Plans for Bellview Hotel in Cairns CBD
Billionaire developer Ghassan Aboud is now planning a 120 million redevelopment of the Bellview Hotel in the Cairns CBD.
His company, company Crystalbrook Collection is already undertaking $370 million worth of development over three hotel sites in the city centre.
The plan could see the Bellview Hotel on the Cairns Esplanade transformed from a 56-room low budget hotel and turned into ta 5-star 276-room development spread across two towers and reaching 10 storeys into the sky.
It’s all part of Crystalbrook Collection’s suite of projects in the Cairns CBD.
Cairns Regional Council’s planning committee will be considering the Bellview project today.
Council officers have recommended the plan’s approval.
According to Crystalbrook’s plans, the hotel will feature large two and three-storey podiums.
They will have asymmetric, lineal roofing, as well as two 46-metre high towers comprising 276 hotel rooms and six three-bedroom residential units.
There will be two street frontages with Abbott St serving as its front-of-house and chief access point.
The plans envisage an Esplanade frontage that will be a total retail front, featuring food and drink outlets, bars, retail shops and other facilities that will be consistent with activities in the street.
“The first level acts as the key point of connectivity across the site, while the podium level serves as a focal point providing substantial landscaped areas and a wellness centre and gymnasium for guests and customers to the development,” the plan says.
The development will also have 66 off-street car parking spaces, including seven which are proposed to be car lifts or “car stackers”.
According to the council report, there are issues with the hotel’s proposed setbacks from the property’s boundaries,
But it says these had already been had been mitigated through clever design.
“By creating two angled, slim towers the design maximises light and ventilation, prevents overlooking between buildings and increases the views and vistas to the water and ocean,” it said.
by Leon Gettler, June 12th 2017
