By Crystal Hsu / Staff reporterGloria Hotel Group （華泰大飯店集團） is to shut down its 50-year-old Gloria Prince Hotel （華泰王子大飯店） in Taipei’s Zhongshan District （中山） next month to pave the way for an urban renewal project and cut losses amid the COVID-19 pandemic.
Domestic outbreaks of COVID-19 this month have cast a shadow over the business outlook for hotels and restaurants as cancelations rose ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, the high season for the industry.
Formosa International Hotels Corp (FIH, 晶華國際酒店集團) said that 5 percent of bookings had been canceled at its restaurants and 10 percent at its banquet facilities, while some year-end banquets are being postponed until after the Lunar New Year holiday.
Additionally, 13 percent of room reservations had been canceled for this month and next, mainly by independent domestic tourists, while reservations by group tours had not been affected.
FIH, which