The planned pullout of a key partner in a project to build a five-star Hilton hotel on Kyiv's Volodymyrska St. has further dimmed the city's hopes of seeing a quality hotel completed before the new millenium.
'Due to the lack of cooperation with the Kyiv City Administration, we cannot start the project,' Peter Wurbs, the head of Hochtief International's Ukrainian representative office, told the Post.
Hochtief holds 35 percent of the Hilton project. Their partners include a Greek company and three American firms. Together, the group had planned to invest a total of $75 million into the construction of a 368-room hotel on Volody-myrska 47-49, opposite the Opera House.
The project's Achilles Heel is what appears to be a pile of rubble lying directly on the construction site. According to the Kyiv City Administration, this gnar-led heap of crumbling rock and twisted I-beams is much more than rubble. It's a pair of historical buildings.
Ihor Shpara, the head of the Ukrainian Union of Architects, claims that there are two historical buildings situated at the construction site. The facade of one of these, he told the Post, was being eyed for reconstruction by unnamed investors. The other building was scheduled to be 'moved.' Thus, the Hilton project was completely unacceptable, according to Shpara.
Wurbs doesn't buy this. 'What they call historical buildings, we call ruins. Look at the picture,' he retorted.
Apparently, this difference in opinion is significant enough to bring down the project. 'These buildings must be transferred to the investor in a proper, legal way so that in the future no questions of ownership arise,' said Wurbs. 'It is the usual procedure for such projects.'
It may be the usual procedure but, as Hochtief and countless other foreign investors have discovered, it is anything but easy. As the city's countless building skeletons attest, snags arise that stall or terminate even the most well thought out real estate projects. Five-star hotels seem to be particularly vulnerable to such snags. A project to build a five-star Intercontinental hotel on Sofiiska square was halted last fall when an ancient cemetery was discovered near the construction site. Other problems ensued, and the project has still not resumed. Nor has any other five-star project come close to getting past the laying of the foundation.
Hochtief has met such a snag. 'We have been discussing these questions for the whole year with the City Admi-nistration,' said Wurbs. 'I do not be-lieve in the realization of this project any more.'
If Hochtief pulls out and the project collapses, Kyiv stands to lose even more than $75 million in foreign investment and a fancy hotel. Wurbs indicated that, given the troubles, Hochteif is considering taking Ukraine off its list of potential investment venues.
Not everybody in Kyiv would be unhappy to see the project collapse, however. Ihor Shpara is just one of those who loudly opposed the hotel on aesthetic grounds. He said the massive 13-story hotel, with its unconventional diagonal placement and its location almost directly across from the National Opera House, would be out of place on Volodymyrskaya street.
Indeed, designs for the hotel suggest a massive structure that would do anything but nestle innocuously behind the turn-of-the-century facades on Volodymryskaya.
Among media outlets, Kievskie Vedomosti was only the most vocal among the many newspapers that slammed the project. In a searing front page editorial, the paper not only questioned the artistic merit of the project, but quoted Kyiv Mayor Oleksandr Omelchenko as claiming that the project had been brought down by a bankrupt contractor.
Omelchenko allegedly said the contractor was found to have only $6,000 on its account balances, which led the city to refuse the deal. Wurbs said Omelchenko skewed the numbers. 'Hochtief International is a reputable company which planned the project in cooperation with reputable financial groups,' he said. 'The accusations made are ridiculous.'
Hochtief has aesthetic supporters as well, including Vyachislav Babushkin, the chief architect of Kiev. Babushkin told the Unian news agency in March of last year that 'the hotel will fit nicely into the architectural ensemble of old Kyiv.' Unian reported that the Kiev Architectural Council actually approved the project initially.
At that time, the project investors were saying the hotel would be ready by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development conference in May of this year. And now? 'We haven't given up hope,' is all Wurbs could muster.
