Plans have been submitted to build a 98 room hotel and spa on the edge of the National Forest in Leicestershire.
Golf club operator Sparsis Leisure wants to develop land next to Forest Hill Golf Club, Markfield Lane, Botcheston, a few miles west of Leicester.
Five years ago the owners of Leicester City Football Club briefly considered redeveloping the golf club as a site of its new training ground. Nothing came of that and the £100 million training ground was built in Seagrave in the north of the county instead.
Now Sparsis Leisure is seeking outline planning for its new proposals months after another, bigger hotel scheme, was turned down.
It would see scrubland next to the club turned into a luxury hotel resort with spa facilities, and includes wider plans to refurbish the site.
A planning application states that the golf course was an established venue for wedding functions, private parties and business conferences, but income was badly affected by the pandemic.
The owners said the hotel plan, dubbed ‘The Club at Forest Hill’ scheme, aimed to help secure the site's long-term future.
Plans for a hotel are not new, though, with a proposal for a 152-bed development and accompanying spa next to the golf course first submitted in 2020.
They were turned down last year after planning officials said they felt the scheme would have a “significant adverse effect” on the landscape and character of the area.
The new application states that the vacant brownfield land, a former landfill site that was last used as a nine-hole golf course and is now disused and overgrown scrub land, would be transformed as part of efforts to clean up “potential environmental health hazards and eyesores”.
The location of the hotel within the golf course’s grounds would “allow for minimal visual impact” from the roads, according to the application. The group said the project would also complement upgrades undertaken around the existing clubhouse.
The developer said that once complete, the hotel and surrounding projects would create more than 40 jobs, both full-time and part-time. This would include eight housekeepers and 12 staff in the kitchen, bar and restaurant.
The application says: “The provision of accommodation on site is an integral part of the overall programme but also supports the local economy and current tourism policies.
"The Club at Forest Hill will be designed to reflect high quality features, well integrated within their surroundings [and] well suited to its purpose as a place of golf and leisure coupled with a relaxed atmosphere for functions and meetings alike.”
