The debate about a second major airport for Sydney has again come to the forefront in recent months following the release of a joint study into the future aviation needs for our global city.
It’s a debate that we will continue to have until we come up with a resolution. It’s been over a decade since the last major community debate mobilised opposition to a major airport being developed at the Badgerys Creek site.
A lot has changed since then.
The Western Sydney economy is one of the fastest growing regional economies in Australia generating over $83 billion in economic activity. We are the population growth centre for the entire city – more people now live west of Parramatta than anywhere else.
Yet we still face a 200,000 jobs deficit – that’s 200,000 people each and every day who have to get in a car, bus or train and travel across the city to their place of employment. That’s expected to rise to 350,000 by 2050.
That’s the equivalent of building nine Barangaroos – a monumental task.
We need to create more jobs here in Western Sydney if we want to get our work-life balance right, and we want to see our kids get well paying professional jobs without having to travel to the Sydney CBD.
We need a game changer that will deliver these types of jobs. I believe the most obvious candidate to that would be to develop a major airport for Western Sydney.
That’s why I’ve called for a new community debate on a major Western Sydney airport. In light of the changing needs of our residents and our goal of developing an independent and strong regional economy, we need a major airport.
I’d like to see us start to think a bit differently about what an airport means.
The first thing we need to leave behind is the idea that it is a “second Sydney airport”. Kingsford Smith Airport (KSA) has plenty of capacity left in it; it’s just being restrained by artificial caps and curfews.
A large regional economy such as Western Sydney deserves to be serviced by its own major airport, regardless of what the future demands of KSA might be.
A major Western Sydney Airport would be a tremendous job generator – and not just at the airport itself, but all those supporting industries that grow around an airport such as hospitality and tourism, manufacturing and maintenance, security and transport.
But of course, airports are not without their challenges – noise and pollution are issues that come with a major airport. However, they are not static issues. The debate on aircraft noise is a 1990s debate. What we need to keep in mind is that aircraft are continually being redesigned and improved.
The world’s largest and newest planes are quieter and less polluting then the previous generation of aircraft.
By the time a Western Sydney airport is up and running, which could be another 20 years, who knows how much better aircraft could be and how ridiculous we would feel looking back on this debate about aircraft noise stopping the construction of a major piece of economic infrastructure for Western Sydney.
If we are serious about creating more jobs in Western Sydney; if we are serious about reducing transport congestion on that morning pilgrimage to the Sydney CBD each and every day. If we are serious about creating an independent and vibrant Western Sydney economy, then we have to be serious about developing a major airport for Western Sydney.
It’s time for a new debate.
David Borger is Western Sydney Director of the Sydney Business Chamber and former Minister for Western Sydney.
