New World resumes Kowloon hotel plan

New World Development has resumed its plan to build a 60-storey hotel next to the New World Centre in Tsim Sha Tsui as demand surges for five-star hotel rooms.

Taking into account the improved economy and an anticipation of growing tourism in Hong Kong, the company was reviewing the plan initiated in the late 1990s, a spokesman said, adding the project was expected to start next year but no timetable had been finalised.

With a gross floor area of about one million square feet, the hotel investment is estimated at $2 billion to $3 billion.

New World originally proposed building a 500-room five-star hotel as part of its New World Centre extension in the late 1990s which also involved knocking down the 130,000 sqft East Wing office building. However, the plan was postponed when the local economy slowed after the regional financial crisis.

New World Centre, covering a site area of 424,000 sqft, is a residential-hotel-commercial complex providing a floor area of about 2.52 million sqft.

'We are now reviewing the project as demand for hotel rooms increases,' the spokesman said.