A TOWN centre hotel by Bournemouth's Lower Gardens could be converted into offices and holiday flats.

Luna Hotels has submitted a planning application for the Bourne Park Hotel in Exeter Park Road, formerly known as the Whitehall Hotel.

The scheme would see the basement and ground floor turned into offices, and the first, second and third floors become 15 holiday flats.

A statement supplied with the application, compiled by planning consultant Ken Parke, states: "The Whitehall Hotel was a relatively small hotel with limited facilities and limited potential for upgrading to secure a long term future as hotel accommodation in the current market.

"The proposals therefore seek to provide an upgraded and attractive type of tourism accommodation in the form of self-contained units which will not require the same degree of facilities as hotel accommodation."

The statement says that since the lower floors of the hotel were previously used as the "reception, bar, lounge, dining areas and so forth", with all rooms above, the application does not constitute a loss of tourism accommodation.

"The reconfiguration of the upper floors to form holiday flats does result in the loss of bed spaces where some of the former letting rooms have been given over to form lounge and kitchen areas to serve the holiday flats," Mr Parke says.

"However, when applying a pragmatic approach taking into account occupancy levels and the requirements of a holiday flat for cooking and lounge facilities it is also genuinely accepted that a lesser number of bed spaces within a holiday flats development is inevitable and is supported."

The hotel itself is highly visible from the gardens.

In 2018, Luna Hotels was granted planning permission for various changes in a bid to improve the viability of the hotel.

These included the loss of two rooms due to the creation of suites, new railings and branding and the formation of terrace areas on the lower ground floor.

Plans for a rooftop terrace were dropped when council planning officers said the "visual impact would be harmful to the setting of the gardens and the general street scene to Exeter Park Road".

At the time, council tourism officers said the loss of two rooms was justified as "the investment and upgrading of the hotel outweighs this loss".