ANOTHER major hotel firm is pushing ahead with plans to move in to York.

Developers are seeking planning permission to build a 120-bed Moxy Hotel on Dundas Street, behind the Black Swan pub and next to the new Hiscox building.

The plans were first raised when investors Vastint Hospitality bought the land from Hiscox in late 2015, and a full planning application is now being considered to the city council. [See the application here]

It shows Vastint wants to build an L-shaped building, with a "rising terrace" design over three, four and five storeys.

If it goes ahead, the new hotel will have 120 rooms, and architects CSP say it will help to reinvigorate the area.

In a design and access statement prepared for the application, the architects say it will create a new public plaza.

The statement says: "The building has been configured to respond to an eclectic townscape setting and is modelled to successfully reconcile significant scale transitions between adjacent buildings on all sides. It removes a void in the urban grain and reinstates a formal streetscape to complete the enclosure of the public domain."

"The design respects the character of important heritage and landmark buildings close to the site with a distinctive architectural composition that maintains the visual clarity of buildings in the group. The proposal will therefore make a positive contribution to the setting of an important heritage asset and the evolution of a distinctive local environment."

The plans have been strongly criticised by the Guildhall planning panel, which says the new hotel building would overwhelm the historic Black Swan pub, and saying it uses materials that are not right for the area.

They added: "It even overwhelms the Hiscox building and certainly the five storeys would not even fit in with their own comparative hotel in London that is only four storeys high, we think by its size scale and massing it has no place within the city."

York Press:

Several years ago, previous plans by the council to build its own headquarters at the site sparked widespread opposition, partly due to the design of the proposed building compared to the Black Swan, parts of which date back 500 years.

Moxy's plan is the latest in a recent wave to come forward for York. 

Malmaison wants to open in the the former Aviva office building on Rougier Street, developers Northminster Ltd last week confirmed their plans for a 146-bedroom hotel on the site of the former Polar garage in Piccadilly, and last October plans were approved for a 97-bedroom apart-hotel in Terry Avenue. The Grand in Station Rise is also expanding, to add an extra 107 rooms and a 160-seat restaurant.

York's hotel strategy, published in 2014, raised concerns that there were too many hotels opening in the city, and said the focus should be on providing higher quality hotels, rather than just increased numbers.

The report said: "Even the most upbeat hoteliers who felt their product competes strongly in the current market place expressed concerns about adding too many additional hotels to the mix."