Yelo café in court
Does takeaway food really have to be taken away?
That’s the legal problem now confronting one of Perth’s most popular cafés.
The popular Trigg cafe named Yelo which often has queues of punters snaking out the door is locked in a battle with the City of Stirling in Perth’s Magistrate’s Court.
The café faces a potential $1 million fine for breaching the council’s planning rules.
The council claims the café breached the planning approval it was given in 2003 allowing service of takeaway food and drink only and restricting seating to 20 people on the veranda.
Planning officials told magistrate Richard Bayly the breaches were overt, they didn’t even try to cover it up.
Covert inspections had revealed people staying for up to 45 minutes to drink coffee and eat organic fruit toast or bircher muesli. Inside the café, they provided seating for 55 people.
The brawl is over whether the planning regulations are that apt.
Café owner Michael Pond argues he has always complied with planning rules. He only serves food and drink in throwaway containers, and never at tables. And the café does not provide or plates, knives or forks. So strictly speaking, it is not a café.
The court was told that Mr Pond had put in an application in 2012 to amend the planning approval to allow more seating.
The council rejected it. The council also told Mr Pond he was not allowed to sell retail items such as thongs, books, surfboards and wetsuits.
The council also ordered the cafe to remove signs pointing customers to a public carpark 80 metres away at a nearby dog beach
The City of Stirling started to investigate soon after the cafe opened in 2009 in response to complaints from residents near the West Coast Drive outlet that customers are parking on the road and nearby verges causing intolerable congestion.
by Leon Gettler, November 25th 2016
