BOURNEMOUTH’S Wessex Hotel is due to close early in the new year in preparation for demolition.

This summer developer Inland Homes was granted permission to demolish the building and construct a replacement 215-bed hotel and 88 flats in two blocks.

The scheme, in West Cliff Road, proved controversial with users of the current hotel’s ballroom, as the new building will not have the same facilities.

The current hotel will close on January 2.

Inland Homes has applied to alter a condition imposed by the town’s planning board which requires that the hotel be in operation before the flats can be occupied.

The firm says this will leave it at the mercy of the hotel operator when seeking to recoup its costs for construction of the three blocks and the underground parking planned across the site.

In a letter to the council’s planning department Greg Cooper, director of planning consultants Metropolis, states: “The developer will have completed the hotel construction but will then be waiting for the hotel operator to take up possession, complete the fit out, train staff and open the hotel.

“Given that the cash flow of the project is heavily weighted at the front end of the construction for the basement the additional delay has a very undesirable effect on cash flow since all of the construction cost will have been expended but no sales completed.”

He adds: “Whilst the council’s desire to ensure that the hotel is delivered is understood the current wording of the condition is in danger of preventing any development from advancing.”

Inland Homes is proposing to alter the wording so that the hotel building need only be ready for occupation, rather than in use, before the flats can be occupied. Borough planners are considering the scheme.

The company has claimed the current hotel is not viable as it barely covers its operating costs, and its sprawling size makes it expensive to maintain.