Why the Westin is a bad idea in Margaret River

Margaret River: a beautiful area that covers 2243 square kilometres of the Western Australian coast with many beautiful beaches, hiking trails and wonderful activities. It welcomes around 1.6 million visitors a year, but, unfortunately, there were two massive forest fires in 2011 and 2021 respectively, one in Gnarabup and one in the Mammoth Cave. These fires devastated the surrounding environment, revealing how the beautiful area is vulnerable to many outside harms.

In 2020 the Westin hotel Gnarabup was announced for planned completion in 2023. It would comprise 121 rooms and the full suite of facilities you would associate with a 5 star hotel, and the community was NOT happy. The hotel, it was argued, was a dangerous hazard, a threat to the natural habitat surrounding it and should not be built.

1. Bushfires

As mentioned earlier, in 2011 there was a horrible bushfire. The exits were too dangerous to use and therefore many people had to find shelter at the white elephant coffee store. The hotel would draw more tourists to the local infrastructure and so if there were to be another bush fire - this time it could be catastrophic. 

1. Pollution

Since many people would be taking a car to the hotel with the nearest major airport being Perth, the amount of carbon dioxide released into the air will be substantially higher; this would impact heavily on an already fragile ecosystem and possibly kill lots of trees. It will heavily pollute the area and potentially turn a beautiful beach village into polluted muck.

1. Disruption of business 

In Margaret River, two of the main industries are restaurants and short-term holiday homes on websites like AirBnB. The restaurants will lose business due to overcrowding that makes it an uncomfortable atmosphere, and will eventually start to lose customers. The Westin will most likely have other venues including restaurants which will crush the smaller businesses. Also, an average Airbnb makes 52,753.86 SGD annually, which some rely on as their main source of income. The hotel will host around 400 people at full capacity, which will take away customers from these AirBnB owners, thus ruining one of Gnarabup’s biggest businesses. 

In conclusion, the Westin hotel is a hazard to the life of hundreds of people, a massive contributor to global warming and a potential killer of many businesses. The locals, and this writer, are united in their belief that it should simply not be built.