Neighbors took issue with a plan to build a three-story, four-room inn on a vacant lot at 14 Narragansett avenue in Oak Bluffs during a public hearing Thursday.

Pitched as the Four Sisters Inn, the project includes the construction of a two and a half-story, 4,000 square foot inn that would be open year round and have capacity for eight guests. The inn would also include a separate bedroom for the innkeeper.

Project applicants are Elizabeth and Harry Marshall, who purchased the vacant property from Dominique Milton in 2011 for $460,000. A previous two-story, five-bedroom structure was torn down in 2004, according to the commission. The lot has been vacant since.

The project is within the Cottage City Historic District in Oak Bluffs and is subject to a separate architectural review by the Cottage City Historic District Commission. Elevations provided to the Martha's Vineyard Commission show an eclectic Victorian structure in keeping with the other homes in the area, according to a commission staff report.

Arguing that the proposed inn was too big and would complicate an already stressful parking shortage, abutters voiced a number of concerns during the project’s first public hearing last Thursday night.

“None of the houses on our end of the street are three stories high,” said next-door neighbor Rita Bartolomeu. She added that the previous home at 14 Narragansett was far smaller than the proposed inn.

Ms. Bartolomeu said her main issue was parking, but also raised concerns about quality of life in a neighborhood that already sustains the busy Pequot Hotel.

“I have a hotel behind me and now I’m going to have an inn beside me,” Ms. Bartolomeu said. “I have an issue with privacy, the coming and goings…. I listen to the Pequot’s dryer 24/7.”

The hotel’s HVAC compressors and condensers and its outdoor shower also abut her property and are visible from her back porch, she said.

Narragansett avenue homeowners Gina and John Albanese and Arthur Bates joined Ms. Bartolomeu in challenging the application.

“I’m very concerned about parking,” Mr. Bates said. “The area fills up, and it’s very crowded.”

Some homes in the neighborhood have no parking at all, the Albaneses said.

As proposed, the Marshalls’ Four Sisters Inn would have one space for staff but no parking for guests.

The couple have said they will discourage guests from bringing cars to the Island, but that has not reassured the neighbors who spoke Thursday.

“I would have no problem if it was a house … but we’re going to have strangers coming,” Mr. Albanese said.

“You’re paying five, six, seven, eight hundred dollars a night to stay in an inn, you’re bringing a car if you want to bring a car,” he said.

Commissioner and real estate broker Christine Todd, who lives on nearby Pennacook avenue, said an already-tight parking situation has been worsened in recent years by the proliferation of short-term rentals.

“I have sold … five houses in my neighborhood, on my street, in past two and a half years that used to be occupied by year-round resident single families, and now they have turned into rental properties,” Ms. Todd said.

“This is a trend that’s happening everywhere on the Island,” she added.

Former property owner Dominique Milton said resident parking permits could help resolve the problem, and architect Chuck Sullivan, representing the couple, agreed that parking permits like those used in Ocean Park would be worth trying.

“Something needs to happen. I think everyone can agree to that,” Mr. Sullivan said.

Ms. Marshall, who joined the online meeting with her husband, sought to ease neighbors’ concerns.

“This is a labor of love for us. We want to be innkeepers. We want to live on the property. We want to control the property…We will be part of the inn and we will be present year round,” she said.

The couple do not want to run a large operation and are limiting guests to eight, Ms. Marshall said.

“The Pequot is big enough already,” she said.

The commission's Four Sisters Inn hearing continues Nov. 10.

In other business Thursday, the commission deliberated on and approved the proposed Red Arrow Farm affordable housing community adjoining Island Co-Housing in West Tisbury.

South Mountain Company is proposing to purchase 3.17 acres from Island Co-Housing to build six structures, including four houses with 11 total bedrooms and shared facilities for parking and storage.

The commission found that the loss of open space was more than balanced by the benefit to Island housing, voting 10-1 to approve the project.

Commissioner Ernest Thomas was the sole nay vote.

The commission also announced the hire of Laura Silber as a housing planner. Ms. Silber has served as the coalition coordinator for the Coalition to Create a Martha’s Vineyard Housing Bank.

Capping the nearly three-hour meeting, commissioners signed their written decision denying the demolition application for a house on Arlington avenue in Oak Bluffs.

For its next meeting Oct. 20, the commission has a packed agenda with a modification review for The Yard in Chilmark and tentatively one for the Outermost Inn in Aquinnah, a public hearing on changes at the West Chop Club and continued public hearings on the proposed Martha’s Vineyard Hospital/Navigator Homes project in Edgartown and a demolition request on Look street in Vineyard Haven.