Two new hotels on cards

InterContinental Hotel Group is to open a 59-bedroom Hotel Indigo next autumn in the Georgian townhouses in York Place which are currently home to the Osbourne Hotel.

And it wants to build a 121-apartment long-stay hotel for business travellers on the former Shrubhill bus depot site off Leith Walk. It would operate under the Staybridge Suites brand and open in autumn 2012. The four-acre site has been an eyesore since it was sold by Lothian Buses for 12m five years ago. A series of proposals for the plot, including houses and student accommodation, have fallen through.

The latest plans are understood to involve demolition of the neighbouring masonic lodge, a new lodge built at street level and new housing and shops.