World leaders to take over city
Fears Auckland won’t have accommodation to handle huge week in global spotlight
Atourism leader is warning big events in 2021 will put strain on Auckland hotels and need to be promoted carefully to avoid damaging the sector.
The America’s Cup will be sailed early in the year and the Apec leaders’ meeting will “take over Auckland” in November, when planned new hotels may not be finished.
It is estimated 10,000 delegates and 3000 media will be in the city for leaders’ week — the highlight of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation event.
While the event’s organisers are confident the city will cope, Tourism Industry Aotearoa chief executive Chris Roberts said even if the reported new hotel developments were finished in time, Auckland would struggle to accommodate Apec and the usual number of visitors at that time of year.
“For the government delegations they’re talking about 9000 rooms — it’s not far off requiring every possible hotel room, including those which haven’t been built yet,” he said.
There had been consultation on how to meet the demand.
“There are very strong imperatives to get it right because it would be very embarrassing to not meet a basic requirement such as having enough rooms for all these delegates.”
Research by real estate firm CBRE has found that based on the current pipeline of hotels planned or under construction, there would be an extra 2200 rooms in the city by January 2021 — just before the scheduled America’s Cup racing — on top of the current supply of 10,000 rooms.
“Our probability adjusted pipeline suggests that only 1900 will be constructed of which 1000 are currently under construction,” said Peter Hamilton.
“In saying this, timing of delivery will be the major risk factor for 2021 as the majority of hotel projects currently under construction have suffered delays, with the America’s Cup less than two and a half years away and 900-1200 rooms in the pipeline that haven’t commenced construction Chris Roberts, Tourism Industry Aotearoa
it is becoming increasingly difficult to meet the proposed completion dates.”
Roberts said the Government would encourage public servants to stay out of Auckland in that period but other people would need to travel to Auckland and be accommodated.
Among Apec’s 21 members are the US, China and Russia, whose leaders and their big delegations could take over entire hotels.
“The logistics are quite significant and that’s why planning has started three years out. Displacement is a major concern — we know that from other events like this,” said Roberts.
Leaders’ week runs from November 8-14 and travellers needed to know there would be rooms free either side of it.
“If the market thinks that Auckland is full with Apec for the month of November then we risk having the situation where we have nobody around for three weeks and being extremely busy for one.”
Auckland Tourism, Events and Economic Development says the city will be propelled into the global spotlight during the big week.
The city successfully hosted Apec in 1999 and since that time had built a reputation for hosting a diverse range of global major events, said destination general manager Steve Armitage.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade said Apec would be the biggest event hosted by the Government.
“We are working closely with a range of partners, including central and local government agencies, iwi, commercial partners and business interests to showcase New Zealand to the world,” said Andrea Smith, Mfat deputy secretary for Apec 2021.
They were optimistic Auckland would handle the influx of visitors.
It’s not far off requiring every possible hotel room, including those which haven’t been built yet.