A £65 MILLION hotel planned for the heart of Edinburgh's Old Town has been given the go-ahead despite despite concerns being raised by UNESCO and local heritage groups.
The 225-bedroom hotel - descending from Victoria Street to the Cowgate - will feature a bar, restaurant, cafe, retail and commercial units.
The crumbling 19th century, A-listed India Buildings at the top of Victoria Street is a key part of the proposed redevelopment, as is the B-listed Cowgatehead Church and a further C-listed building.
Jansons Property, who are behind the development, say that hundreds of jobs will be created and experts have estimated that it could be worth more than £5 million a year to the city’s economy.
However, objectors among the Grassmarket Residents' Association say that the new buildings - higher than the tenements which occupied the plot until the 1950s - would spoil views and block light from the next-door Central Library.
And they have criticised the council for selling off the publicly-owned land to the developers instead of reserving it for housing or a library extension.
Andy Jansons, Managing Director of Jansons Property, welcomed the council's decision. He said: "At the heart of these proposals was the desire to create a quality development, that was respectful of its location within Edinburgh’s historic Old Town, but also looked to regenerate and bring new life to both the existing listed buildings and the long established gap-site at the Cowgate.
"I strongly believe that this has been achieved, and that a four-star hotel will bring a great number of benefits to the area including significant visitor spend and the restoration and reopening of some of the area’s historic old closes."
He added: "I am also pleased that the committee recognised the role the development will play in both revitalising the site, but also adding employment opportunities that will be of great benefit to both the Old Town and surrounding area.
"As our track-record has shown at both SoCo and Edinburgh Park, we are committed to investing in Edinburgh and continuing to bring high-quality developments to Scotland’s capital."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel