The owners of the Palm Reef Hotel property have submitted new plans to the Planning Department, which if approved, would allow them to demolish the hotel and build 24 residential homes on the site.

Previous plans submitted called for 41 homes for "upper middle management accommodation'' coupled with a two-storey office block.

Now the potential developer wants to build only three-bedroom homes on the property, a swimming pool, a 38-berth marina, and a boat fuelling station. The new plans were submitted by Beam Ltd., owned by Alan Burland.

The homes will be built in two separate blocks with staggered stories with two, three and four levels.

Beam Ltd. also wants to redesign Darrell's Wharf by expanding it with a new pavilion.

Palm Reef owners John Jefferis, Emilio Barbieri and Bridget Marshall closed the 70-room Palm Reef Hotel in November, citing a lack of business. The planning application letter submitted by architects Cooper & Gardner states that the owners want to sell the property, which is currently used as a boarding house for construction workers.

"Bermuda's economic environment reveals a current trend to recycle older hotel properties to satisfy an increasing housing need,'' the letter states.

"This (plan) provides for an efficient use of land resources. Hotel beds are accounted for by upgrading those properties that are viable to increase occupancy and by building a new hotel product on a variety of sites.'' The letter adds that the proposed homes will "satisfy an urgent need for housing at the upper level of the market''.

Mr. Jefferis, Mr. Barbieri and Ms Marshall purchased the Harbour Road hotel from the Warwick Hotel Company -- principally owned by Kenneth DeFontes and Conrad Englehardt -- in 1989.

BUSINESS BUC PLANNING PLN