Bradfield Oration 2024: Sydney Airport needs Metro station by 2050
The head of Sydney Airport has told The Daily Telegraph’s Bradfield Oration international visitors to the country need a better experience of arriving into the city.
NSW
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The head of Sydney Airport has said there will need to be a Metro station constructed at Kingsford Smith by 2050.
Sydney Airport chief executive Scott Charlton said in order to grow the capacity of Sydney Airport and better welcome international visitors to the country the experience of coming into Sydney needed vast improvement.
“Some of the first experiences that tourists get when they come into Australia isn’t great,” he said.
“We need the Federal government to realise we are in competition with other nation states.”
Mr Charlton said Australia was one of the only countries that still used paper cards when entering the country and that the system needed to be updated.
“We need to get rid of paper cards,” he said.
“Our visas are also more expensive than other countries.”
AIRPORT’S MISSING LINK
Travellers flying into Western Sydney International Airport will face a brutal final leg on a broken public transport system before they are greeted with the bright lights and iconic vistas of the Harbour City.
International and domestic tourists will be able to jump on the soon-to-be-completed Sydney Metro West Airport line – ferrying passengers from the Western Sydney Airport to St Marys Station in the city’s west in just 15 minutes.
But the smooth ride of the driverless Metro service will come to a grinding halt for tourists and commuters at the suburban train station, where they will have to drag their luggage, while braving the congested and often delayed T1 Western Line for 19 stops on the heavy rail to Central Station for more than 50 minutes before they arrive in the Sydney CBD.
And if travellers fly into WSI in the dead of night, they may be forced to catch a slow and crowded night bus from St Marys Station, while services are suspended between 11.30pm and 3.22am.
It comes as Western Sydney leaders and tourism bosses call for the Sydney Metro Airport line to be linked to the Northwest Metro at Tallawong, and the Sydney Metro Western line at Westmead.
Western Sydney Community Forum chair Dr Andy Marks told The Daily Telegraph a “part-time rail link can’t service a 24-hour airport”.
“Why invest $5.3 billion of taxpayers’ money in a new airport, connecting Western Sydney to the world, only to leave visitors stranded on arrival?”, he said.
“Worse, the NSW government has no timeframe for building a rail link between the coming airport and the Macarthur region.
“Closing the metro gap between Tullawong and St Marys also doesn’t seem a priority.
“These are among the fastest growing areas in the country, apparently not worth connecting to the jobs that big-ticket infrastructure like a new airport brings.”
Dr Marks said he feared passengers on international flights would be greeted with an in-flight message from the captain on a late-night arrival at Nancy Bird Walton International Airport: “Welcome to beautiful Sydney, passengers, it’s a pleasant 22 degrees, and the next train is due in 4 hours.”
Business Western Sydney executive director David Borger said while it was impressive the Sydney Metro Airport line would open alongside the international airport in 2026, the line needed to be linked to the rest of the network.
“It’s imperative that the entirety of the North South Metro line from Tallawong to Campbelltown gets delivered, along with extending the Leppington line to at least Bradfield (city centre),” he said.
“We’d love to see planning and funding commitments now, so when the current projects are completed we can move those crews to the next phase of metro building.”
Meanwhile, NSW Tourism Association boss Natalie Godward urged the state and federal governments to fast-track plans to extend the Western Sydney Airport Metro line to the northwest line, while also connecting it with the Sydney Metro Western line.
“We urge that these projects be fast-tracked to ensure robust support for the opening of Western Sydney International Airport in 2026, especially given the crucial need for 24-hour connectivity at the new airport,” she said.
“Consideration must also be given to dispersal of visitors into key locations — if we are truly to recognise the potential of this airport, we need to keep open minded about the tourism opportunities.”
Box Hill Residents Association president Vicki Giannoulis said it was “absurd” the Sydney Metro Airport Line stopped at St Marys.
“Millions of Greater Western Sydney residents will not have access to the new airport, due to this sheer lack of planning,” she said.
“It is ridiculous that The Hills has a Metro line to Tallawong that won’t link with the airport when it opens.”
Ms Giannoulis said northwest Sydney residents and workers would have to travel on the Sydney Metro northwest to Central Station for an hour, then ride the T1 Western Line to St Marys for an additional hour before swapping onto the Sydney Metro Airport line to access Bradfield city centre.
A spokesman for Transport Minister Jo Haylen said the NSW government had “committed to completing business cases for potential future extensions of the Sydney Metro – Western Sydney Airport line north from St Marys and south from Bradfield”.
“Once complete, it will take five minutes to travel from the airport to Bradfield, approximately 15 minutes from the airport to St Marys and approximately 20 minutes from Bradfield to St Marys, where passengers can connect to the rest of Sydney’s rail network.”
He said the Australian and NSW governments jointly committed $100 million to complete a business case for a Metro connection between Bradfield and Campbelltown, as well as Metro and heavy rail options for a connection between Bradfield and Leppington and Glenfield.
In the north, $40 million had been set aside by the state government to complete a business case for a Metro connections between St Marys and Tallawong.
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