IPSWICH: Budget hotel chain Travelodge is to open a new hotel in the heart of Ipswich, creating 20 jobs.

Travelodge has exchanged contracts on the Duke Street site, which had been in receivership and is currently a car parking site. The firm says it expects its new acquisition to become one of its “top-performing” hotels.

The hotel, which will be next-door-but-one to the street’s Loch Fyne restaurant, will have 87 beds and a bar/caf�.

There will also be a 16,000sq ft retail unit on the ground floor and car parking space for 58 vehicles.

It is expected to open in the summer of 2012.

The company said 20 jobs will be created at the hotel, with all the entry-level roles being filled through Job Centre Plus (JCP).

Travelodge has a national partnership with JCP, providing pre-employment training for successful candidates from the local long-term unemployed, enabling them to gain the skills and confidence they often need to re-enter the workforce.

Tony O’Brien, UK development director for Travelodge, said: “We have long-identified Ipswich as a location we would like to be at the heart of. The Marina development, ambitious plans for the university and number of businesses in town mean there are clearly not enough hotel rooms available to meet the existing demand.

“We expect our new Ipswich Central hotel to open in the summer of 2012 and I have no doubt this will soon prove to be one of our top performing hotels.”

Between January and July, Travelodge has exchanged contracts for 22 new hotels across the UK, spending a total of around �165million.

Forty-three hotels with a total of 4,280 rooms, are currently being built, and 21 of the properties are expected to open before the end of the year.

Travelodge was originally intending to take up a site up the road at Regatta Quay, but the plans were scrapped last year after site developers City Living Development went into administration.

Ipswich-based Barnes Construction is the design and build contractor for the new hotel.