For anybody arriving late in Abingdon there is a list of Hotels and B&Bs on the A Board outside the Town Council Information Centre. (Thanks to DM for the comment yesterday. The Four Pillars has been recently renamed as the Oxford Abingdon Hotel. Maybe I should have sent the MG to Sandford on Thames.)
Still missing from the Abingdon list is the Upper Reaches which is looking overgrown as well as boarded up. The Vale of White Horse District Council own the land and could well be on the case. The hotel has an excellent location beside the River Thames.
Just to clarify the Vale own the freehold to the land, but there is an 86 year lease on the site to caparo who own a small hotel chain. Caparo are owned by the Paul family who have steel (in receivership) and property interests.
We all know really.. this is going to be more flats / houses..
The restaurant has an old, illuminated, undershot waterwheel, surely this is listed!
I agree…a grwat place for some more flats. Just think of all that extra council tax!
As previously said on here the waterwheel and part of the building where the bar/restaurant was are listed, the rest is newer and was added so is not. Personally I’d like it to stay as a restaurant/hotel, surely someone can make a success of it unless the illuminati at the council have already decided it’s fate and as has also been said here won’t the town need more hotel beds when all the building in the north of the town goes ahead? All this selling off of stuff will come back to haunt them at some stage. I’m sure developers are also salivating over the thought of the football ground over the bridge potentially being available through disuse and what to build on a site that floods on an almost yearly basis.
I do know that negotiations are going on with “Mr Paul” regarding the purchase of the lease from him, if it goes through it will remain as a hotel
Unless the Vale change the length of the lease then it may not make a good purchase to a builder, offering luxury riverside apartments for sale with just 80+ years left on the lease does not sound appealing.