Queenstown hotel site approved

Press, 8 May 1985, Page 1

Queenstown hotel site approved

Special correspondent

A much needed top-class 200-bed hotel for Queenstown is a step closer now that the Tourist Hotel Corporation has been granted consent to build on the old Buckhams brewery site in the heart of Queenstown. The Lakes, Queenstown, Wakatipu combined planning committee announced its decision last evening a month after a two-day hearing on the corporation’s application for planning consent and a relevant scheme change to enable the $3O million development to go ahead partly on reserve land.

The development is now subject to further consent by the Minister of Lands, Mr Wetere, on the use of reserve land.

Twenty-seven objections were heard against the scheme change and 34 against the planning application to build the hotel on the old brewery site on the lake front.

The committee said it did not see the T.H.C. application leading to further hotel development out of the appropriate zoning. The T.H.C. had the power to use reserve land for hotel development with the necessary consent and this distinguished it from private developers. The committee was satisfied of the need for a first-

class tourist hotel in Queenstown and some positive moves had to be made to satisfy that requirement, it said.

There was inadequate freehold land offering elsewhere in Queenstown to build a suitable hotel. The committee had not been influenced by the T.H.C.’s “implied threats” that if it was not allowed to build on the chosen site it would abandon any proposals for a hotel in the area.

The corporation’s proposal to provide staff accommodation for at least 70 of its employees had also impressed the committee. This accommodation would be built on another site.

The corporation would be required to enter into a

legal agreement prepared by the Queenstown Borough Council to guarantee this accommodation was provided in the district, the committee agreed. It would also have to notify the public that the reserve area was still available for unrestricted public access by erecting signs at entry points to the reserve. The committee also took into account the offer of an annual grant to the Borough Council by the T.H.C. for the maintenance of the Queenstown Gardens. A local environmental group, the Guardians of the Reserve, plans to appeal against the decision and will approach the Commissioner for the Environment, Mr Ken Piddington, to act on its behalf.