Height regulations changed for new hotel
Councillors vote to allow six-storey building on Kenmount Road
St. John’s city council has voted to allow a hotel company out of British Columbia to add an extra 10 metres of height to its building to be constructed on Kenmount Road.
The application by Pacific Coast Architecure Inc. for Northwood Properties Corp. asked the city to allow it to build a six-storey hotel with a height of 23.9 metres in a zone where the maximum allowable height is 15 metres.
Council voted Monday during its regular meeting to accept an amendment to the St. John’s Development Regulations and its Municipal Plan in order to accommodate the height.
Development chairman Coun. Tom Hann told council notice of the amendments have been posted on the city’s website, advertised and property owners in the area have been notified.
Two letters were contained in Monday’s agenda — one supporting the project and one opposing it.
George Kirkland, owner of Kenmount Properties, said the development would be a significant improvement to the area.
The letter opposing the project, which has no name attached to it, appears to be from a property owner who is hoping to build a home in the area. The letter says the owner has been delayed building on Old Pennywell Road (behind the proposed hotel) due to the blasting work on the extension to the Team Gushue Highway.
“My main concern with the above amendment is considering the height elevation on Old Pennywell Road, when I build my home the people in those hotel rooms will be looking directly into my home. I do not feel anybody would feel that is an acceptable situation,” the property owner wrote to council.
The property owner also suggested traffic is a concern in the area.
Coun. Sandy Hickman agreed traffic is a problem and this new project provides a chance for council to address some of the issues on Kenmount Road.
“One of the problems we all see is the driveways accessing onto Kenmount Road. They’re all stop, turn and there’s no real highly engineered entrance and exit.
“So this would be an excellent opportunity for us to take the existing entrance off of Kenmount Road and use that for the three properties and this is what we need to do more of along Kenmount Road,” said Hickman.
The hotel proposal encompasses three properties 227, 229 and 245 Kenmount Road.
“Engineer it so that you can at least leave the road at 30 or 40 kilometres and not have to completely stop and not have three entrances,” he said asking the matter be referred to the engineering depart- ment.
Now that council has accepted the amendments, Hann said they will be sent to the Department of Municipal Affairs for approval, they’ll come back to council and an independent commissioner will be appointed to hold a public hearing.
“It is a very good development. It is Sandringham Hotels out of British Columbia, with 200 rooms, two franchised restaurants going in there and a freestanding one in the future and a banquet room. So it makes for a significant development,” he said.
The developer is also proposing to include a parking lot to accommodate 360 vehicles.
Hann pointed out the amendments are site-specific, which means they will only deal with the piece of land near Tim Hortons and Metro Place, the office used by the former St. John’s metropolitan area board on Kenmount Road, which is the area being set aside to build the hotel complex.