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Piha's first cafe will add to the noise woes of campers, who complain about the RSA and children's playground, says an objector to the proposal.
Fiona Anderson, who is lessee of the Piha Domain Motor Camp across the road from the proposed cafe site, said her customers sought a natural environment away from the trappings of city life.
"Time and again campers tell me how fabulous this natural environment is and how lucky we to have been able to keep it like this," she told a planning commissioners' hearing at the Waitakere City Council.
Ms Anderson said she was concerned at the effect building the cafe would have on the campers because she had complaints and had lost patrons because of noise from a larger playground and the RSA.
"Campers say 'we've come here for peace and quiet'."
A proposed "high-end" cafe would be too expensive for campers who "can barely afford to eat at the [Piha] store," said Ms Anderson. "The cafe will just make Piha less unique, less restful, more traffic, more noise, and bring little or no benefit to few campers."
Auckland regional councillor Sandra Coney, who is a Piha author and historian, spearheaded the objections of the Protect Piha Heritage group.
"While a single cafe might seem like a small change, it constitutes a 50 per cent increase in commercial activity at Piha and will undoubtedly act as a destination for new visitors," Ms Coney said. "The village will become noisier and busier and it will be different, more urban.
"The effects of the proposal will begin the journey of changing the landscape of Piha in its wider sense, from a unique village with its own special unsophisticated West Coast character and charm, to a more urbane, unauthentic and therefore unmemorable place."
Property owners Susan and Greg Davis presented a video of traffic and parking filmed on Labour Day outside the Piha Store, which adjoins the proposed cafe site. They said that a cafe would worsen "existing chaos and congestion" of the Garden Rd-Seaview Rd intersection during summer, when up to 10,000 people visited beaches daily.
Traffic consultant Selwyn Green said the proposed site was an inappropriate location for a busy cafe.
