Developers want to knock down a city centre hotel and build what could be Bristol’s tallest building in its place.
The plans would see the Premier Inn, which overlooks the Bearpit on the Haymarket, demolished and two tower blocks built in its place.
One of the buildings would be 18-storeys and house 136 people in a ‘co-living’ set-up, while the other would be a 28-storey building housing 445 students. The current tallest residential building in Bristol is the 26-storey Castle Park View, although a 33-storey building has been proposed to be built next door.
Read next: Plan to demolish Bristol city centre NCP car park for tower blocks moves forward
Those behind the plan say the current 20-storey Premier Inn was built in 1972, originally as offices for the former Avon County Council, and is ‘at the end of its life’.
The proposals would include a new ground floor café which would open onto both the bus and coach station behind, and the Bearpit roundabout, and developers promise to make the current pedestrian access from the Bearpit to the bus station much more welcoming and less ‘hostile’.
The location is one of the most prominent in Bristol, with the Premier Inn currently one of the tallest buildings in the city centre, visible to people arriving in the city centre from the M32 along Bond Street. The Premier Inn is owned by hotel and hospitality chain Whitbread and, while it will stay open until its demolition, isn’t seen as a building for the future by Whitbread bosses. The small rooms and layout of the hotel doesn’t make it easy for Premier Inn’s retrofit upgrade programme.
Instead, the firm is looking for new sites for a new Premier Inn around the Harbourside and at Temple Quarter, and will be selling the site to developers.
“The Premier Inn at Haymarket is at the end of its life,” said Richard Pearson, Whitbread’s development manager. “Though the location is great the current building does not provide the high brand standards our customers expect of us, and it needs substantial investment. We also have a much newer Premier Inn at Finzels Reach which is a short walk from the Haymarket hotel and serves the same catchment.
“Redeveloping the site presents an opportunity to realise the true potential of the gateway location for the city, whilst generating funds to reinvest in our network of modern and energy efficient hotels in Bristol and elsewhere. The sale is part of our strategy of ensuring our hotel offer is of the highest quality and in the very best locations for our customers,” he added.
The developer with the job of getting planning permission for the huge project is Olympian Homes. It’s appointed architect Hodder and Partners to create what it says is a ‘striking’ scheme for the 0.3 hectare site, with two tall tower blocks proposed.
The smaller block would be 18 storeys and contain 136 rooms in a ‘co-living’ arrangement. It’s the second proposal in the past week for a big ‘co-living’ project on the same road in Bristol city centre.
Last week, developers submitted a planning application to demolish the NCP car park further down the A38 in Rupert Street, with a similar scheme mixed between student accommodation and ‘co-living’ accommodation.
Co-living is essentially the same principle as purpose-built student accommodation, but for people who aren’t students. Residents would live in shared flats like student apartments, where people have en-suite rooms but share kitchen and shared living spaces. Of the 136 rooms, which would be rented out, 20 per cent would be designated as 'affordable housing'.
Read next:
- Calls for Bristol's universities to 'do a lot more to manage downsides' of student expansion
- Building up or building out? Do we solve Bristol's housing crisis with skyscrapers or new suburbs?
- Campaign to save a multi storey car park by asking for it to be Listed - dubbing it a 'classic'
- Plan for tallest building in city's history is 'assault on Bristol'
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