Truce suggested on 2nd airport
Could federal MPs cut a deal to put a 2nd airport at Badgerys Creek? A senior Coalition figure is talking up the need for an airport truce.
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THE best place for Sydney's second airport is Badgerys Creek - the site both major parties have ruled out - the Coalition transport spokesman, Warren Truss, has suggested. But neither side of politics would take the electoral risk of supporting it unilaterally.
Mr Truss said only a bipartisan political agreement would settle the battle over a second airport site, adding he understood why Badgerys Creek had been chosen in 1986.
The alternative site at Wilton, being promoted by the government, was ''too far out of the city'' to be viable, he said. And noise and transport access problems presented huge problems for expanding Sydney Airport.
Preferred site in 1986, in limbo in 2012 ... Badgerys Creek. Photo: Anthony Johnson
Conceding an Abbott government would have to make a decision on a future site in its first term, despite opposition from the NSW Premier, Barry O'Farrell, to any site inside the Sydney basin, Mr Truss said it was time for politicians to acknowledge the facts.
''There is no perfect site; when one is chosen the people will always find reasons why it shouldn't have been chosen … but no new sites are going to magically appear and all the work has been done now, there's no need for more studies, it's just a matter of making a decision,'' he said. ''Political parties have been ruling things out in relation to Sydney Airport for a long, long time. Soon we will have to rule something in.
''I know the problems with all of the sites, but I know why Badgerys Creek was chosen in the first place, and I thought it was very interesting the [recent state and federal inquiry] basically put it right back on the table. But both sides of politics have ruled it out, so that is where it is at the moment.
''We've ruled it out, and we will rule it out in the context of the next election as well, and Labor has ruled it out as well.''
Asked whether politicians should reconsider Badgerys Creek - recommended by the joint study as the best and most cost effective solution and where land purchased by the Hawke government remains available, Mr Truss said: ''I think it would be helpful if there could be some kind of bipartisan agreement about what is the best site, taking into account what the options actually are, because it will be many years before the project starts and many years to build, so it is highly likely it will cross political eras.''
Labor will release a scoping study into the site at Wilton, south-west of Campbelltown, early next year, but it is understood that it will expose big problems with the site. Privately, senior Labor figures also deeply regret Labor's announcement in 2003, from opposition, that it was abandoning support for the Badgerys Creek site.
Airlines, industry experts and investors have been pressing for a second airport decision for years, and the joint study found failure to act would cost NSW billions in lost jobs and revenue and cause significant noise and traffic problems in Sydney.
But any discussion of Badgerys Creek is complicated by the crucial role western Sydney will play in next year's federal election. Labor fears that it could lose six western Sydney seats.
The Coalition leader, Tony Abbott, has said he is waiting to see a proposal from the federal government, but the shadow treasurer, Joe Hockey, has said the NSW government's position that it should be built outside the Sydney basin is ''absurd''.
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