It seems like the ideologues and realists are going to be forced together to find a 2nd Sydney Airport.
The announcement this afternoon that the Aviation White Paper will be released on December 16 comes with reference to a joint Federal/NSW study to short list sites.
But the Feds want it to be outside the Sydney Basin, and the State has joined itself to the airline position, that it has to be within the Sydney Basin, not in the sticks.
Short of filling in Botany Bay other than the part already occupied by an inadequate port facility, the options inside the greater metropolitan area are fairly well defined.
They include Badgerys Creek, which is a preserved site with easily obtained access to existing motorways and readily adaptable to connection to the City Rail network in a variety of ways that could deliver much needed improvements to services to western and south western Sydney. (’Could’ not ‘will’, this is NSW!).
A quick and comparatively easy relief airport for domestic inter city routes can be provided at the Richmond air force base (which is expected to close down) and with a civil war, a long second runway could also be built at Richmond to make it relevant to international flights.
A third option would be a variation on the original Bill Bradfield plan to develop a strip to the west of Kurnell, perhaps to remove turbo prop rural flights from the nearby main airport. This options comes with opportunities to link the Cronulla-Sutherland peninsula by road and public transport to the eastern suburbs via La Perouse.
Some other options have already been suggested to Plane Talking, including turning the rifle range at Malabar into something akin to London City airport. (Brave, very brave.)
Outside of Sydney the opportunities for white elephant developments are limitless. There is the Don Bradman International Airport, knocking down Bowral in the process, or the Bong Bong airport, obliterating the nearby party race course, or Marulan, or Goulburn, or the Colo Vale-Mittagong airport, or the Kings Tableland near Wentworth Falls, or the lovely flat stretch between Blackheath and Perry’s Lookdown, which did briefly host an air strip during the war.
Followed further out by something behind Seven Mile Beach near Gerringong, or a Vineyard Airport in the lower or upper Hunter Valley. The opportunities to come up with truly idiotic proposals are immense, and it is clearly a sign of goodwill to the fourth estate by the Federal Government to bring the issue back onto the boil at the start of the traditional summer holidays ’silly season’.
10 Comments
“But the Feds want it to be outside the Sydney Basin, and the State has joined itself to the airline position, that it has to be within the Sydney Basin, not in the sticks.”
Why do the State Government and the airline (does this mean QF) want the new airport within the Sydney basin if the options are effectively limited to Bagerys Creek?
A new Sydnew airport along the lines of the new Asian airports like Changi, Incheon, KLIA and Beijing would require enourmous amounts of land, which would be very expensive to acquire anywhere near Sydney.
Sydney will continue to sprawl westward and if they leave it too late (if 60 years isn’t late enough) the new Sydney airport might end up being west of the Blue Mountains or halfway to Canberra. Sydney could be a less attractive business and tourist destination in that case. Maybe by then QF will have a western hub in Perth for direct UK flights and a Brisbane hub for direct US flights.
If only one could negotiate more hourly movements, expanding KSA on structure rather than fill would seem more than feasible and viable compared with the rationale of other ideas.
A shorter (1500-1800m) regional 16/34 runway on the southside along with new terminals between this and the existing 16R and between 16L and R, all on structure, would allow continued use of the current runways by “heavies” and areas to develop airside and landside needs.
I’m not sure why the Navy base at Nowra has never been considered, as it’s current use by military fixed wing aircraft is minimal and it has the space available to handle a second airport infrastructure, with possibly the south coast rail link being adapted for a fast train service. The Navy could easily relocate to another military base for it’s helicopter operations, along with the technical support services and perhaps a joint RAAF and Navy base at Richmond would be feasible.
Nowra is in my view likely to get a smallish jet service in the coming decade with Melbourne and the Gold Coast or Brisbane the likely destinations. Or it may get a turbo prop ’stub’ route to Canberra for general domestic connections or with growth, Canberra flights to the likes of Singapore, Wellington and Auckland. (Not tomorrow, but in the medium term).
Reasons: It is very inconvenient, although scenic, to drive to either Canberra or Sydney airports from Nowra. I also think that for those that deal with the hassles of getting to Sydney Airport by road or rail from Wollongong could be readily induced to use Nowra airport instead given the loss of the always poorly supported Qantaslink Dash-8s from Albion Park.
Such services would address the need for air access to centres beyond Sydney. Rail does offer much better opportunities to improve daily as distinct from weekend leisure access to Wollongong, Nowra and beyond. While a full TGV type rail project seems to me an unlikely spend given higher ranking candidates for such dollars, there are feasible options for much better use of the rail corridor, starting with the long planned and constantly shelved multi-tunnel bypass for the scenic but slow and rock slide prone section from North Wollongong through to Waterfall.
This would dramatically shorten the distance by rail as well as avoid the really awkward slip zone, which is one of the most active in Australia.
PS Albion Park is jet unfriendly given the speeds at which current designs would need to make quite impressive last minute directional changes very close to the final approach (and an assortment of cliffs.) It is a very bad place in which to deal with the loss of an engine on departure according to those who fly. The largest airliner ever to use it is likely to remain the wonderful visits by the restored Super Constellation and of course the Dash 8s of yesteryear. There was, maybe 15 years ago, room to put in a fairly clever jet runway, but it is now all housing estates and small industrial properties.
Ben, You’re attributing way too much spectacular stupidity to the public servants who will deliver us the next short-term disaster in the development of aviation infrastructure for Sydney. Instead of the four-runway complex required to cater for, say, 50 years’ growth, we will get the do-nothing option: 1. Richmond with a 2200-metre strip to take narrowbodies — short haul only. A new rail link will be promised, but will never be delivered. 2. Re-assignment of the 1400-metre strip at Bankstown for turboprops to open up 20 slots an hour at KSA — effectively what’s already authorised but isn’t used (connecting shuttle bus to KSA). You reckon it will take a civil war for even the do-nothing option. Well, they’re your NIMBYs — you deal with them.
Simple – A floating airport a few km off the coast.
Wow, noone has mentioned Newcastle, an obvious choice. With a high speed rail network, which should probably be already there, the deal would be secure.
Civil war over Richmond would be just. I can’t believe how the place would be destroyed by a 2nd airport.
I believe the central coast/Newcastle with a HS rail network is the only feasible alternative.
Newcastle is just too far away from Sydney to make it feasible. It’s about 150km direct, without taking into account lakes, mountains etc the train would have to go round, and even at 100km/h (realistic average speed) it would take 90 minutes. Something within 50-80km of the city would be around 30-45 minutes into the city centre… It doesn’t sound like a long time, but if you live in Goulburn and have to catch a train to the city (90 mins) then another train to Newcastle (90 mins) then get on a 24 hour flight to the UK, it’s a lot of extra travel time… And the airport up there is used quite a lot by the RAAF, would cause major distruptions to them and services from Newcastle Airport as it is today (Canberra, Brisbane, Melbourne etc etc…)
This is just the result of simply awful planning in the past and the present
andy, 100 km/hr is not standard for High Speed Rail. HSR standard speeds are 300 km/hr. In fact, with a high-speed rail link to Canberra (and on to Melbourne), we could:
1/ Slash demand at Sydney’s existing airport, due to greatly reduced demand for flights to Melbourne, as HSR could do the trip in under 3 hours – it takes that long to get from Sydney Central Station to the aircraft.
2/ Connect Sydney with Canberra in well under an hour, allowing Canberra to be used as a secondary airport for Sydney.
Cost for a High Speed Rail link capable of these characteristics is about A$33b, which is about what the Badgerys Creek site would cost anyway.