$120M hotel announced for airport site

The multinational hospitality firm, Northland Properties, will build a six storey, 245-room hotel and parkade on the Kelowna Airport property.

It’s part of expansion plans for the airport that aim to increase annual passenger numbers from 2 million to 3.5 million over the coming two decades.

The Canadian company owns Moxies and Denny’s restaurants, Sandman Hotels, Revelstoke Mountain Resort and the Dallas Stars NHL franchise, among many other brands.

They will construct one of their 4.5 star luxury Sutton Place hotels a short walk across from the expanded terminal building.

The development will feature a 1,000 vehicle parkade, 800 of the spaces to be covered.

The work is expected to start in 2025 and will take about three years to finish.

“If you look at Kelowna and the entire Okanagan region, it’s really taking off, “ Northland Properties President and Chief Operating Officer Steve Sammut said at a media event Wednesday. “Our values are: we love people, we love connection, we love challenge, we love growth.”

Sammut said the city’s expansion plans for the airport mirror those values.

Among many amenities on offer, he said the hotel will feature a large restaurant highlighting local cuisine and wines.

YLW CEO Sam Samaddar said the hotel and parkade would elevate the airport into “a different class.”

Also, the parkade allows for the preservation of valuable space for future expansion by building vertically as opposed to a large horizontally built parking lot.

“The Sutton Place hotel will offer luxury brand services right on the airport campus and literally just a few minutes’ walk from the terminal building,” he said.

This $120 million project on top of over $100 million in various work around the airport and terminal represents the largest cluster of infrastructure investment in YLW’s history.

Check out the video for renderings of the project.

(Story by Glenn Hicks/Kelowna10)