Hotel would help Riverview become tourism centre: mayor

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The Town of Riverview is looking for commercial developers and landowners who are interested in building the town’s first hotel, which the mayor says would bring big benefits.

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“We are looking at more residential growth and commercial opportunities in Riverview to ease the burden on taxpayers,” Mayor Andrew LeBlanc said Thursday. LeBlanc said a hotel in Riverview would help promote tourism business, sports tournaments, conventions and special events.

With a population of over 20,000, Riverview is New Brunswick’s fifth largest municipality and part of the Moncton-Riverview-Dieppe Census Metropolitan Area that was named by Statistics Canada as the second-fastest growing area in Canada. Several new apartment buildings are now rising in Riverview, and construction has begun on a $39-million recreation complex that will include swimming pools, indoor sports field and meeting rooms. The complex will be next to the Mill Creek Nature Park and new residential neighbourhoods.

This week, the town released its “Hotel Market Study Executive Summary,” which makes the case for private developers to consider it a place to build a hotel. The study recommends a 60-room, limited-service hotel with features like food service, fitness centre, guest laundry, market pantry and possibly a swimming pool. The study says the hotel could have occupancy rates of up to 70 per cent by 2030, with nightly rates at $150.93.

The study says people using the hotel would include commercial travellers, vacationing families, conventions and special groups, sports teams and “bleeders,” which are travellers who come for business and stay a few extra days for leisure time.

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Riverview is on the south side of the Petitcodiac River, with two bridges connecting to Moncton. The Gunningsville Bridge is a short distance from Moncton’s Avenir Centre, which is home to the Moncton Wildcats and regularly hosts concerts and special events. There are several hotels within walking distance of the Avenir Centre, including the Hyatt Place and Crowne Plaza.

Riverview is also the gateway to Route 114, the link to the Hopewell Rocks, Fundy National Park and other tourist attractions. LeBlanc said bringing more visitors to Riverview would help support local businesses.

“We’ve built the business case for a hotel and now we’re hoping to partner with developers to take it across the finish line,” LeBlanc said. The town offers commercial development grants to help businesses with the costs.

The mayor said a location hasn’t been established, but there are many properties in the eastern part of Riverview near the Gunningsville Bridge and Bridgedale Boulevard, where the recreation centre is taking shape next to the nature park and walking trails.

Because Riverview doesn’t have a hotel, it isn’t officially part of Destination Moncton-Dieppe, a tourism marketing agency founded in 2021 that is funded by a levy on hotel rooms. Destination Moncton-Dieppe has a website that provides information on tourist attractions, restaurants, hotels and special events in the region.

LeBlanc said Riverview would like to be part of the Destination Moncton-Dieppe for the benefits of regional tourism marketing.

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There are now over 3,100 hotel rooms in the Moncton region, and the tourism business continues to grow, said Jillian Somers, CEO of Destination Moncton-Dieppe.

“We are funded through a levy on hotels by the two participating municipalities – Moncton and Dieppe – but we represent a large portion of the region that will be travel motivators to bring people to stay here,” Somers said. The agency already promotes tourist sites and businesses in Riverview, along with its link to Bay of Fundy tourism. The website also promotes tourism in Shediac and other communities.

“We are representing the entire region and are funded by the municipalities. If Riverview had that funding mechanism and wanted to partner with the other municipalities, we’d be open to that. The only reason Riverview isn’t participating from a functional perspective is because they don’t have a mechanism to collect the levy, because they don’t have a hotel,” Somers said.

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