A.M.P. HOTEL Details given to commission

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33001, 22 August 1972, Page 1

A.M.P. HOTEL Details given to commission

Although its decision was reserved, the Licensing Control Commission yesterday indicated it saw “nothing to trouble us” when considering a hotel premises licence for the proposed 14storey, 216-room hotel on the Australian Mutual Provident Society’s land near Cathedral Square.

The commission’s chairman (Mr R. D. Jamieson, S.M.) made the comment when reserving the commission’s decision on the licence application by the company (Mr J. G. Leggat) yesterday.

The application was not opposed. With Mr Jamieson was Mr R. S. Austin. Evidence was given of the design and facilities of the planned hotel, and that the premises would be leased by the Australian firm of Noahs, Ltd, of New South Wales, which would later apply to the commission for a keeper’s licence. The regional manager of

the A.M.P. (Mr K. G. Elliott) said the hotel would be part of a much larger project which would include a carpark, office block, and the hotel towards the rear of the site.

On the ground floor of the hotel would be the lobby, a coffee shop, a tavern bar, and administration facilities. On the first floor would be the main dining-room, a cocktail bar, grill room, function rooms and a tavern bar. The other 12 floors would be accommodation, with 18 rooms a floor. Tenders would close on October 23, work to start in mid-November and to take about 22 months.

The cost of the whole proj- t would be about slom, the hotel costing about $5.5m, Mr Elliott said. The hotel would have 456 beds.

Mr D. J. Crone, principal of the architects, Donald Crone and Associates, said the design aimed at spaciousness, and rooms, beds, and other areas were all more spacious than normal. Eating areas in the hotel would seat 530 at one time, or about 975 when a normal table turnover was considered.

He produced artists’ impressions of various bars and dining areas. Mr A. E. Baker, general manager of Noahs, Ltd, of Cremome, New South Wales, said his firm would manage the hotel, and that it, and its associated companies, now managed 20 motels and hotels through Australia. The company was building a hotel in Fiji, and was the secondlargest firm of its type in Australia.