THE Whitsunday Regional Council and Whitsunday Chinatown Investment Pty Ltd held an official signing ceremony yesterday to finalise the sale of Council land at Waterson Way, Airlie Beach for the sum of $2.5 million to build a $300 million Chinatown development in Airlie Beach.
Mayor Jennifer Whitney said the official signing ceremony finalised the sale of the land with council receiving a 10 per cent deposit.
She said the Airlie Beach Chinatown development was for a tourism-based mixed-use development that combined a landmark hotel, short-term accommodation along with up to 100 shops and restaurants.
“Within the Airlie Beach Chinatown site the design consists of a central open-air pedestrian mall, with ground floor retail and entertainment venues, fronting an events plaza adjacent to Airlie Creek boardwalk,” she said.
Now that the land sale has been finalised, Whitsunday Chinatown Investment Pty Ltd will lodge a development application.”Once this application has been lodged with Council there is a 21 day period before the completion of the sale, the remainder of the $2.5 million will then be paid to Council and Whitsunday Chinatown Investment Pty Ltd can then commence work on their development,” Mayor Whitney said.
“Council expects Whitsunday Chinatown Investment Pty Ltd to start work at the Waterson Way block at the end of January or beginning of February 2015, subject to development approval.
“This is a very exciting time for the Whitsunday region with the Chinatown development bringing hundreds of millions of dollars of investment and thousands of jobs into our region,” she said. “This project is the largest tourism development to occur in regional Queensland in the last ten years and will create thousands of jobs, not just in the design and construction phase but also in the new precinct when it is complete.
“No other local government in Australia has been able to help deliver a project of this size to boost the economic development of their local community,” she said. President of the Whitsunday Chinatown Investment Pty Ltd, Raymond Wang, said official signing ceremonies were very significant events in China in the life of a major project.
“The signing ceremony represents the closeness of the relationship of the two parties working together for the success of the project,” Mr Wang said.
“It also emphasises a good start for the project and strengthens the partnership between the signing parties.
MARK Bell has seen plenty of “last drinks” during nearly 27 years as manager of the Airlie Beach Hotel. But on Friday night, the last drinks were for the affable publican following his recent decision to ease into semi-retirement. Paul Keating was Australia’s prime minister when Mr Bell decided to … Read more
Improved housing affordability and skyrocketing demand for rental properties is transforming the Whitsundays in to an investment paradise for buyers from southern markets, according to PRDnationwide. While data from SQM shows Sydney is experiencing its highest rental vacancy rates in 13 years, with more than 19,000 properties on the market, … Read more