Hotel plans attract 70 objections in town of 200

A majority of Patonga households are believed to have objected to the expansion of the Patonga Hotel.

Save Patonga campaign organiser Mr Paul Williams said more than 70 Patonga residents had lodged objections to the development application.

"To put that into context, Patonga has just five residential streets and a permanent population at last census of 202 people."

The existing hotel was approved by Gosford Council in 2009, on land at the time zoned for low density residential use.

The current development application proposes to renovate and expand the existing hotel and fish shop at the entrance to the village

Mr Williams said: "The application now before Central Coast Council proposes to increase the hotel floor space by 100 per cent, mainly at the second floor level, and would more than double patronage from 200 to 500.

"Proposed second floor spaces will include a cocktail lounge, band stand and dance floor, and a 150-seat wedding reception facility," he said.

"The original owner managed to secure approval without any onsite car parking.

"Incredibly, the latest proposal again makes no provision for onsite parking.

"The DA claimed that existing street parking could accommodate any increase in patronage.

"A traffic study organised by residents comprehensively put paid to that argument.

"The hotel already monopolises adjacent public parking areas, and on weekends and holidays, parking routinely overflows into residential streets.

"More recently the current owner, who purchased the property in 2014, has acknowledged that there is an existing problem with car parking and he is prepared to contribute to help alleviate the problem.

"It's estimated at least 66 car spaces will be required based on increased floor space.

"The owner has said he is trying to make a bigger effort to keep Patonga a quiet and beautiful place.

"It is difficult to reconcile those sentiments with a development proposal that can only exacerbate noise, congestion and parking issues.

"The community is supportive of renovations and additions to the ground floor hotel, fish shop and kitchen, but they object to the planned second storey lounge, reception centre and sports bar development.

"It will create, in the owner's words, a "destination venue" which is at odds with the objectives set for the current zoning of the land (B1 Neighbourhood Centre).

"These objectives require that business and commercial uses are small scale centres commensurate with the local needs of the people who live and work in the surrounding neighborhood.

"The present hotel and fish shop complex has reached the environmental and socially acceptable boundaries of the site it occupies.

"The fact that the owner is now seeking to rely on the use of adjacent public land to double the size of his business makes it hard to square this proposal with the public interest.

"It is not, as the owner recently claimed in the press, the hotel that is in danger of being "loved to death", but rather Patonga itself."

Media release, 13 Jul 2016

Paul Williams, Save Patonga