Business opinion splits over new hotel proposal

The chairman of Bradford's hoteliers association has hit out at plans to build another hotel in Shipley.

But the company which runs the town's newest hotel says the competition could have a beneficial effect.

Councillors are due to make a decision on outline plans for the re-development of the western half of Baildon's Butterfields Industrial Estate next month.

Leeds-based Contract Experts Ltd wants to build a two-storey hotel with pub/restaurant and 30,000sq ft of office space.

But the site off Otley Road is within a mile of the Holiday Inn Express, which opened in Shipley last year, and less than two miles from the Marriott Hollins Hall Hotel and Country Club where a multi-million pound re-vamp and expansion has recently been completed.

Stephen Fenwick, general manager of the Marriott Hollins Hall Hotel and Country Club and chairman of Bradford Hoteliers Association, said: "Average room occupancy at hotels throughout the Bradford area is only around 60 per cent, which clearly indicates that far from having a shortage of hotel accommodation the district probably has too many hotels already."

He said the association wanted a meeting with the Council's chief planning officer to discuss the plan.

Stephen McCarthy, general manager of Bradford's Cedar Court Hotel, and Richard Stoyle, general manager of the Jarvis Bankfield Hotel in Bingley, said they both agreed with Mr Fenwick's views.

But Richard McKevitt, managing director of Premier Hotels which runs Shipley's Holiday Inn Express, said: "We are aware that some of the hotels in Bradford are against another property opening but since we opened we've enjoyed a rapid growth in occupancy both mid-week and at the weekend.

"Whilst we support our colleagues in the hotel association we feel that the addition of another hotel could ultimately be beneficial to us all.

"Competition within our economy hotel sector is very positive.''

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