Second airport rises again

[Jacob P]

Article in SMH this morning what are your thoughts/comments on this issue?

I personally think on a whole the point of the airport being unable to accomodate new flights is a big load of BS whilst it is somkewhat true about the mroning peak periods, the rest of the day there is plenty of capacity for more services but problem is airlines want the services in the morning peak.
I think SYD does not need a second airport but more so Airservices and Macquaire need to upgrade infrastructure and improve flow efficiency so as to minimise delays and improve traffic flow during peak periods.


PASSENGERS at Sydney Airport and across Australia will increasingly be forced to endure long delays because the airport is pushing the brink of its capacity.

Analysis prepared for a government inquiry into a second airport site for Sydney shows that within a decade, relatively minor disruptions to morning flights will delay flights for up to five hours over the rest of the day.

The analysis also shows Sydney Airport's limited ability to accommodate new flights means airlines are finding it harder to fly into the city when they would like.

Advertisement: Story continues below The federal government, which has committed to nominating a site for another airport this year, is expected to seize on the figures to help justify the cost of a second airport.

One piece of analysis, by the consultants Booz & Company, shows the burden on passengers through the day if morning flights are disrupted.

By 2015, the analysis suggests, if flights at Sydney were limited to 55 an hour in the 7am-9am peak due to bad weather, it would take three hours, or until noon, for the airport's schedule to recover.

The delays would frustrate travellers at Sydney, but also those at other airports whose flights link with Sydney.

By 2020, the analysis suggests, the same morning delay would set back the flight timetable by five hours, or until 2pm.

''It's clear Sydney needs a second airport sooner rather than later,'' the Transport Minister, Anthony Albanese, told the Herald yesterday.

''Without action the national economy will be constrained with a negative impact on growth and jobs."

Mr Albanese has commissioned a joint federal-state study into locations for a second airport which is due to report by the middle of the year.

The study is expected to canvass as many as 10 locations. But Labor's former preferred site, Badgerys Creek, has already been ruled out.

Mr Albanese will argue that a second airport for Sydney is a national economic priority, not just an issue for the city.

A separate piece of research prepared for the federal Department of Infrastructure shows that airlines are increasingly unable to fly into the city at their chosen time.

Federal legislation limits the number of aircraft movements at the airport to 80 an hour.

But at the start of 2011, airlines requested more than 80 flights an hour on seven different hours. For the same period last year, the number of bids by airlines exceeded 80 on only four hours.

The chief executive of Airport Co-ordination Australia, which manages the hourly slots at Sydney Airport, Ernst Krolke, said there was increasing pressure on the 80 flights an hour cap.

But Mr Krolke said he was still able to accommodate new demands for flying into Sydney.

A spokesman for Qantas acknowledged the lack of spare capacity at Sydney. ''Capacity constraints at Sydney Airport do create pressure on peak hour operations, which can have knock-on effects for the rest of our network,'' the spokesman said.

Sydney Airport, owned by the publicly listed MAp Group, says the constraints are artificial. ''The 80 movements per hour cap is an arbitrary regulatory cap that does not reflect the capacity of the existing infrastructure at Sydney Airport,'' a spokesman said.

He said the airport would tell a Productivity Commission inquiry into airport regulation to review the constraints.

''This will also remove the need for the government to spend substantial taxpayer funds to construct additional aviation capacity elsewhere.''

At a forum in Parramatta in February, Mr Albanese said it would be a tragedy if Australia missed out on economic opportunities because of a lack of space at Sydney Airport. ''You already have the case that we could fill more capacity than is there with the growth in our region … the growing travelling public of China in particular, but also India and other countries,'' he said then.

[Jon Harris]

Not sure if SYD needs a second airport but the international arrivals is a disgrace and borders on 3rd world standards when you compare it to the likes of ICN / SIN / HKG where it so organised and efficient.

But I guess there is prob not much room to further expand that terminal? Not sure.

And what I hate most is being forced to walk through a shop when you leave and arrive. Very tacky!

[Jarden S]

They can get rid of that 80 movements an hour cap for starters could easily increase it to 120. Its political issues that get in the way it will never happen same as the curfew it is here to stay unfortunately.

