Terrace Junction, which is now under construction, is located next to the BP service station on Frankton Rd and will house several other experienced and well-established business operators, providing retail and convenience outlets, including an optician, liquor retailing, restaurants and cafes, hairdressers, industry consultants and property law-related tenants, with a total of 125 car parks on site.
Westpac Southland area manager Andrew Moreton said the branch would have full services and a staff of about 15.
"It's a great location for visibility, with a huge traffic flow and great car parking.
"We had a solid financial result and because of that we're looking at reinvesting money back into the community.
"Queenstown is a real growth area - we're still keeping the other branch in town, so we'll have two branches servicing Queenstown.
"The growth is certainly happening out this way [at Frankton] and we are making an investment in that growth," Mr Moreton said.
Terrace Junction project manager Lindsay Williams said he welcomed Westpac as an anchor tenant and congratulated the bank on taking "confident leadership and demonstrating its confidence in Queenstown's future" by investing in the new branch.
Despite talk of an economic slowdown, Mr Williams was confident "increasing good-news stories" would come out of the resort in the coming months.
"Queenstown, given the nature of the economy, is well positioned to continue to prosper as it is not reliant on domestic consumerism to the same extent as larger New Zealand centres."
Evidence indicated it was "business as usual" in the resort, with a "plethora of commercial developments proceeding strongly" and traditionally low commercial property yields being further supported by interest rate cuts and an unpredictable sharemarket.
Mr Williams predicted the 2009 ski season would be "exceptionally busy" resulting from Australian tourists cancelling their northern winter ski trips this summer in favour of winter skiing in Queenstown, also boding well for next summer.
"Destination Queenstown has significant additional funding to specifically target the Australian tourist [and] increasing unrest in other world destinations underlines New Zealand's reputation as safe and friendly."
