Wellcamp Airport: Australia’s newest airport near Toowoomba reaches 10th anniversary

It’s the project that has put a regional Queensland city on the world map — and it started life as a cow paddock. Ahead of a 10th anniversary, here’s the past, present and future of Wellcamp Airport:

As he overlooks a creation that will be front-and-centre to Toowoomba’s growth for the rest of the century, John Wagner can’t help but put the achievement of Wellcamp Airport into perspective.

“Who would have thought 10 years ago that we’d have a 747, the biggest jumbo in the world, landing in Toowoomba every week — sometimes four times a week,” the Wagner Corp chairman notes, referring to the regular Cathay Pacific freight shipments from Asia.

“That’s the difference with this development.”

A proud John Wagner at his Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport in 2018. Lyndon Mechielsen/The Australian

Now, nearly a decade on from the first plane arriving on the tarmac, Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport has become not just a centrepiece of the city’s entrepreneurial spirit but a focal point for what lies ahead for the region.

On a national scale, it remains Australia’s newest airport and was clearly built to allow Toowoomba to compete with other regional centres.

While its passenger numbers have yet to match the ambition of its owners, various experts are excited by its upside over the next 30 years as Queensland grows and airfreight becomes more desirable.

Here is a look at the past, present and future of Wellcamp:

The first in nearly 50 years

The decision to build an airport with a runway that could service Boeing 747s started in 2012 with a simple Google search.

“It was February 2012 — I was on my computer looking at Google Earth, and I worked out we could get a 3km runway in the right direction,” Mr Wagner said.

“I met with my brothers (Denis, Neill, Joe) on the Monday morning, over the bonnet of the car, and we made the decision to go ahead with it.”

Wellcamp Airport under construction. Photo Contributed

What followed was a whirlwind exercise to deliver an international-standard airport within two years – an idea that was considered laughable to the aviation industry.

“It wasn’t just Toowoomba, there was a lot of scepticism in the aviation community,” Mr Wagner said.

“I’d go to conferences and say to people we’re building this airport, and they’d just laugh at you.”

Inaugural general manager Phil Gregory said he had distinct memories of trying to convince governments, regulators and industry professionals that what the Wagners were attempting was achievable.

Phil Gregory.

“I remember going to a meeting with CASA, and they said it wasn’t going to happen, talk to us in five years, (but) eventually they came on board.

“I attended every aviation conference in the lead-up to construction — I can remember the industry thinking we were crazy.

“People wouldn’t even talk to me.”

But once construction on the airport started, key bodies started to fall into place.

After the Toowoomba Regional Council approved it in 2013, CASA gave it the all clear soon after, before Qantas signed up as the first carrier.

Mr Gregory said seeing Toowoomba embrace Wellcamp for its reality and potential was among the highlights of his career.

“There was a real buzz, the big thing was the open day we had – we were expecting a few thousand people to turn up, and tens of thousands turned up,” he said.

“That was the day that made me realise how big it was.

“I thoroughly loved it, it was the best time of my career. I got to build and run a new airport.”

For Mr Wagner, the launch was a vindication of his vision.

“While it was challenging, the fact that we had started before we sorted (the whole plan) out, we were actually showing people that we were serious and that we were putting our money where our mouth is,” he said.

“That’s what happened, and that’s what we did, and it has worked out extremely well.”

ARRIVING HOME: Home from Sydney, to visit her parents in Dalby Lisa Hegge arrives on the first flight from Sydney. The Brisbane West Wellcamp Airport is officially open with first passenger flights by Qantas Link. Photo Bev Lacey / The Chronicle

Wellcamp’s true value to Toowoomba revealed

Since that first flight in November 2014, Wellcamp has seen more than 700,000 passenger movements in 10 years, as well as moving 11,000 tonnes of freight to and from Asia.

Mr Wagner said freight, primarily transported by Cathay Pacific, had played a large role in Wellcamp’s success and had the strongest upside.

“We’re doing a lot, some of it commercial in-confidence, but my guys are up in Singapore the week after next, and we’re looking at a lot of e-commerce opportunities,” he said.

“We’ve got a regular service now into Papua New Guinea, Cathay planes are full and we see that’s going to continue to grow.

“We’re very confident that the freight side of things will just continue to grow and continue to double in size.”

