Banbridge set for new five-star hotel?
A new five-star hotel has been mooted for the Banbridge area primarily to service increased visitor numbers once a proposed £24m Game of Thrones attraction opens its doors.
The GoT exhibition, which will be based at the Linen Mill Studios and feature sets, props and costumes from the hit fantasy series, is expected to attract as many as 600,000 visitors a year.
Many of the most iconic scenes from the series were filmed at the Linen Mill Studios and its makers, HBO, are involved with the studio in developing the attraction which had been set to open to the public in October.
The suggestion that a five-star hotel could be built was raised earlier this month during a meeting of Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough Council when the authority’s head of tourism, Brian Johnston, warned members that without a hotel in the vicinity, the new facilities might end up becoming a revenue generator for venues in Belfast and Dublin rather than the local region.
Deputy Lord Mayor, Kyle Savage, told the meeting that he believed a hotel would be an important facility once the new Game of Thrones attraction was in place.
And speaking to LCN this week, NI Hotels Federation chief executive, Janice Gault said that she felt a hotel development in the area would be ‘broadly welcomed’ by the hotel sector here:
‘The GoT series has real global reach and has attracted tourists to Northern Ireland who visit the many sites associated with the programme,’ she acknowledged. ‘The opening of the Linen Mills Studios could increase dwell times in local hotels in the area and may in the longer term create the need for additional hotel accommodation in the Armagh, Craigavon and Banbridge Council area. A number of schemes have been proposed in the location and this could be the driving force behind further expansion.’
No planning application has been made for a hotel at this time, but applications for the GoT-themed tour at the Linen Mill and a park-and-ride facility at Cascum Avenue in Banbridge are both still awaiting a decision by local councillors.
The tour, which should draw visitors from all over the world, was to have opened this autumn but Coronavirus-related delays mean that environmental impact displays relating to the tour itself have only just gone on display to the public.
Nevertheless, Brian Johnston recently assured councillors that the local authority was still ‘heavily invested’ in the project and that officers were regularly talking to John McGrillen of Tourism NI around support for local tourism businesses. Mr Johnston said that he understood that Tourism NI ‘really wanted the project to happen’ and therefore, was ‘putting great efforts into it’.
‘We have lots of confidence that this project will become a reality and we are very much on top of that,’ Mr Johnston told members.
Visitors to the proposed exhibition will be able to walk around the sets and view props, costumes and weapons from the show as well as learning some Game of Thrones special effects secrets.
