Crucial talks over hotel plan

Crucial talks are to be held over the future of a planned multi-million pound hotel in Shrewsbury after the application was called in by regional government planners.

A meeting between council officials, English Heritage and developers is to be held to address EH concerns about the scale and design of the nine-storey 111-bedroom hotel on the site of the former Telephone House in Smithfield Road. 

It follows a Shrewsbury and Atcham Borough Council development control meeting last night when the hotel bid was deferred.

Councillors were told that the Government Office of the West Midlands had sent a letter to planners instructing SABC not to grant permission without specific authorisation. 

Ian Kilby, borough planning services manager, today said there had been “strong objections” from English Heritage but claimed applicant Dunedin wanted to sort out the issues.

Mr Kilby said: “They want to arrange to meet with us and English Heritage to hear the concerns and have an opportunity to see if there is scope for an agreement to be reached between the parties or whether the concerns are so fundamental that there would not be a mutually acceptable agreement.

“Initially English Heritage’s concerns are about the scale of the development and its design.”

Mr Kilby said it was possible that an alternative scheme may be drawn up by Dunedin.

Speaking at last night’s council meeting Mr Kilby said the Government Office of the West Midlands did not necessarily agree with the views of English Heritage but considered the issues to be “fairly substantive”.