Independent commissioners will hear from Queenstown Lakes District Council (QLDC) staff today in the third day of a hearing on McDonald’s proposal for a Wānaka restaurant. 

On Monday commissioners heard from the McDonald’s Restaurants NZ team; on Tuesday members of the public shared their views; and today the local council will have the opportunity to make its case (after the last few members of the public speak in the early morning).

QLDC has already signalled in a report released last month that it is against the McDonald’s proposal for a 24-hour-a-day, seven-day-a-week restaurant and drive through operation on the outskirts of Wānaka.

Council planner Andrew Woodford said the proposal was inappropriate in the rural-zoned site, detracted from the Mt Iron Outstanding Natural Landscape feature, and had other “adverse visual effects”.

Some similar views were shared during yesterday’s public submissions, with many submitters saying the location of the proposed McDonald’s was inappropriate. 

One submitter described the proposal as “a highly lit, eyesore of a restaurant in a rural-zoned location at the entrance to our town”.

For others, the issue of whether or not McDonald’s gets the go-ahead had much higher stakes; one said the decision on the McDonald’s would “determine the future of this community”.

There were also passionate calls for the preservation of the “small-town feel” of Wānaka, extensive concerns over the litter McDonald’s packaging could lead to, as well as the impact on local eateries and the nutritional content of McDonald’s food.

At the opposite end - in the pro-McDonald’s camp - one submitter argued the proposed location for the McDonald’s wasn’t the centre of town or even a focal point; that any negative health effects from eating fast food could also happen from eating in excess at

existing Wānaka burger restaurants; and that the arrival of McDonald’s is “simply a symptom of a rapidly changing town”.

“We are fortunate to live in an outstanding place…a single McDonald’s is simply not going to change that,” he said.

The submitter joked that he made his submission “at the risk of being burnt at the stake,” referencing the heated and divisive discourse on the proposal.

Day three of the hearing will begin at 9am today at the Lake Wānaka Centre.