Luxury hotel at centre of housing dispute

Alastair Robertson, The Scotsman, 13 December 2003

A country house hotel which became the star of national newspaper and magazine advertising campaigns will be shut down and converted to private homes unless its owners are allowed to build luxury £1 million homes on its surrounding estate.

Macdonald Hotels has threatened to axe the four-star Pittodrie House, near Aberdeen, along with plans for a £20 million timeshare, hotel and leisure development unless the luxury house plans are approved.

The threat, coinciding with the housing planning application, has been branded "scandalous" and "hinting at blackmail" by a former convener of Aberdeenshire Council.

Macdonald Hotels wants to build 30 luxury homes to help finance a new man-made community around the hotel on the wooded lower slopes of Bennachie, the landmark hill near Inverurie once dubbed "Aberdeenshire’s Mount Fujiyama", by an over-enthusiastic Marquess of Aberdeen.

The hotel chain’s executive chairman, Donald Macdonald, has warned: "Pittodrie House has no future without the development."

And the entire Pittodrie project, described by Mr Macdonald as "an upmarket village" including timeshare, 18-hole golf course, health spa and 40-bedroom hotel extension will be under threat. The hotel group says 84 new jobs and 40 existing jobs are at risk.

"If we don’t get permission then we would have to take a view and that would be to convert what is there already into an upmarket residential development," said Mr Macdonald.

Macdonald Hotels, which already has approval for the timeshare and leisure project envisages creating an Aberdeenshire version of Cardrona, the "new village" in the Borders.

But its planning statement emphasises the Pittodrie project is dependent on cross-funding from the luxury housing.

The prospect of what one local resident described as "a new suburbia in the countryside" has raised hackles in the nearby community of Chapel of Garioch.

Colin Millar, a former councillor and Aberdeenshire Council convener, said the hotel firm’s "unfortunate" remarks appeared to be trying to put pressure on the council.

"I thought it was scandalous to be essentially hinting at blackmail. It will not endear [Macdonald Hotels] to councillors."

Robert Smith, a lifetime resident in the area and managing director of an Azerbaijan-based oil service company who has circulated valid grounds for objection to other residents, asked: "Should our community be directed by a corporate entity based in Bathgate which threatens existing local jobs if it does not get its way?"

A previous application for the houses was rejected.

But the timeshare and leisure development has been approved over the last three years because of its perceived benefits for economic development and tourism.

Macdonald Hotels says the proximity of Aberdeen Airport makes Pittodrie a European destination.

For almost 25 years, Virginia Creeper-clad Pittodrie House Hotel and its 1,200 acre estate has been an out-of-town refuge for Aberdeen’s senior business community.

Its Scottish baronial exterior, exuding tradition and permanence, has been widely used by Macdonald Hotels to help advertise some of its less architecturally attractive establishments.

Macdonald’s half-year, pre-tax profits were down 9 per cent to £6.2 million on improved turnover of £67.2 million due to war, terrorism fears and economic uncertainty affecting tourism.