Western Sydney Airport could be the size of Dubai or New York’s JFK, says its chief executive

Western Sydney Airport CEO Simon Hickey says the new airport could service 80 million passengers a year and grow to the size of Dubai’s, becoming Australia’s gateway to the world.

Western Sydney International Airport could become the country’s main gateway thanks to the lack of a curfew and its ability to move 80 million passengers every year, its CEO Simon Hickey says.

Mr Hickey said the greenfield development – twice the size of the current Sydney Airport site – would solve the problem of Sydney being one of few global cities with no 24-hour airport, as well as opening up new routes and scheduling options.

Western Sydney Airport will commence operations in 2026 with a single runway and a terminal capable of handling 10 million passengers per year.

There are plans for the airport to cater for more than 80 million passengers by 2060. “We have the ability to be the next Dubai or JFK airport in New York by being able to handle 80 million passengers in the coming decades,” Mr Hickey told the Financial Review Infrastructure Summit.

The CEO said that the airport was in talks with international airlines about launching services from day one.

He said it had the third biggest catchment area of any airport in the country, behind Sydney and Melbourne.

“We’re talking to a number of international airlines at the moment,” he said.

“It takes a little while for an airline to understand a new greenfield airport in western Sydney, but western Sydney is just an unbelievable place.

“We’ll open with about three million people that can get to and from the airport within an hour, so that’s our package. That’s the third largest package in Australia. It’s the most diverse community – 170 different ancestries within western Sydney.”

Qantas and Jetstar will base 15 aircraft at the site and commence flights in the first year.

The airport will allow more people to catch flights domestically and internationally without being bound by the curfew that forces Sydney Airport to shut between 11pm and 6am.

“In terms of international connectivity, it means that airlines can go into their hubs, which means that we can connect around the world more quickly,” he said.

“That’s not available until now. We have business people who will travel to Melbourne to get to Singapore because they’ve got a flight that actually works better for them. From a domestic perspective, people will even travel to have better connectivity with airlines.”

Mr Hickey said Australians would be able to have dinner in Melbourne and get back to Sydney that night, which he describes as a level of connectivity that has been missing and is required.

The airport will not be impacted by fog or winds that affect Sydney Airport with it having the country’s second category 3 landing system after Melbourne, which allows for flights to land at zero visibility. There will also be Australia’s highest tech baggage system that operates similar to an Amazon warehouse.

Taxi times for aircraft would be on average five minutes versus nearly 20 minutes in Sydney.