Answer to airport woes right on doorstep

Sunshine Coast Mayor Mark Jamieson says the Sunshine Coast Airport could take more traffic and help ease delays at Brisbane Airport. PIO: Megan Slade Source: The Courier-Mail

THE Sunshine Coast says it is ready, willing and able to ease Brisbane Airport's flight congestion woes.

Tiger Airways have launched a regular service between the Coast and Melbourne and Mayor Mark Jamieson is keen to see more direct flights from southern cities.

He said he had already raised the idea of rescheduling some services to the Sunshine Coast with Deputy Premier Jeff Seeney and the SEQ Council of Mayors, and was "in dialogue" with the airlines.

"We can provide a solution now," Cr Jamieson said.

The State Government has ordered a breakdown of the capacity of all southeast Queensland's airports to see how much of the load can be moved from Brisbane, where persistent delays continue to frustrate passengers.

The latest Federal Government statistics, released this week, revealed that only 61.5 per cent of flights landed on time at Brisbane Airport in February.

It was the worst performance of any major airport and Brisbane's worst on record.

"We have a dominant airport that clearly cannot handle the traffic," Cr Jamieson said.

"Right now, we can provide a solution that will ease the problem and ease the burden on Brisbane Airport and, more particularly, on the travelling public."

The Coast could comfortably handle four to six extra flights daily to and from major centres such as Sydney and Melbourne, said the mayor.

The Sunshine Coast Airport had a catchment of up to 750,000 potential passengers from South Burnett and Wide Bay down to Pine Rivers (north of Brisbane) who found it more convenient than driving to the state capital to catch flights.

In the longer term, a second runway on the Sunshine Coast would boost capacity even more.

"There's no doubt that our three SEQ airports - Brisbane, Sunshine Coast and Gold Coast - need to have an integrated plan for the future," Cr Jamieson said.

Tiger will operate four weekly return flights between Melbourne and the Sunshine Coast, increasing to a daily service from June.

The on-time arrival rate for the Sunshine Coast Airport last month was 78 percent, while the Gold Coast Airport recorded 69.2 percent of flights landing on schedule.

The Gold Coast Airport is the country's fastest-growing, with passenger numbers for the six months to December up 13 percent on the same period the previous year.

But executives yesterday declined to comment on what opportunities they saw for increasing passenger services.

Archerfield Airport general manager Corrie Metz said its 1.48km runway could not accommodate large passenger aircraft but they were looking at expanding Fly In Fly Out operations.

"We are getting a lot more FIFO inquiries, especially with the issues at Brisbane. They are looking for alternatives."

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