Extensions drive Premier Inn expansion in North West
The hotel chain has applied to both Trafford Council and Preston City Council for permission to provide more bedrooms through extensions to existing hotels.
Whitbread, the owner of the Premier Inn brand, had previously announced its intention to increase the number of rooms available in the North West.
Planning consultant Walsingham Planning facilitated the applications on behalf of the chain, and Allison Pike is working in tandem with Premier Inn, designing expansions across the region.
Preston
Plans submitted to Preston City Council are seeking consent to construct a three-storey extension to the existing 67-bedroom Premier Inn on Bluebell Way, adding 20 bedrooms across three floors.
In addition, permission for the conversion of the hotel’s existing restaurant space into 32 bedrooms across its two floors is being sought. A breakfast room would remain on the ground floor of the refurbished building.
Three bedrooms would be lost due to the expansion, meaning the net gain of bedrooms would be 29. This would bring the hotel’s capacity up to 116 bedrooms.
The net additional gross internal floorspace of the extension would be 2,876 sq ft.
To view the application, use the reference 06/2024/1065 on Preston City Council’s planning portal.
Sale
Trafford Council will consider a similar application from Premier Inn to alter a hotel off Carrington Lane in Sale.
Plans are to demolish the hotel’s existing restaurant to build a two-storey annexe on the restaurant’s footprint.
A breakfast room on the ground floor of the extension would serve Premier Inn guests in lieu of the restaurant.
The replacement building would create an additional net 43 bedrooms, and provide a net additional gross floorspace of 2,766 sq ft.
To view the application, use the reference 113914/FUL/24 in Trafford Council’s planning portal.
In July, Whitbread had stated it wanted to build at least 24 new hotel sites in the North West.
Various applications in the region have been submitted aiming to expand existing and develop new sites, such as in West Didsbury, at the MIX Manchester development, and the 229-bedroom hotel being constructed on Rochdale Road in Manchester.
Whitbread has been contacted for comment.
We really wish some of these would include genuinely accessible rooms (with hoists) I have asked Whitbread about this numerous times and they just ignore emails.
There really should be a rule that, in order to get permission for extra rooms, at least one of them should be fully accessible.
There are thousands of people in the UK who need hoists, and very very few hotels that provide this.
By Kathy Standing