The Metro Vancouver region is in dire need of hotel rooms and developers have clearly gotten the message as well, with many having now submitted new rezoning applications or altering some of their previous plans in response to this.
The latest is Bosa Properties, who recently submitted a text amendment application to the City of Vancouver pertaining to their development application for 888 West Broadway. Bosa submitted its development application for the site in 2022 and was planning a 10-storey office building and a 10-storey hotel. The rezoning application was approved in January 2023.
Bosa Properties is now seeking to revise that plan into a 15-storey hotel and an 11-storey hotel, "in response to the strong demand for hotel rooms and to support tourism, the city, and the local community," the company said in its application.
"New hotel rooms are desperately needed to address the significant shortfall," Bosa added. "Metro Vancouver faces overwhelming economic opportunity losses from the inability to meet the growing demand from tourism and businesses. Central Broadway plays a key role in gaining back more hotel capacity to provide hospitality services for tourism, businesses, and the healthcare industry."
The change is not without some irony, however, as Bosa Properties acquired the site from another developer — Centennial Hotel Ltd. — who was planning a 13-storey and 11-storey hotel project. The decision to go back to something closer to the original plans — designed by a different architect — is also indicative of how quickly the appeal of office development has changed.
With the change, the amount of hotel rooms provided by the project will increase from 156 to 396 suites. The site is currently occupied by the now-closed Park Inn and Suites, which had 117 hotel rooms, as well as the Fairview Pub.
Notably, Bosa Properties says that it has secured Hilton as the hotel operator, who will be operating under two different labels between the two towers.
The 15-storey West Tower will be under the Homewood Suites by Hilton label, which is geared towards extended stays, while the 11-storey East Tower will be under the Tapestry Collection by Hilton label, which is geared towards short-term stays. Of the 396 hotel rooms, the Homewood Suites tower will house 125 while the Tapestry Collection tower will house the remaining 271.
Despite the two different labels, however, the two will share a lobby, which will be on the rear lane rather than on W Broadway, as the rear lane allows for some surface parking to be provided. The W Broadway side of the building will then house much of the 26,000 sq. ft of commercial retail space that is also planned.
Ground level view from W Broadway and Laurel Street.(Henriquez Partners Architects / Bosa Properties)
The hotel entrance at the rear lane.(Henriquez Partners Architects / Bosa Properties)
The hotel entrance at the rear lane.(Henriquez Partners Architects / Bosa Properties)
Hotel developments in Vancouver across the past few years can be split into two main categories: ones that are primarily geared towards tourists and ones that are primarily geared towards healthcare.
The former, which are all located in downtown Vancouver, include the 30-storey hotel planned for 848 Seymour Street, the 32-storey mixed-use hotel planned for 509 Richards Street, and 33-storey hotel planned for 717 Davie Street.
The latter, which are all located in the Broadway Corridor near Vancouver General Hospital, include the 12-storey hotel planned for 901 W Broadway and this latest Bosa project.
This is the second big hotel project Bosa Properties has now undertaken this year. In January, the company announced that it was redeveloping the Listel Hotel on 1300 Robson Street into a 28-storey project with a unique mix of hotel rooms and rental homes.
This is also the second recent case of a developer looking to change their existing office plans into a hotel. In February, Thind Properties submitted an application to the City of Burnaby seeking to convert 10 floors of their completed 48-storey Highline Metrotown tower from office use to hotel use.
