FED: Cabinet could defer new Sydney airport 15 years

AAP General News (Australia)
08-09-1999
FED: Cabinet could defer new Sydney airport 15 years

MELBOURNE, Aug 9 AAP - Federal cabinet could afford to defer building Sydney's second
international airport for another 15 years, an airport conference was told today.

The chief executive of lobby group Tourism Taskforce, Chris Brown, said Mascot Airport
could continue to serve international air traffic in the medium term.

A meeting of federal coalition MPs tomorrow is expected to discuss the controversial
airport proposal which has sparked ongoing demonstrations in Sydney's western suburbs.

An anti-Badgerys rally at Fairfield, in Sydney's west, yesterday attracted 1,500 people.

Mr Brown today predicted political pressure would force the federal government to put off
making a decision until after September 11 - the date for Sydney's local council elections.

Mr Brown said a second international airport in the Sydney basin area was eventually
inevitable.

But he said: "I'm offering a 15-year reprieve through which they (Badgerys Creek residents)
get together as a community to determine how the airport is too to operate, where they want an
avgas pipeline to be built and where (these) pipelines should be managed.

"The pipe is to get the fuel from Kurnell to Badgerys Creek. That would save taking it out
by trucks, which wouldn't go down too well, he said.

A delay would also give the New South Wales and local Sydney councils time to call a
moratorium on issuing new land and approving new housing development in the airport's
scheduled flight path.

AAP aj/sp/ra/cjh

KEYWORD: BADGERYS BROWN

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