ANOTHER six hotels and up to 175 jobs are coming to Oxfordshire through budget hotel Travelodge.

The firm has revealed it is eyeing up two new potential hotel sites in Oxford plus others in Witney, Didcot, Abingdon, Banbury and Henley.

It is all part of a £40m expansion plan for the county by the company which has its headquarters in Thame.

Travelodge announced end-of-year results this week, showing revenue was up 13 per cent to £558m, from £494m in 2014.

Earnings for the 12 months to December 31 were more than £100m, up from £66m in 2014.

Average room rate rose by 10.2 per cent from £45.53 in 2014 to £50.19 last year.

Last month [Feb] saw the official opening of the firm’s £5.5m, 83-bed hotel on Abingdon Road.

Other Travelodge hotels are already open in Oxfordshire at Pear Tree roundabout, Burford, Bicester, Thame and Wheatley.

All five have been upgraded in the past three years, at a cost of £1.5m.

Chief executive Peter Gower said: "Oxford is managing to attract some incredibly high-profile businesses and science projects and also has enormous prestige from the university.

"There has been a resurgence of high-skilled jobs in Oxfordshire, especially through the science parks, and that is creating a feel that the county is on the move."

Mr Gower, who studied at Keble College, Oxford, also confessed the city was "not the easiest place in the world to get planning permission".

But he added: "We know they have to balance between keeping it a beautiful city but making sure it doesn't stand still.

"That makes processes more difficult and we would like them to be easier but we recognise everyone is trying to preserve the heritage of Oxford."

Oxford was last year rated the fourth most costly location for booking a double room in the UK and Ireland in a survey by cheaprooms.co.uk.

Tourism agency Experience Oxfordshire therefore said it welcomed a wave of new hotel plans for Oxford.

For example, Travelodge could soon be competing with a Premier Inn in Paradise Square: Land Registry documents seen by the Oxford Mail this year show the discount hotel chain is now the freeholder of land at Greyfriars Court, currently leased by accountancy firm Critchley's.

Plans had already been revealed for a Hotel Indigo nearby in Paradise Street.

According to Oxford City Council, a 150-room hotel is likely to be part of the redevelopment of the Oxpens and another hotel, with up to 180 rooms, has been included in a blueprint for the Northern Gateway in North Oxford.

Proposals to demolish the former Cooper Callas building and Brewery Gate pub and build a 150-bed Hotel Indigo in Paradise Street have met a wave of opposition.

More than 200 people have objected to the scheme, with Historic England, Oxford Preservation Trust and Oxford Civic Society also voicing concerns.