Schevening pier may be saved, serious potential buyer found

An un-named but serious candidate has come forward to buy Scheveningen pier, local broadcaster Omroep West said on Wednesday.

The broadcaster bases its claim on a report by the curators who have been trying to find a buyer since 2013.

Although around 100 groups and organisations came forward to buy the pier, just three serious candidates emerged, the receivers’ report says.

One of the three is thought to be a combination of EasyHotel and property developer KondorWessels but it is not clear if this is the signatory to the declaration of intent, the broadcaster said.

EasyHotel is a budget hotel chain run by EasyJet founder Stelios Haji-Ioannou. The company raised £24.5m for its European expansion plans in June.

Two years

Scheveningen pier was declared bankrupt at the beginning of 2013 after its owner, hotel and catering family Van der Valk, failed to find a buyer. Efforts to find an owner through an auction also flopped.

The pier was put up for sale in March 2013 but parts of it were closed to the public in November because it was no longer considered safe.

The Van der Valks bought the pier in 1991 for the symbolic amount of one guilder.

The current pier dates from 1961. The original pier, designed in 1900 and stretching 380 metres into the sea, was destroyed by the Germans during World War II.

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