Brisbane Airport Corporation boss Julieanne Alroe is getting ready to takeoff after nine years at the helm

Brisbane Airport boss Julieanne Alroe will depart in July next year after overseeing a series of massive upgrades at Australia’s third busiest airport.

Brisbane Airport Corporation boss Julieanne Alroe.

IT’S up, up and away for Julieanne Alroe.

The well-regarded Brisbane Airport Corporation boss is getting ready to spread her wings and takeoff after nine years at the helm.

Alroe will depart in July next year having overseen a series of massive upgrades and improvements at Australia’s third busiest airport.

It’s not clear what her next move will be, although she still sits on numerous boards and is keen to have a little downtime after spending more than 40 years in the industry.

No successor has yet been picked and a search will ramp up in the months ahead.

Those familiar with her work are virtually unanimous in lavishing praise.

“She’s done an amazing job,’’ one colleague said yesterday.

SPENDING SPREE

ALROE will exit two years before the airport’s long-anticipated $1.3 billion parallel runway starts operation in late 2020, effectively doubling the maximum number of arrivals and departures.

BAC has already spent $1.6 billion in infrastructure since 2012 and the new runway is part of another $2.2 billion splurge that includes new terminal upgrades, car parks and other improvements.

Passenger numbers have steadily increased during Alroe’s tenure, with nearly 23 million using the airport last year. The number is tipped to grow to 50 million by 2035.

Alroe has also been instrumental in developing a large part of the 2700ha site into a $1.2 billion commercial and retail hub employing a 23,000-strong workforce.

That includes a $300 million “auto mall’’ set to open in 2020 with more than 20 motor dealers and a 2.5km track.

All that activity goes a long way to explaining how Brisbane Airport Corporation generated a $180 million net profit from $679 million in revenue in the last financial year.

FLYING BACK

ALROE, who arrived in Brisbane in 2009 after spending about 30 years climbing up the management ranks at Sydney Airport, did not respond to City Beat’s request for a comment yesterday.

As it turns out, she was airborne for a good bit of the day, flying back from Adelaide after attending the Australian Airports Association annual awards.

BAC snared a few gongs—for technology and “customer experience” – to add to their already substantial trophy cabinet.

Meanwhile, a BAC spin doctor asked City Beat to hold off on this yarn because airport staff and stakeholders had not yet been alerted to Alroe’s impending departure.

Look for a formal announcement to be made by BAC tomorrow but, hey folks, you’ve already read about it here first.

MASONIC BATTLE

LONG-simmering discord inside the secretive Freemasons fraternity in Queensland has reached fever pitch.

Critics unhappy with the hierarchy intend to move three motions of no confidence at a quarterly meeting in Brisbane on December 6.

In a highly unusual move, they hope to oust the Grand Master, two of his underlings and the entire board of the Masonic charity arm known as the Board of Benevolence.

They want to replace them with an interim committee consisting of five rebel members.

“The feeling is that the governing body of Freemasonry is completely out of control and just doing what they want without talking to members,’’ one critic told City Beat.

“If the motions get through, there will be a huge shake-up of the way the Grand Lodge and Board of Benevolence conduct business.’’

Grand Master Alan Townson hit back yesterday, accusing his detractors of failing to use proper channels of protest and impugning the good name of the organisation.

He described the complaints as “offensive’’ and said much of the criticism was “factually wrong’’.