I’m 82. Sydney’s domestic airport seems to hate me

At 82, I’m fortunate to be a fit old person (who exercises regularly, and only has a mild heart condition). At the same time, I’m part of a couple doing its bit to making as small a footprint as possible on the environment, with solar panels, a battery and an EV, and doing whatever we can to reduce our impact on climate change. And so, that also means using planes as seldom as possible, including – sadly – no longer taking those wonderful long trips overseas.

I did, however, have to take a short flight from Wagga Wagga to Sydney the other day. Fun fact – Wagga Wagga Airport was originally an inland training base for the RAAF, later expanded to also become a regional airport and now the 36th busiest airport in Australia. And despite being partly serviced by Qantas, it will come as no surprise that Wagga Airport is small: a waiting room with one gate, and a short walk to the plane.

Sadly, we no longer take trips overseas, but we do have to fly from time to time. Credit: iStock

Being on a plane after such a long time between flights was quite nostalgic in a pleasant way, for someone who absolutely loved hopping on a plane and going anywhere, back in the day when we could fool ourselves that carbon credits meant something.

From the time of disembarking at Sydney’s domestic airport, however, things went downhill, metaphorically and physically. The plane from Wagga is small, a De Havilland Dash 8, and gets parked on the tarmac rather than alongside a bay. And its exit gate – unsurprisingly – is way up one end of the terminal. So there is a long, long walk to the baggage pick-up area. And then, whether generally or just this time, the baggage carousel was way up the far end of the long, long hall.

Then came the coup de grâce: getting to what is laughably called the “express” pick-up area. Certainly not express to get there. While trudging along the long, long pathway, I remembered the time – way back when – that cars could not only drop people off at the terminals, but pick them up as well!

So, having walked with increasing amounts of baggage from the plane towards – finally – the pick-up area, and becoming more and more exhausted as I went, I did start to wonder whether this might be an effective way of reducing the lifespan of older and – even more so – old passengers.

In consideration of not only the older passengers, but those with young children – not to mention any of the many who are just generally unfit – why couldn’t some thought be given to the allocation of a closer pick-up area in the car park? Especially when considering, on the one hand, the massive income raked in by the current owners, the Sydney Aviation Alliance (SAA), with over six million passengers passing through the domestic airport annually, together with the gold mine of filled car parks charging exorbitant rates, and – on the other hand – the avowal of Sydney Airport’s 2024 CEO, Scott Charlton, that “in terms of our operational performance, we’re focused on efficiency and delivering a seamless experience for all stakeholders, on-airport partners, and most importantly, passengers.” (My italics, but they should be his).

It may be that Charlton believes the description that his airport puts out about that express pick-up area, which reassuringly asks, rhetorically, “Picking up friends or family? Pick them up at our express pick-up zone at Sydney Airport Domestic, located a short walk away from the terminals”. As this is patently, for those who’ve been there, not true, the question is whether this is misinformation (that is, out of ignorance) or disinformation (a deliberate untruth). Either way, I’m calling it just plain wrong. It’s a decent walk for a young person with luggage. Try it when you’re 82.

Further research into the parking issue did reveal the following: something called an “accessible pick-up zone”, with two kerbside spaces to pick up disabled passengers. Useful to know, but does it include the fit elderly? And two spaces do not go nearly far enough.

A final suggestion, for within the airport: moving walkways to cover those long, long internal walks, from gates and to carousels. I don’t fly much these days, but when I do, I start to think Australia’s domestic aviation infrastructure would prefer me not to.

Dr Anne Ring is a health sociologist, freelance writer, and author of Engaging with Ageing: What matters as we grow older.

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