Brisbane’s QueensPlaza could welcome ‘high-end’ hotel
Brisbane’s Queen Street Mall looks set to get its third hotel, with Vicinity Centres hinting at plans to add to its luxury QueensPlaza complex.
The company’s executive general manager of development, Carolyn Viney, said the centre was developed with the potential to be expanded upwards.
“QueensPlaza is definitely a location where we would consider adding something,” Viney says.
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“When it was first constructed, all the concrete reinforcements were built to allow something to be built on top, whether that be apartments or a hotel.”
She says any additions are more likely to be of the hotel variety, to ensure the Edward St end of Queen St remains as vibrant as the rest of the CBD.
With development under way on Queen’s Wharf and Dexus redeveloping the Eagle Street Pier precinct, Ms Viney said a further announcement on plans for QueensPlaza would be made in the next 12 months.
“The level of investment that’s going into the whole of the Brisbane CBD is a positive for everyone concerned,” she says.
Any hotel associated with QueensPlaza will be aligned with a “higher end brand” in keeping with the centre’s luxury image, Viney says.
Earlier this month, Vicinity Centres announced it would sell off $1 billion worth of retail assets and invest the proceeds in its remaining portfolio, which includes Chatswood Chase in Sydney and Chadstone in Melbourne.
Work is due to start on a $36 million revamp of QueensPlaza that will see a balcony added along with two new restaurants and more luxury brands.
Viney says offering different experiences within a shopping complex was becoming more important. “The best places throughout the world generally don’t have just one thing,” she says.
Two hotels border the Queen Street Mall — Next Hotel on the site of the former Lennons, and the 31-year-old Hilton Hotel atop the Wintergarden shopping centre. The $3.6 billion Queen’s Wharf development will include five hotels offering a combined 1000-plus rooms, including the Ritz-Carlton, Rosewood, Dorsett and two Star Entertainment Group hotels.
This article originally appeared on www.theaustralian.com.au/property.