New freight capabilities at Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport

CAPA Centre for Aviation research head Simon Elsegood said the success of Toowoomba as a freight hub would depend on the delivery of key logistics projects, notably the Inland Rail.

“If you can get the multimodal connectivity, it’s going to be good for Toowoomba, but I can’t speak as to the volume,” he said.

“That’s where the advantages are speed and cost, and if you can’t promise both of those, it’s not going to work.”

While the passenger numbers appear impressive at first glance, the figures are well below the one million mark within 24 months Mr Wagner had predicted back in 2014.

While Wellcamp did rank inside Australia’s top 50 airports between 2015 and 2020, it has been slow to recover from the Covid-19 pandemic.

“Seat numbers since 2020 have recovered slowly — that’s a broader symptom of the Australian market,” Mr Elsegood said.

“We’ve seen regional markets recover much more slowly — your Cairns and Byron Bays and Hobarts have recovered well, but a lot of smaller airports haven’t.

“Qantas is a pretty solid operator there, but capacity has been steady since Bonza left.”

The first Bonza flight from Melbourne lands at Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport on April 17, 2023.

Mr Wagner said the loss of low-cost airline Bonza, which moved 50,000 passengers through Wellcamp during its short run, had stymied his hopes of a full recovery from Covid-19 for now.

“It’s really tragic what happened with Bonza — we were really getting on top of things with Bonza, but they went by the wayside for various reasons,” he said.

“The reality is, if Qantas is charging $250 a seat and four people can get on Jetstar in Brisbane at $70 a seat, people will drive, which surprises me.

“I wouldn’t drive, but a lot of people will.”

But Mr Wagner said he held plenty of hopes for increased domestic numbers to and from Wellcamp, especially once services returned from Melbourne.

“The Qantas planes are full every day now, and I think we’ll get some more services to Melbourne over the next 12 months then we’ll just keep at it until we get there – it will come into its own,” he said.

Sara Hales at Wellcamp Airport near Toowoomba. Pic Annette Dew

Former Wellcamp general manager and aviation consultant Sara Hales said the airport’s success couldn’t just be measured in passenger figures, but also as a selling point for investment in Toowoomba and helping to shape its image.

“The initial investment and the confidence in our community, which that demonstrated, changed the way Toowoomba thinks about itself,” she said.

“It took us from being a country town to a cosmopolitan city with a real role and identity in the world.

“Toowoomba grew up, and the airport was a large part of that. In a way, it’s a beacon of our role globally.”

Mr Wagner said access to international-capable flights was essential to attracting major players to the attached Wellcamp Business Park.

“The airport was effectively an anchor for the Wellcamp business park, and it’s proven to be a very good anchor,” he said.

“We’ve got Qantas, we’ve got Boeing coming, and we wouldn’t have gotten those sorts of deals across the line without an international airport.”

What the future holds for city’s aviation

QBM – Wellcamp airport pics. Pic Mark Cranitch.

While domestic travel and freight will be key parts of the airport’s growth over the next 20 years, Wagner Corp’s recent foray into developing a sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) plant in Brisbane and a blending facility at Wellcamp has excited experts.

Mr Elsegood said SAF would play a major role in the aviation industry as countries continued to invest in decarbonisation.

“The blending plant is actually a big deal — Australia produces no sustainable aviation fuel, and I think all the SAF used by Qantas (this year) was bought in Singapore,” he said.

“There is a huge opportunity for sustainable aviation fuel, potentially billions of litres, and we need it to be produced here.”

Ms Hales said she believed Wellcamp was ready to turn a corner after the pandemic.

“It has particular strengths as an international logistics airport, and I understand that the freight business is really humming along now and maturing nicely,” she said.

“Wagner Corporations investment in the development of Wagner Sustainable Fuels sets the business up very well to benefit from the aviation industry’s strong moves towards emissions reduction.”

Wagner Corp Chairman John Wagner. photo: Glenn Hunt/The Australian

All of these points ring true for Mr Wagner, who firmly believed Wellcamp had yet to reach its ultimate form.

“The biggest legacy is we’ve put Toowoomba on the national and international map — that to me is a true legacy,” he said.

“I’ve always said that my generation’s not going to make any money out of it, our kids will do okay, but our grandkids will do really well.

“It’s a multi-generational asset, and that’s the way we’ve always looked at it.”