Hotel plan upsets neighbours

A five-level Auckland Quest hotel, planned for 80 Beaumont St near the Northern Motorway and Victoria Park, has raised the ire of neighbours.

Nigel McKenna of Melview Developments had previously planned an office building on the 430sq m site which he later sold vacant.

Auckland Council notified the public of the application for the five-level building with 34 hotel rooms, a 54sq m cafe, two onsite car parks and a further 10 carparks leased from a nearby site.

Beaumont Trading Co, owned by Safari Management, is the applicant and people have until early next month to say what they think.

Tony Brown, who lives in the Beaumont Quarter, said the empty site beside the Victory Church was extremely small.

The new building would be much taller than the surroundings buildings "and uglier", Brown said.

"Everything about it is just wrong."

Beaumont Quarter is three levels with a basement level, he said.

"While the immediate residents will clearly make a submission to try to reduce the effects on the surrounding residential developments, there is a bigger picture at issue in relation to an unsuitable development in the wrong place that the planning process seems incapable of addressing."

Safari Group (NZ) has advertised for investors to buy Quest apartments, then lease them back. Robert Neil of Safari said deposits had been paid on 11 rooms for $180,000 to $236,000.

Construction would start in October and be finished next year.

The council said the building needed resource consent in the business mixed use zone because of a shortage of parking and loading space.

Overall, the proposal requires resource consent for a discretionary activity.