NEW YORK CITY-As it prepares to open a 600-room hotel near TimesSquare next month, InterContinental Hotels Group PLC says it’splanning to nearly double its roster of New York City propertiesover the next few years, the Wall Street Journalreports.

The UK-based lodging chain has 15 properties on the drawingboard to add to the 22 it already operates here. Among them are aHotel Indigo boutique on 38th Street, a Crowne Plaza in Long IslandCity and a Holiday Inn in the Bronx.

The InterContinental New York Times Square scheduled to open onJuly 12 at 300 W. 44th St. could get company across Manhattan inthe years to come. “We think that, ultimately, we could have threeor four InterContinentals in a market like this,” Jim Abrahamson,president of IHG's Americas unit, told the Journal. Headded that IHG eventually might plan on opening anotherInterContinental Downtown, along with another “further uptown” fromthe two it now operates.