Star Entertainment Seeks To Expand Scope Of Its Gold Coast Project
Star Entertainment Group has announced that it has plans to expand the scope of its proposed project on the Gold Coast Jupiters Casino site.
Star stated that it intends to add a further four additional towers to the project’s master plan, making it bigger than the planned Queen's Wharf casino resort complex in Brisbane which is also being built by Star.
As of now, the renovation project for $345 million and the construction of a $500 million tower has been confirmed for the Gold Coast Jupiters project. However Star Entertainment’s managing director Matt Bekier said the company was keen to expand it further and make a bigger economic contribution to the Gold Coast.
Bekier stated that the master plan for the project was exploring the full potential of the site and it would be nice for the company to gain approval for all of its proposals at the same time so that construction work can go on simultaneously. Star is seeking to establish a dominating presence in the Gold Coast casino market before the entry of the ASF consortium which is looking to build a mega casino resort near The Spit.
The Queen Wharf is located close by and is approximately an hour’s drive from Brisbane and the Star sees the two regions as complementary to each other. The hotel facility planned in Queen’s Wharf is estimated to have 1,100 rooms. Bekier said that the capacity at the Queen’s Wharf was designed in a manner that would allow the locations in Brisbane to accommodate double the capacity of the Queen’s Wharf hotel.
In a statement Bekier said,
What we are doing here is trying to match that[Queen’s Wharf]. The idea being the typical tourist has two to three stops in Australia, the international tourist. If we have a matching capacity we can give them a modern urban experience and quite an outstanding, different, beach type experience, so we can maximize the share of the market that we get here in Queensland.
The Star Entertainment Group is primarily focusing on the affluent Chinese tourist market as China has become the top source for visitors to Australia. Casino operators across Australia are seeking to build facilities that can attract this fast-growing Chinese tourist segment. The previous government had released three additional casino licenses in a bid to ramp up facilities in the region and put it on par as a destination with other international spots.
The high-level of investment in the casino industry has potential to lead to the economic revival of Queensland, with the Star Group pouring in billions of dollars for the construction of its facilities. The company is also in the process of moving its head office to Brisbane and will create employment opportunities as well.
David WalkerAuthor
David is our resident 'down under' contributor, letting us know what is going on in the southern hemisphere, he is also keen blackjack player
