With Tourism Ireland’s latest SOAR report now published, an emphasis has been put on Ireland’s hotel industry to pursue new hotel development in Dublin City.

 Tourism Ireland’s Situation and Outlook Analysis Report revealed that although Ireland has received 160,000 more arrivals from January to August this year than last, accommodation capacity constraints in key areas are a major barrier to future growth. Intelligence reports have shown that business is strong from overseas visitors and bookings and performance are ahead of last year.

 According to Dan O’Connor, senior vice-president at JLL, “New hotel rooms are urgently needed in Dublin City and we welcome the publication of Fáilte Ireland's latest SOAR report which calls for new hotel supply now."

The SOAR report shows that, despite a decline in UK arrivals, total overseas arrivals to Ireland from January to August show a record 6.7 million visitors, which is an increase of 2.5%. This would be largely due to the arrival of North American visitors which is up 18%. This increase shows that North Americans have overtaken the traditional UK visitors in terms of revenue spent.

 

With only five hotels opening this decade in the Dublin City Centre and only one new hotel opening this year, JLL are calling upon all stakeholders in the industry, including developers, lenders, hoteliers and planning authorities to encourage and pursue new hotel development in Dublin city centre now.

 

Dan O'Connor added, "With one of the highest hotels occupancy levels of any European city, new hotel supply is necessary to cater for the significant leisure, corporate and group demand now facing Dublin city. We will lose out on millions of spend for the capital, if we don't deliver new hotel and apart-hotel supply swiftly."