marie Weigum also filed lawsuits against Dene and several prior developers for failing to remove the asbestos in accordance with state law.

On July 20, 2009, a fire of unknown origin broke out in the entrance to Floor 3 during the late afternoon. The fire damaged the Block C entrance to the point where its roof collapsed within a month, and left scorch marks on the exterior of the former building.

### Final demolition

In January 2012, contractors were finally issued the necessary permits to begin demolition. After several weeks of asbestos abatement, which was completed by early February, crews began to demolish the hotel on Wednesday, February 15. Demolition was completed June 17, 2012, after which the site was cleaned up and leveled in preparation for future development.