DEVELOPER NOEL SMYTH’S Fitzwilliam Real Estate is to lodge plans for a nine storey 245-bedroom hotel at Arnotts, Dublin in the coming days.

The hotel scheme involves a two storey element with setbacks over Arnotts and a three storey element with setbacks over Arnotts multi-storey car-park.

The hotel scheme will involve the demolition and decommissioning of the top three open air levels of Arnotts multi-storey car-park resulting in the removal of 145 car spaces.

The lodging of the plans comes 10 months after Smyth’s firm lodged plans for a planned 12 storey 159-unit ‘build to rent’ scheme on the same site at Arnotts.

That scheme involves the construction of a 12 storey over basement element fronting Williams’ Lane; a five storey element over Arnotts’ multi-storey car park and a two storey element over Arnott’s store.

That proposal also involved the removal of the top three floor levels of Arnotts’ multi-storey car park.

Earlier this year, Dublin City Council requested further information on the scheme and the applicants earlier this month sought a six month extension in which to lodge the new information.

Four years ago in October 2018, Smyth secured permission for a nine-storey hotel 257-bedroom on the same site and with no substantial works on that scheme advanced, planning permission will have now lapsed necessitating the new application.

That scheme attracted two objections and the support of Fáilte Ireland with the tourism agency telling the council that the hotel “would be a valuable addition to the accommodation stock in Dublin and would go some way to addressing the accommodation challenge being faced by the city”.

Planning consultant, Tom Phillips told Dublin City Council that the 2018 proposal “will facilitate the provision of a state of the art accommodation facility, whilst significantly improving the character of the area”.

Phillips stated that the hotel scheme “represents a very positive proposal for Middle Abbey Street and William Lane responding positively to the site’s existing context”.

The planning consultant contended that the proposed development “can be comfortably accommodated on the site and … it is important to highlight that the development site is strategically located in the city centre on an under-utilised site”.