72-room hotel to go before council

PORTARLINGTON’S planned Drooping Sheoak hotel and function centre is set to remain at four storeys plus a rooftop terrace in designs soon to hit the desk of council officers.

Developer Bill Votsaris said project planners were finalising a formal application to present to the City of Greater Geelong (COGG) within weeks, which would keep the initial building height despite community concerns, and committed to an “architecturally pleasing design”.

Mr Votsaris, who is director of Batman Management Group, which has proposed the hotel build, presented to Portarlington Community Association (PCA) meeting last week to provide information and field questions about the development.

“Overall, we got a good reception for the plans,” he said.

“The objective is to explain and for people to make an informed decision, and the only way they can do that is it for us to explain to them rather than seeing a drawing on a website.”

While the community is broadly in support, residents raised concerns about the development’s towering height and potential clash with Portarlington’s natural features.

Mr Votsaris said after the meeting that he remained confident the planned hotel would remain amicable to its surrounds.

“I acknowledge that some people have expressed their view of the number of levels.

“Because of where (the building is) positioned and it already being two levels below the buildings across the road because of the slope, we think we will stay with the design we’ve got.

“We’ve chosen to only build on 30 per cent of the land, and as we go up each level to set it back to create an architecturally more pleasing building, rather than plonk something with a huge footprint.

“(The meeting) gave me a lot of confidence that the overwhelming majority of the community are in support.”

Batman has previously hosted consultation sessions late last year. It also invites public submissions on its project website, where it publishes up-to-date plans.

PCA president Geoff Fary said the group welcomed the local developer’s collaborative approach and the opportunity for PCA members to present “strong opinions, some in favour and some against” the project.

Mr Fary said PCA would likely refrain from taking a formal position on the project unless it achieved a consensus from its members – as it did when it opposed a proposed waterfront apartment development that was officially scrapped in December.

Mr Fary said the association instead encouraged members to make individual submissions.

Drooping Sheoak would be a 72-room, seven-star hotel on Portarlington Road, which developers say would provide a marquee tourism attraction and conference centre for its town and the wider Bellarine Peninsula.

The project would also include a wellness centre, new hospitality opportunities and open space to complement the opposite Portarlington Recreation Reserve.

Mr Votsaris said he had given planning consultants the green light to lodge a permit application with COGG, once they collated final reports for the proposal.