Southampton aparthotel plans back before committee

Revised plans for an aparthotel in Southampton – which have twice been turned away – are set to go before committee next week.Sabre Commercial Investments is behind the application, which concerns a site on Winchester Road.Proposed is the redevelopment of the site to form a part-two, part-three storey aparthotel fronting onto Winchester Road and Hill Lane.This would function in a similar way to a traditional hotel but rooms would be offered with their own cooking facilities meaning that they are, effectively, self-contained with the option of using the communal offer.A total of ten parking spaces are proposed, with the building set to accommodate 20 serviced apartments, a ground floor café, a gym, bin and cycle storage, and associated back of house facilities for staff.The plans are a resubmission following the previous refusal of 34-bed and 26-bed hotel schemes on the site as considered on 1 November 2022 and 6 June 2023.In seeking to address the previous reasons for refusal, the revised scheme has reduced the number of guestrooms and increased the number of onsite parking spaces. The scale and massing of the hotel building has also reduced.A report drawn up ahead of Southampton City Council’s planning committee meeting on 21 November said: “The principle of an aparthotel has been accepted in the past, and the previous concerns relating to adequate car parking on site and pressure for on street parking have been addressed by reducing the number of bed spaces and increasing on site car parking to ten.”The application has demonstrated a need for aparthotel accommodation and would be available for staff and visitors to the hospital. Planning obligations can also be secured to offset the impact of the development locally, including widening of the footway in front of the site.”There are also economic benefits and job creation, in the form of two full-time jobs and two part-time cleaners, linked to this site development.”