8:58am Tuesday 21st October 2008
By Gareth Lewis
DREAMS of a newlook waterside heart for Southampton again lie in tatters after it emerged the credit crunch has put paid to work on a massive new hotel in Ocean Village.
The decision means two of the biggest projects on the city’s waterfront have fallen victim to the slump in the economy and may now never be built. It is a body blow to hopes the site might rival Portsmouth’s successful Gunwharf Quays.
Ocean Village Resorts (OVR) had intended its 224-bed, glass-sided hotel, complete with a waterfront “events piazza”, to be the catalyst to lure back prestigious sailing races and events to the city. The 13-storey hotel would also have had space for conferences of up to 800 people.
Bosses of the £50m scheme have followed the lead of fellow Ocean Village developer Wilson Bowden and put the brakes on development until “some point” in the future.
As previously reported in the Daily Echo, opposite the entrance to Ocean Village a third development, Crescent Apartments, also stands half finished and abandoned due to financial difficulties.
OVR had already run into financing trouble and gone back to the drawing board with a simplified scheme after a more ambitious plan was scuppered by spiralling construction costs.
Yesterday, the new scheme also hit the buffers.
OVR chief executive Tony Keeler said: “This decision to defer has come about as a consequence of the current deteriorating economic conditions in these uncertain times. We will continue to monitor and review this decision and it is anticipated that at some point in the future we will be in a position to recommence works on the project.
Ocean Village remains a priority for the company’s development plans and work behind the scenes will still continue.
The planning and design phases of the Hotel development have been successfully completed.”
Wilson Bowden called off work at its Admirals Quay development earlier this year with just three of the planned five blocks built and only two of the ten shops and bars completed. The site has been up for sale for around five months with no buyers.
Developers Inner Circle Homes, who were behind Crescent Apartments – a six-storey block of 88 flats, told workers to down tools, board up the windows and walk off the site after they hit financial difficulties. They were unable to give a day when work would start again.
Ocean Village’s woes follow a pattern of development disasters across the rest of Southampton and elsewhere in the country.
Already this year Southampton has seen plans for an art centre housed in two landmark glass towers collapse after developer City Lofts ran out of funding. The site, the former, Tyrrell and Green store, is to be demolished while the council attempts to find another developer to take it on.
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