Developer Rightacres To Develop 228 Key Hotel From Brains Brewery, Cardiff Wales

Main Photo: The former Brains Brewery in the centre of Cardiff

Date: August 2021

Name: TBA

Location: Central Quay, Cardiff, Wales

Number of Keys: 228

Seller: The site was the former Brains Brewery. In December 2020, Brains handed over the running of it’s 156 pubs via a 25 year lease-back deal to Marston’s

Buyer: The hotel will be part of the Central Quay mixed use redevelopment, but has yet to win formal approval. Other elements, including a 27 storey residential tower, and eight storey office and car park have already been approved.

A seven-storey hotel is planned on the former site of the Brains Brewery in Cardiff.

WalesOnline revealed pictures of the proposed development in 2019, and also reported on the demolition of the brewhouse later in the same year. The development will be accessed from a new junction with Penarth Road, alongside a new road to the east of the hotel linking up with Harper Street.

The council report says that Environmental Impact Assessment “will not be required to accompany any application for planning permission”.

The UK Government website explains that the aim of an assessment is “to protect the environment” by ensuring that when a local planning authority is deciding whether to grant planning permission for a project that is likely to have significant effects on the environment, it “does so in the full knowledge of the likely significant effects, and takes this into account in the decision making process.”

The report goes on to say however that the major development will require “appropriate technical reports/statements” when an application is submitted.

The report explains that one the reasons the hotel will not require an environmental assessment is because its size is less than one hectare. Another reason is that does not lie within an “environmentally sensitive area”, with no part of the site being “within a statutory designated site of conservation value”.

The scale of the building will also not be out of character with the surrounding area, it adds, and it will “integrate well with the street scene”. Furthermore, it was found that the “proposed development will not give rise to any significant residues or emissions” and the impact on biodiversity has already been assessed.

The report said waste production will be “limited”, while it also assured that levels of construction pollution and noise are to be “expected” but will not be “significant”. No parking provision is proposed for the hotel, so the area will also be car-free.

Rightacres, a family business, was Chaired by Mike McCarthy, who died in August 2020. He also owned and operated a number of hotels, including buying and extending the Royal Ivy Bush Hotel in Carmarthen, building the Stradey Park Hotel in Llanelli, the Inn on the Avenue in Cardiff (now Mercure North) and Holland House hotels in Cardiff and Bristol.

THPT Comment: Good to see this historic building being reinvented to good use, by hospitality. Unsure at this time who the operator will be….shall find out!

First Seen: Wales Online

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