The hearing for a controversial Waiheke Island marina - which would feature the country's first floating car park - was so packed that people had to sit cross legged in the public gallery.
Render of the proposed Kennedy Point Marina. Photo: Kennedy Point Marina
The group, Save Kennedy Point, is in the Environment Court in Auckland trying to stop the 186-berth marina, the island's first, to be built at Kennedy Point.
The proposal has divided the island, with opponents saying it is only for the rich and will ruin the pretty bay where it's planned.
A lawyer for the marina developers, Derek Nolan QC, told the court the opponents were seeing Kennedy Point through rose-tinted glasses.
It was far from an untouched landscape, and has a well-used car ferry terminal, a breakwater, a boat ramp, road, houses and a carpark, he said.
Waiheke had a busy maritime area - something important for Auckland's economy, he said.
"Waiheke is an island and relies on boats for access. It is a destination and place of residence for boaties of all kinds. To suggest that a marina does not fit in with the ethos of this island defies logic," Mr Nolan said.
The Kennedy Point area was already well developed with a car ferry terminal, wineries, roads, homes and a carpark.
And it was wrong to say the marina would be for the rich, with expressions of interest from nearly 700 people, many of them ordinary New Zealanders, Mr Nolan said.
One of the opponents who had made the trip from Waiheke was nine-year-old Te Au Aio Ani Mereti who sat on her mother's knee during the long submissions.
She came because she didn't want the bay to change, she said.
"The good thing about it is it's good for kids and adults because you can go swimming, there is a swing there and you can climb the big-as tree," she said.
Save Kennedy Point will make its submissions later this week.