Infrastructure Minister Anthony Albanese ended the one airport for Sydney policy today in a rider to granting approval to Sydney Airport’s latest 20 year plan.
He said Sydney would need a second airport after 2029, and invited the NSW Government to join in a study to find and develop a site.
Which really means something will have to be selected and built by 2029, and in the state with the worst record in infrastructure and planning processes in the country, that means overcoming an immense burden of political and administrative inertia.
But the statements that accompanied the announcement from Sydney Airport and Qantas contain important departures from what the Minister said.
Here is Albanese’s announcement in full:-
Today I have approved Sydney (Kingsford Smith) Airport’s 2009 Master Plan – but in doing so I note its long term forecasts are further evidence that Sydney will require new airport capacity.
Sydney Airport Corporation plans to further develop the site in order to support the aviation activities so critical to the economy.
Already this critical piece of aviation infrastructure handles about a third of the nation’s air traffic, generates approximately $8 billion in annual economic activity and supports more than 200,000 jobs.
Specifically, the Master Plan proposes to increase the proportion of the site used for aviation activities from 86 to 91 per cent; improve the taxiway system so aircraft can move around the site quickly and safely; expand freight handling facilities; and provide more gates at both the domestic and international terminals.
The Government is absolutely committed to maintaining the existing cap on movements as well as the curfew. Noise sharing arrangements will continue.
My approval of the Master Plan does not however indicate acceptance that the Airport can and should handle the projected growth in traffic, with the annual number of aircraft flying into and out of Sydney expected to rise to 427,000 by 2029.
Such traffic volumes would place considerable added pressure on those communities living around the Airport.
As the Airport gets busier, the supporting road and rail infrastructure will become more congested, delays more frequent and nearby residents exposed to even longer periods of aircraft noise.
The national interest dictates that Sydney will need new airport capacity.
That’s why I have today invited the NSW Government to participate in a joint study to assess options, identify potential sites and evaluate investment strategies for delivering additional airport capacity.
The joint study will also look at ways of providing integrated transport solutions for the existing airport as well as any second airport. It will also consider the future of the Badgerys Creek site given the Government has ruled it out as an option for a second airport.
The study’s final terms of reference will be outlined in the National Aviation White Paper expected to be released later this year.
The Government got independent expert advice from Access Economics to assist its assessment of the Sydney KSA Master Plan.
Sydney Airport Corporation is now required to publish the final Master Plan within 50 business days and make copies available to the public.
Now consider the response from Qantas.
The words ‘in the Sydney basin’ are the contentious issue. No airline is going to support a remote Sydney Airport. Nor will their passengers, who will either avoid doing business in Sydney, or change flights at an intermediate port to ensure they arrive at an airport relevant to their actual destination within the metropolitan area.
Albanese has ruled out Badgery’s Creek, which is the only passably large site left on dry land in the Sydney basin.
Which points to filling in a large part of Botany Bay to greatly expand Sydney Airport, or just part of its southern shores around Towra Point, for a satellite airport connected by road and rail to the main airport along the lines proposed at the turn of the century by the late Bill Bradfield.
Or alternatively it points to a huge waste of money on an airport somewhere in the southern highlands, the Illawarra, or in the lower Hunter, which needs a new airport given the constricted opportunities at the RAAF Williamtown base where facilities are leased by the airlines.
(Badgery’s Creek is roughly as far from the centre of Sydney as Narita Airport is from Tokyo Central, the southern highlands sites are two to three times as remote and anything near Newcastle is four to five times the Tokyo-Narita distance allowing for the topographical challenges north of Sydney.)
Finally consider this extract from the Sydney Airport statement, which promises not to do a whole list of things while finessing what it has today to lift capacity from 31 million passengers a year to 79 million a year.
At no point in its full statement does Sydney Airport acknowledge the point the Minister makes about needing a second airport.
It sounds more like a case of ‘No Minister’ rather than ‘Yes Minister.’ The smart money would be put on the minister prevailing over Sydney Airport but having something of a struggle with Qantas, the other airlines and perhaps even a NSW government that realises that a remote second airport means the end of Sydney’s pre-eminence in business and leisure travel.
3 Comments
I’m still not sure – while Badgery’s Creek is clearly the “obviously correct” option, if we can’t manage to get a fast train to do the trip from Central to the Picton / Bargo area in under 60 minutes then we’re Doing It Wrong.
Great caf that gives people in southwest sydney two fantasic options: cop aircraft from a northerly or southerly direction. I wonder which government it’ll be that goes back to Badgery’s seeing as how no one can put in a fast train to the CBD apparently.
Albanese better hurry up – with a predicted 2m rise in sea levels Kingsford Smith Airport will soon be swimming with the fishes.