[Jon Harris]

Given that MEL doesn't have a curfew do you think in the long term it could ever overtake SYD as Australia's busiest airport? Those late night/early AM departures seem to be very popular at MEL particularly for corporate traffic allowing a full day's work.

Flew on the QF29 a few weeks back MEL-HKG and the intl term was so busy.

[Jacob P]

The issue with SYD is not so much runway capacity, whilst the airport has the necessary runway infrastructure to handle 80+ runway movements other infrastructure such as apron and terminal capaity is very much lacking and that is where the problem lies. It is not uncommon to see international arrivals land on time in the morning and then wait in excess of 45 minutes in some cases for an avialable bay (in some cases a bussing operation).

[Jon Harris]

Think you're spot on there Jacob.

[D Chan]

the politicians will talk about for the next 10-15 years and not do a thing, because they lack the ***** to do it and it won't win them the next election. Its sad because the state will suffer because of this bottleneck

[Michael Mak]

NIMBY

[Nigel C]

the politicians will talk about for the next 10-15 years and not do a thing, because they lack the ***** to do it and it won't win them the next election. Its sad because the state will suffer because of this bottleneck

It's the timing of this announcement that amuses me. Yeah, sure, we've all heard the same talk from our politicians over the last 30 odd years regarding a second Sydney airport, but isn't it just coincidental that an announcement like this is made when there's a bit of tension already in Federal politics concerning the proposed carbon tax?!?! And given that there's been protests and rally's both for and against the tax in Sydney in recent days, this seems like a clever diversionary tactic to get Sydney-siders away from the carbon debate for a little while and concentrate on something 'that everyone in Sydney will agree on'.

I really don't know just how many more feasability studies there needs to be for a second airport, or indeed its proposed location. I'm sure the previous 10 taxpayer funded studies already have all the answers, if only they'd bother looking back through them:rolleyes:

Once again, there'll be all the talk about it but nothing will get done. And it will all be forgotten for another 3 years.....

[Andi O]

They can get rid of that 80 movements an hour cap for starters could easily increase it to 120. Its political issues that get in the way it will never happen same as the curfew it is here to stay unfortunately.

120 per hour!! How do you propse that will work Jarden?
And no.....1 aircraft per minute is not an acceptable rate

[Jeff N]

Maybe I'm being a bit simplistic here, but if runway capacity was the issue, would it not be possible to build a fourth runway, say as a third parallel runway into Botany Bay?

Should terminal capacity be the issue, would it not be feasible to extend either or both the domestic and international terminals?

I realise these things take time and costs lots of money, but surely they would be one hell of a lot preferable to these cruddy ideas of building an international airport in say Canberra, Goulburn or Newcastle.

Politicians would happily tell you this (C/G/N) is the way to go, but that's only because they stuffed up the opportunity build the new airport at Badgery's Creek some twenty years ago, before allowing the suburban sprawl to permanently kill the idea!

[Nigel C]

The building of the third runway caused numerous environmental issues for Botany Bay, especially in terms of sand movement. The groynes at Kurnell and Dolls Point are examples of how they've tried to slow the movement of sand. Building another runway into the bay, on top of the current Port Botany expansion project would cause all sorts of grief I would imagine. Besides, there's about 1034m separation between the current runways...where in the bay could you put another runway?

For terminal expansion, I'm pretty sure the Master Plan (publicly available on the SACL website) goes some way to addressing these issues.

[Scott L.]

A high speed rail feasability would be nice, just for a change.

[Nigel C]

Hasn't that also been studied to death by numerous governments over the past 20 years?

[Kent Broadhead]

I was assuming Scott's post was tongue in cheek....there's still a NSW HSR investigation Act on the books from 1989....

[Kent Broadhead]

where in the bay could you put another runway? Towra Point anyone? :) Or maybe moving the Cook's River mouth and obliterate Kyeemagh :)

[Noel White]

Towra Point anyone? :) Or maybe moving the Cook's River mouth and obliterate Kyeemagh :)

Bloody hell Kent, that's digging up an old proposal when the Department of Civil Aviation was still in power. :D

[Kent Broadhead]

Bloody hell Kent, that's digging up an old proposal when the Department of Civil Aviation was still in power. :D What goes around comes around :)

And I should have said move the Cook's River mouth again, as it originally flowed along the route of 07/25, entering the bay just west of 16L/34R

[Jethro H]

I was assuming Scott's post was tongue in cheek....there's still a NSW HSR investigation Act on the books from 1989....
The "current" Federal HSR review as endorsed by Julia is well under-way and should have 'another' report due later this year. The report has a budget of $20m... so it better be more than a PowerPoint presentation with some pretty pictures.

The Terms of Reference state that it is to look at a HSR with a primary emphasis to connect Newcastle and Sydney.

Media speculation found it interesting that originally the current "Second" Airport review was suppose to come out at a similar time and placed rumours that Williamtown as the focus location for the rail and airport.... all speculation of course!
Like the previous up-teen versions, I am sure the current HSR and Second Airport Reports will just make good shredded paper.

Money is on for the next 100 years that:
- We will never see a HSR rail system connecting eastern cities.
- We will not see a Second Sydney airport within the Sydney Basin. (NIMBY seems to rule)

[Jarden S]

What is the rate of movements per hour at Heathrow? Any ideas.. It must be a fair bit higher than SYD as they have a lot more passengers but also LHR has plenty more gates to park aircraft which solves a lot of delay issues.

Here is an interesting proposal from Heathrow airport's wikipedia page:
In order to increase the number of flights, BAA have proposed using the existing two runways in 'mixed mode' whereby aircraft would be allowed to take-off and land on the same runway. This would increase the airport's capacity from its current 480,000 movements per year to as many as 550,000 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heathrow_airport#Operations

Could something similar be adopted for SYD to increase its capacity to allow room for the anticipated growth to come. SYD had 289,741 movements in 2009. So Andi this is how it could possible work for SYD.

[Owen H]

Sydney already uses mixed mode...

[Chris Q]

Expanding airports/new airports and race tracks (RIP Oran Park) - dying breed in NSW thanks to all the new suburbs being created !

Williamtown would be a good one to expand on - I prefer the drive to Newcastle airport rather than Sydney from the Central Coast ha!

[Andi O]

Heathrow rate is currently 80 movements per hour, the SAME as the cap at Sydney. It would be near impossible to increase the rate above that as it takes up to 90 seconds for an aircraft to land and clear the runway and that will never get much quicker with the current generation of aircraft.
The reason why Heathrow has double the movements of Sydney is that 80 per hour is used in every hour of available ops whereas Sydney only use it in 3 maybe 4 hours a day.
Without doing the whole maths "mixed mode" increases the movements slightly as instead of 90 seconds bewteen arrivals, you make it 150 seconds and squeeze in a departure. Of course, by doing that you would most ceratinly increase the rate of "go arounds" too!

[Jarden S]

Plus Heathrow does not have a night curfew (only restrictions) which allows for far more flights than SYD. What I recorded when plane spotting many a day at the observation deck at Heathrow they were getting arrivals every 70 seconds so that will enable it to get a few extra flights in each hour. Those controllers can pack them in tight in the airspace over London. But the queue at the departure runway would be always 7-9 aircraft some had a fairly long wait for there turn. This would go down only after a runway change. The cross taxiway to T4 was busy with a queue at times too, but one aircraft would cross as soon as one aircraft had landed, pilots would have to act quickly when told to proceed by ATC.

[Matt D]

Heathrow works to just under 9300/slots per week. At night they operate on noise quota restrictions that effectively operate as a curfew from 11:30pm to 6am. The quota system allows a limited number of arrivals before 6am

That's an average of 80 movements/hr for every operating hour. But they are not constrained to 80 movements/hr, just an average of 80/hr. They can get in the range of 120 movements/hr on two runways.

Heathrow's layout allows for better acft flow than Sydney:

1) two long parallel runways
2) many more high speed exits
3) a better terminal/taxiway/runway config
4) a better terminal layout - toaster rack style (T5 and T2), rather than dead ends where a pushed back acft blocks inbounds
5) The stack management allows tighter sequencing of groups of like arrivals (groups of mediums followed by groups of heavies)
6) Doesn't have to accomodate turboprops (people can catch trains for these distances)
7) Numerous runway entrance options (rather than just A6 on 34L, for eg)

This allows average runway occupancy times of only 41sec for departures and 56sec for arrivals.

In turn this allows a tight sequence of arrivals and departures making it able to avg 80/hr but push closer to 120/hr at times

M

[Jason H]

Saw this interesting video last week on ATC at Heathrow

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLNbYqraTgE&feature=player_embedded

[Jarden S]

Thanks Matt for the useful info. Yes Heathrow has learned to cope a lot longer than SYD with extreme traffic movements. Investment in nearly every possible improvement was made except for a third runway to help speed up traffic flows. So in short SYD is in no way prepared yet to increase its handling capacity. They should invest more in non-retail activities. But there is no rate of return in it for the accountants. The toaster rack style is a new term I not hear before for a terminal layout I like it...

[Jarden S]

Found a good article on this topic, they will not be lifting the cap:
Transport minister Anthony
Albanese has refused to be drawn
on a timeframe for a decision on
Sydney’s second airport despite
warning additional capacity will
be needed “sooner rather than
later”.
Albanese said delays will worsen
at Sydney as growth continues.
There were applications this year
for flights exceeding the 80-slot
maximum for seven different hours
during the operational day, against
only four hours last year, he said.
“That reflects the growth,”
Albanese said. “Already we know
there are more people who want to
fly into Sydney Airport than the
capacity will grant.”
But the minister reiterated there
will be “no shift in the curfew or
the cap in movements on my watch
at Sydney Airport”.
“What is not a solution is a
removal of either the curfew or
the cap which are constraints that
have been put legitimately around
Sydney Airport,” he said.
A report into Sydney’s airports
needs – a report independent of
Government or party politics - is
in the process of being written and
will be completed in the second
half of the year, Albanese said.
But he refused to speculate on a
timeframe for any decision.
“It is appropriate that there is a
considered response to this rather
than a series of announcements
in which there are chopping and
changing. We need to receive
the report, consider it and
have discussions between the
Commonwealth and the NSW
Government,” he said.
With the exception of Badgerys
Creek, all locations for an airport
will be considered, he added,
including Newcastle. “It’s up to the
committee (producing the report)
but certainly what they’re looking
at in great detail is the sites. That’s
the job they’ve been given,” he said
http://www.travelweekly.com.au/getattachment/7f5b42eb-2e9a-4370-85bc-e6e17221d67d/pdf.aspx

[Nigel C]

Well, it's certainly not a solution if Mr Albanese wants to retain his federal seat at the next election. :rolleyes:

What this whole debate needs is a federal transport minister whose electorate does NOT lie underneath an existing flightpath, and who is willing and able to see both sides of the argument equally. Then, and only then, might we see a balanced discussion and a reasonable outcome to this long-term debarcle.

[Shayne G]

Nigel, you hit the nail right on the head! :D

[Sarah C]

Agree 100%

[Mike W]

Well, it's certainly not a solution if Mr Albanese wants to retain his federal seat at the next election. :rolleyes:

Ha Ha LOL :D

[Jarden S]

This month's Australian aviation has a page 2 story on SYD second airport saga. It mention that the cap could be easily lifted to 100 movements an hour with the improvements of GBA and RNP being used.

[Nigel C]

The GBAS is currently out of service while they start installing an updated system in the coming days.

[Matt D]

London's 6th airport, London Southend, has just been announced as Easyjet's 20th base airport. Southend is 55min by train from London Liverpool St station. Easyjet has signed a 10 year deal with the airport operator and will operate flights using A319's to Europe, expecting to move 800,000 pax in the first year.

London now has 6 reasonably sized airports in an area only slightly larger than the Sydney basin (Luton, Heathrow, Gatwick, Stansted, Southend, City)

I wonder if London's 7th airport arrives before Sydney's 2nd :)

[Jarden S]

I believe they got 7 already. London Manston airport but its a long way out in the county of Kent.