The first passenger flight from Western Sydney International Airport (WSI) is due to take off tomorrow, the culmination of an 80-year quest for a second Sydney airport that has spanned 19 proposed sites, street protests and repeated government reversals.
For Matthew Hayes, a 20-year-old transport enthusiast who took part in trial passenger runs two months ago, it is a dream come true.
"I used to go with my mother down to the site of the [Badgerys Creek] airport. Back then it was just paddocks and hills, and livestock grazing along the way," he said. "My mum would tell me, 'One day, when you're older, this is going to be a whole airport.'"
His fellow trial passenger, 80-year-old Kevin Appleby of Mount Druitt, was a teenager when he first heard talk of a second Sydney airport.
The question of where to put it has been debated since 1946, when aviation boomed after World War II. A NSW government study recommended Towra Point in Botany Bay in 1964. Within a year of Gough Whitlam's rise to power in 1973, his government selected Galston in Sydney's north-west, prompting nearly 2,000 people to travel to Canberra to protest. The decision was reversed less than a year later.
An International Air Transport Association report in 1976 concluded a second airport was unnecessary, but a federal and state group called Major Airport Needs of Sydney recommended in 1979 that Badgerys Creek be the site if one was ever needed. The Hawke government selected Badgerys Creek in 1986 and began buying up land that was mostly grasslands and cow paddocks.
Opposition continued through the 1990s. A No Aircraft Noise Party contested the 1995 NSW state election, and in 1998 federal and state Labor MPs formed a bloc called Labor Against Badgerys, joined by the Western Sydney Alliance of Councils. The project was finally locked in when the Abbott Coalition government confirmed Badgerys Creek as the site in 2014.
Funding and approvals took four years, construction began in 2018, and 10,000 workers built the airport, described as Australia's largest civil earthmoving project outside the mining sector. The site now includes a passenger terminal, a cargo precinct and a 3.7-kilometre runway, with capacity for 10 million passengers and 1.8 million tonnes of cargo a year.
Cargo flights have been operating since July, and some residents say the round-the-clock operations have already confirmed their worst fears. Carolyn Wong, whose family has lived in nearby Luddenham for 70 years and who has protested against the airport for most of that time, said she was saddened by the passenger opening.
"It makes me sad that the airport is about to fully open; it really is the end of an era and our lives as we know it," she said. "We still don't have access to the new buses, the rail isn't ready, the houses that need [sound] insulation haven't got it, the Luddenham Village Plan and zoning haven't been sorted. It's such a kick in the guts that they are opening it without addressing any of the community's concerns."
Ms Wong and her daughter Katherine were considering moving away because of the noise from overnight freight flights.
Seven passenger airlines have signed up with WSI, including Qantas, Jetstar, Air New Zealand and Qatar Airways, with flights to Doha, Singapore and Ho Chi Minh City already scheduled.