Coherent Hotel Ltd applied in December for an eight-storey, 89-room hotel in Queenstown’s Aspen Grove, below the Kamana Lakehouse hotel, which it also owns.
Its consent application will be considered by independent commissioners at a two-day hearing starting on June 24.
City Hall’s planning report on the application, written by consultant Nathan O’Connell, recommends it be refused, saying the complex in its current form would be “visually dominant and out of scale” with its surroundings.
Site coverage and height infringements would be out of step with the area’s residential character and amenity values, while elements of its layout for vehicle access would result in an “unsafe and unacceptable” traffic environment, O’Connell says.
Of 50 submitters on the proposal, 49 have objected, with about half asking to speak at the hearing.
Their concerns include the complex’s size and height, effects on outlook and views, shading, the negative impact on the largely residential neighbourhood, and precedent.
The hotel’s construction would require more than 30,000 cubic metres of earthworks.
