Hillingdon has approved 128 hotel rooms on Bath Road that were already built and, officers said, not lawful. Nobody objected. The council gets £324,898.

Hillingdon’s planning committee has granted permission for a four-storey, 128-bedroom hotel extension on Bath Road in Harlington that has already been built, and which the council’s own officers say is not lawful.

The decision was taken on Tuesday 15 September. It was one of eight applications before the committee that night, and all eight were approved. (Printed decisions, Hillingdon Planning Committee, 15 September 2026)

The site is the Novotel at 234 Bath Road, about five miles south-east of Uxbridge and 200 metres north of Heathrow, in the Heathrow Villages ward. The applicant is Nine Heathrow Ventures Ltd.

What went wrong, in the council’s own words

The officer report sets out a sequence going back more than a decade.

  • September 2015: permission granted to convert the existing office building into a 159-bedroom hotel.
  • 9 December 2016: permission granted for a four-storey extension holding 108 rooms, linked to the main hotel by a covered bridge.
  • November 2019: drainage works started on site. That would normally count as starting the 2016 permission, but the applicant had not discharged several pre-commencement conditions, and had not complied with obligations in the accompanying section 106 agreement.
  • 12 May 2026: on the council’s most recent site visit, the extension was found to be largely built, including the frame, the basement and the second-floor link bridge, with external materials already fixed to the elevations.

What has gone up is not what was approved. The report says the built development “substantially differs from the approved plans”, most notably because a basement was constructed that was never consented, and dormer windows were put into the roof to create additional bedrooms. The application the committee approved is for 128 rooms, 20 more than the 2016 permission allowed.

The conclusion in the report is blunt: “the structures constructed on site are not lawful”. The retrospective application was submitted to regularise the work. (Officer report, 41331/APP/2025/3250, Hillingdon Planning Committee, 15 September 2026)

Timeline of the Novotel Bath Road site: 2015 office converted to a 159-bedroom hotel, December 2016 permission for a 108-room extension, November 2019 works start without conditions discharged, May 2026 council finds the building largely complete, September 2026 committee approves 128 rooms retrospectively
The planning history of 234 Bath Road, from the officer report to the committee. Graphic by Uxbridge News.

Nobody objected

The council wrote to 154 neighbouring properties on 22 January 2026, posted site notices on 27 January and advertised the application in the local press the same day.

No representations at all were received from members of the public. Transport for London, Heathrow Airport, NATS, the council’s noise officer and the other statutory consultees raised no objection, several of them subject to conditions.

What the council gets for it

Permission is not issued yet. The committee approved the scheme subject to a section 106 agreement covering four things:

  • £175,309.16 towards an employment strategy and training scheme
  • £74,589 towards air quality
  • £75,000 towards Active Travel Zone improvements
  • a Hoppa bus strategy, setting out how the Heathrow Hotel Hoppa service will reach the site

That comes to £324,898.16 in cash. If the legal agreement is not finalised within six months, officers have delegated authority to refuse the application instead, on the grounds that the development would not have mitigated its impacts on air quality, skills and sustainable travel.

The car park is the part residents will notice

The hotel, as extended, will have 287 bedrooms and 57 car parking spaces, including seven disabled bays, plus five taxi bays, 16 motorcycle spaces and two coach bays. That is down from the 133 spaces consented when the offices became a hotel in 2015, a reduction of 76.

The rooms in the extension come with no parking at all beyond disabled bays. Officers accepted this on the basis that it pushes guests towards public transport.

One condition matters more than the rest for Harlington. The report notes that the car park is currently open to the public and not restricted to hotel guests. A car park management plan, to be approved before the extension is first used, will restrict it to guests, which officers say is needed to stop the site being used for long-stay airport parking.

The transport statement estimates the whole development generates 105 vehicle trips in the morning peak and 98 in the evening. The extra 20 bedrooms in this application, over the 108 already consented, account for roughly 3.8 additional two-way trips at peak.

What it means for you

If you live near Bath Road, the practical changes are the parking restriction and the Hoppa bus link, and neither takes effect until the section 106 is signed. Until then the permission does not exist, and the buildings on site remain unlawful on the council’s own assessment.

The wider point is about enforcement. The report records the breaches plainly but does not record any enforcement action over them, and the council’s route to resolving a building that is already up is to grant permission for it after the fact. We track planning decisions across the borough on our Uxbridge planning news page.

Everything else the committee approved that night

All eight items were approved as recommended.

  • The Barn Hotel, Ruislip (7969/APP/2024/2451 and the linked listed building consent): 71 homes, none of them affordable, on the site of the Grade II listed hotel. We covered the report in detail in Barn Hotel Ruislip: 71 homes, none affordable.
  • Homebase, Victoria Retail Park, Victoria Road, Ruislip (50209/APP/2026/372): continued use as a retail unit including food sales, with external alterations and demolition of the garden centre lean-to.
  • Holland and Holland Shooting School, Northwood (16568/APP/2026/703): demolition of site buildings other than the retained timber-framed barn, a new workshop building, a new pond and biodiversity works.
  • 13 Clammas Way, Uxbridge (43721/APP/2026/871): subdivision into two two-bedroom flats with extensions.
  • 42 Pield Heath Road, Colham and Cowley (17611/APP/2026/400): first-floor rear extension and a single-storey infill.
  • Land west of Abbotswood Way, Wood End (76551/APP/2026/1578): new landscaping and public realm works.

Sources