James Packer’s Crown hopes for Queensbridge planning exemption

Crown Resorts will need special treatment from the Victorian government to get its Southbank apartment tower approved.

Crown Resorts is hoping to build a 313m-high tower with 680 apartments and a 388-room hotel on the Melbourne site.

James Packer’s Crown Resorts will need special treatment from the Victorian government if its plan for a $1.5 billion hotel and apartment tower in Melbourne’s Southbank is to be approved.

Crown and its joint venture partner, Schiavello Group, had chosen designs by British ­architects Wilkinson Eyre for ­another hotel and apartment tower to be built on its Melbourne resort site.

The plans include a 313m-high tower with 680 apartments and a 388-room hotel. It will be called the Queensbridge Hotel Tower.

But the planned project does not comply with interim planning controls that Victorian Planning Minister Richard Wynne introduced in August for proposals in the CBD and Southbank.

The controls limit the amount space that a developer can apply to build on a site for the next 12 months while the government considers a long-term policy.

New development applications would be required to comply with a plot-ratio of 24:1, meaning the floor space of a project could not exceed 24 times the area of the site.

Crown plans to submit its planning proposal over the next few weeks.

Mr Wynne has the authority to exempt certain projects from the interim controls if it is of significance to the state.

“There is yet to be a permit put to the minister to decide. Mr Wynne said the project would be assessed on its merit,” a spokeswoman for the minister said.

Mr Wynne has flagged that Melbourne needs more hotel rooms and has this year approved the development of about 1400.

The government is also considering exempting Cbus Property’s 447 Collins Street plans from the interim controls.

Crown’s application will first be considered by the City of ­Melbourne council, which will refer its position on the project to Mr Wynne, who will make the final decision on its approval.

Lord Mayor Robert Doyle ­yesterday added that Melbourne needs more hotel rooms if it is to keep attracting international ­conferences.

But Mr Doyle said that air bridges, which Crown’s plans have, were “problematic” and “there would have to be a very good reason for it”.

“I don’t mind about height — that doesn’t worry me — what I care about is the human scale and what happens when the building hits the footpath,” he said. “Does it activate the street? Is it an architectural contribution?”

If all goes to plan for Crown, the project will be completed by 2020.