News / Clifton
Avon Gorge £1m hotel rejected
Published in the Daily Telegraph; Friday, October 15 1971
Plans to build a £1 million hotel in the Avon Gorge, Bristol, have been rejected by Mr Walker, Secretary for the Environment.
The 126-bedroom hotel would have been built alongside Brunel’s Clifton Suspension Bridge.
is needed now More than ever
The solid mass of the hotel would detract from the delicate charm of the bridge and seriously interfere with views of the gorge, said Mr Walker.
He ordered legal proceedings to revoke outline planning permission granted by Bristol City Council to the Grand Hotel Co. last February.
Mr Walker stepped in to settle the row after national and local societies objected to the scheme and the way they said it had been rushed through.
The company made application on January 6 and was given planning permission on February 3. It hoped to qualify for a £126,000 Government grant by starting work before March 31.
Now the hotel company is expected to demand substantial compensation for the work it carried out including a geological survey, after being given the go-ahead.
Normally when a local authority revokes its own planning permission, it pays any compensation.
But a spokesman for Bristol Council said: “There is sure to be a legal battle over who will pay, the council or the Government.”
The fight against the hotel was led by the Save the Avon Gorge Campaign who seat more than 1,500 letters of protest to Mr Walker.
The campaign secretary, Mr Gordon Priest, lecturer in architecture at Bristol University, commented: “We are extremely pleased.”
Over 20 people spoke against the scheme at the public inquiry including Sir John Betjeman.
Photo courtesy of Redcliffe Press. For more on this scheme and others that never were, read Eugene Byrne’s book, Unbuilt Bristol: The city that might have been, 1750-2050
Read more: Victorian steps restored at Avon Gorge gully
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