“ 1) It is increasingly apparent Premier Inn will be sold to an unknown international investor with unknown intentions probably even before the proposed hotel could be opened. Fears people are expressing for some unknown future reuse of the proposed hotel building should be fears for here and now.
Reputable financial media coverage of Whitbread’s sale of Costa Coffee to Coca Cola reveals the company’s policy is being dictated by american billionaire asset stripper Paul Singer’s vulture hedge fund Elliot Advisors. Premier Inn and the staggering bank balance of its cash–rich parent Whitbread are said to be their next target.
Despite comments by Whitbread management beyond reasonable doubt the current massive expansion of the Premier Inn portfolio is being used as a bait and switch operation by activist investors. The brand name is being used to obtain planning permission to build a huge number of new Premier Inns inevitably leading to the business being swallowed up by a larger international operator. Unlike Coca Cola, who were diversifying into a new market, the buyer will undoubtably be an existing overseas hotel operator who will wish to expand their own branded operation with its own operating policy and expectations of individual properties.
The only pause between the Costa sale and Premier Inn’s will be seeing through outstanding planning applications and also splitting the property ownership and hotel operation portfolios through a leaseback facility to maximise the value of both assets. It is implied in the proposal that such a separation of ownership and operation is already in place for the Marketplace.
Promises made by the applicant are core to a whole raft of planning considerations and completely vital to the hotel’s construction and operation as proposed. Any such promises made on the basis it is in the applicant’s interest to resolve issues such as impact on neighbours, traffic and parking are meaningless if the applicant will not be the operator. All they need is to tick three boxes – “hotel”, “100 plus rooms” “restaurant and bar”. Everything else that isn’t on a drawing in the application is just window dressing to get planning approval and can quietly melt away if it is obtained.
Given ridiculous over expansion by many hotel operators the certain over provision of rooms will lead to many buildings being sold off or repurposed. We simply do not know what sort of management we will get or what anything built would be used for within the broad C1 use planning approval. What we would get in terms of a building are the bricks and mortar of an inner city hostel prefabricated for future urban degeneration.
2) The reapplication has not taken the chance to overturn Grounds for Refusal. The procedure seems to have been to agree compromises with the planning department rather than either comply with the stipulations of the planning committee or abandon the proposal.
Windows facing Chipping Close would only be part obscured glass offering no privacy for residents of the cottages despite yet more very dodgy graphics claiming it would. The lines of sight on the drawings are achieved by showing groups of people significantly shorter than the middle glazing bars on traditional sash windows, normally well below the eye line of adults of average height. The previous approved plans from which the obscured glass requirement was lifted was for fully opaque windows. Premier Inns have many rooms with no windows at all, insisting all rooms in this building must have a view is complete hubris.
Similarly it is boasted the side elevation has been moved back to 11.33 metres from the facing properties in Chipping Close, but read the details and this will only be in two tiny recesses along the wall. The contention was whether the figure of 21 metres between frontages in planning policy applied or not. Sorry but an extra 0.3 metres although welcome doesn’t really show any grasp of the problem.
The main entrance has been moved from Chipping Close. However there will be no pedestrian access down the opposite side of the building, although that will allegedly be provided for coach passengers. These two statements are surely mutually exclusive. The fact remains almost all pedestrian access would still be down Chipping Close.
The scheme would still inevitably cause dangerous congestion and obstruction in Bruce Road, Chipping Close, St Albans Road and its junction with the High Street. Can anyone familiar with Bruce Road seriously believe any assertion it is suitable for this use?
The biggest threat to the town apart from likely change of use is still displacement parking in and out of shopping hours. It would be a blow to all local trade and residents and a stake through the heart of existing local evening jobs and business including five restaurants and two pubs. It seems improbable these could all survive competing with the new restaurant and bar offsetting its costs against those of the hotel. Hotel parking at the Spires carpark is just not a binding part of the planning application. Extension of CPZ hours (except in Chipping Close itself) would spread the problem.
If the people that get planning permission aren’t the people that will operate the finished building there is no motivation to resolve any of these issues.
3) The applicant still makes the ridiculous claim of £1,908,704 annual gain to local businesses. Clearly that uses a figure for “eating out or at the hotel” and says it is just for “eating out” which with other statistical nonsense completely invalidated their maths.
I had genuinely expected to find valid research showing how much hotels benefit other businesses in their area, just not any that would apply to the transit hotel and tradespersons’ hostel this would be. Surprisingly the whole concept of hotels boosting economic activity in their immediate area seems purely to be the result of years of lobbying without any valid research backing it up. If such statistics were available they would be readily available, they do not seem to exist anywhere.
A source tells me that while some businesses such as tourism obviously require hotel accommodation this need not be as local as would be assumed. It appears benefit from hotels to adjacent businesses has not been and can not be shown to be significant in anyway whatsoever. Unsubstantiated claims for such benefit are however being repeatedly used to leverage planning approval for new hotels in town centres.
4) Are we still believing promises of arrangements for the hotel’s operation such as 3rd party offsite parking that are simply not physically part of the application? Can anyone seriously want or trust additional visualisations of the proposal having seen those previously provided?
The inherent extremely negative issues for the immediate neighbours and the wider town centre remain. The impact on the residents of Chipping Close would still be appalling. I am so sorry but the benefits some see and want so much are a fantasy. It is simply all cost and on benefit.
Hopefully after the Barnet Society has considered the full hard facts and residents’ opinions as promised it will be mindful to actually oppose the reapplication rather than say it is great idea and everyone is in favour of it. ”