Shoptop Hotel Plan Filed for Botany Bay

Sydney developers are planning an eight-storey, 104-room hotel on a beachfront site in Ramsgate, overlooking Botany Bay.

The $78-million mixed-use development application now before the Bayside Council envisages a three-storey podium and four-storey hotel, all on top of a rebuilt Coles supermarket, other retail, and food and drink facilities.

Ciaran Goodman’s Sydney-based Bronxx is behind the hotel development. The award-winning developer-builder has made its name in the past decade with luxury apartments, mostly in Sydney’s eastern suburbs.

The hotel will be built across eight adjoining lots—totalling 4479sq m—on the corner of The Grand Parade and Ramsgate Road in front of Ramsgate Beach, about 15km south of the Sydney CBD.

In answers to written questions, director Goodman said Bronxx would be the owner of the site, with the purchase expected to settle at the end of the year.

“We live and work in this area. And as proud locals we at Bronxx are excited to be proposing what will become a magnificent amenity for all of Sydney’s south to enjoy,” Goodman said.

A Coles supermarket, built in 1977, will be demolished under the proposal, and then rebuilt with a slightly bigger, 2900sq-m floorspace on the ground floor of the new development.

In a statement of environmental effects accompanying the application, town planners Planning Ingenuity said the existing supermarket “is of poor architectural design, has reached the end of its economic life and contributes little to the character of the locality”.

▲ The submission says the supermarket contributes little to the character of the locality.

The second podium level will include a restaurant, gymnasium, spa, office space, more retail and a swimming pool. Two basement levels will provide parking for 204 cars.

A second pool will be part of a rooftop garden and recreation area.

However, to achieve that, the developers are asking Bayview to waive height restrictions and allow the development to rise about 10m higher than gazetted.

At a meeting in late July, and prior to the submitted application, the council noted their local environmental plan allowed for a height of 20.5m in the area. However, the main part of the building rises to 29.05m and the lift overrun will have a height of 31.15 metres.

Further, council controls allow for a gross floor area (GFA) of 8958 square metres. The development seeks a GFA of 10,450 square metres.

In an 11-page submission to the council, Planning Ingenuity said the variation was partly attributed to the need for adequate floor-to-ceiling clearance for a full line supermarket, which had certain pre-determined requirements.

“It has been demonstrated that the proposed development sits comfortably with the locality and provides an appropriate built form that is compatible with the varied height of buildings in the locality,” the document said.

Bayside’s heritage advisor has also asked the developer to take account of the former Ramsgate Baths—an in-ground swimming complex opened in 1924 on Botany Bay. The baths were a hub for swimming, diving and socialising for 45 years until its demolition.

In response, Planning Ingenuity said the development could “provide public art that acknowledges the former use of the site by the Ramsgate Baths through an interpretative display”.

Bronxx confirmed it had a commercial agreement in place with Coles for the ground-floor supermarket but would not discuss details.

There is no agreement over potential hotel branding. “While the project is in its early stages, we have not yet entered into any discussions,” Goodman said.

With a capital investment value of more than $30 million, the proposal is deemed a regionally significant development and, as such, will eventually be determined by the Sydney Eastern City Planning Panel.