Developer Tony Gapes says he doesn’t yet have a start date for his new hotel, planned on land beside Queenstown’s FreshChoice supermarket.
Gapes, through the Alloway Development Trust, was last week granted non-notified consent to construct a 204-room hotel, with a cafe and restaurant, in a six-storey building at Hylton Place.
Their target market’s smaller groups and individuals travelling to Queenstown on scheduled buses or by plane, or bus tour groups.
Just 26 carparks are proposed, including two mobility parks, which can be reserved when guests book in, along with pick-up and drop-off areas for coaches, vans, taxis and service vehicles — the planners note any minimum number of parking spaces has been removed from the
district plan.
The consent decision says because the hotel’s close to the town centre, where other modes of transport are available, having a limited number of parks won’t have an adverse effect on the surrounding traffic network.
Transport engineer Simon de Verteuil notes bus stops are close to the hotel site, while the Queenstown CBD’s about 700m away, and the
council’s ‘active travel network’ will provide improvements and upgrades to promote non-vehicular travel along Gorge Rd.
Planners Erica Walker and Sarah Gathercole note while the hotel’s maximum building height — 21.35 metres — is ‘‘significantly higher’’
than existing buildings in the area, what’s proposed is ‘‘generally reflective of the future character and context of the Gorge Rd business
mixed use zone’’, determining it’s a ‘‘good fit’’ within the neighbouring and local context and presents good urban design outcomes.
Gapes also developed The Alex, directly opposite the consented hotel’s site, a 52-unit residential development with ground-floor
retail on the corner of Gorge Rd and Hallenstein St.
In 2020, he told Mountain Scene he also had big plans for the nearby former Carters building supplies property, also on Gorge Rd, where
he was proposing a twin hotel development with 400-plus rooms and commercial/hospitality tenancies, which Swiss-Belhotel International
would manage.
