Opinion and excitement on the new Western Sydney International Airport

In this blog, I will discuss my opinions on the new Western Sydney Airport, my excitement for it and provide a little travel blog of the day I went down to Sydney at the end of April to do the runway walk. This blog will be fairly relaxed and won't include really any references - take my opinions very lightly as I am just an airport and train foamer.

Photo I took of the WSI terminal building 26 April around 5PM

Hello to anyone reading this, it has been a while since I've posted something, but I am still here! I've just been very busy and a lot of things have changed as I've graduated high school, started university and started working a part time retail job as well, so my free time has reduced this year. Despite, the runway walk occurring back in April, I still want to share my experiences and thoughts on the new airport especially since I am someone who loves anything transport infrastructure related. 

Western Sydney International (Nancy Bird Walton) Airport (WSI) is commencing flights on the 25th October of this year, with the first flight to going to the Gold Coast, with the day after commencing the first international flight (with AirNZ to AKL) the day after. This airport has long been in speculation and planning and it is great that it eventually got built. 

Design, layout and runway

Firstly, I think the design of the airport is incredibly opulent; the brown colours, the warm lighting, the sandstone and open space is incredibly inviting. Although I am yet to go inside, the interior and extremely high ceilings of the airport look spectacular (judging by the videos posted on YouTube by news outlets and creators). Secondly, the plaza or park that fronts the main entrance is a nice addition, especially since the entrance into airport is usually a pick up/drop off road.

Interior photo taken up against outside glass

Outside the main entrance 

Landscaping fronts the airport instead of a road

 

What I find interesting about the airport is the way that the airport is reliant on technology, namely, the lack of a control tower and lack of check in staff. The lack of the control tower and the use cameras is a very interesting, especially since it is one of the first airports purpose built and designed with the 'remote and virtual tower' in mind. Furthermore at some stage, the airport will be expanded to have a capacity of 82 million passengers, although the current capacity sits at around 10 million passengers. (see this source) 

Additionally, check in and bag drop will heavily rely on check in screens and self bag drop with minimal staff to assist. I think this decision might be helpful in mitigating lines, but could be limiting for passengers who have trouble checking in with the kiosks. Personally, from my experience, the kiosks have worked fine on domestic flights, but we have experienced repeated troubles with using the kiosks for international flights previously and needed to go to the normal check in line.

Also, the implementation of the swing gates and bag drop areas is a really smart concept as well. I can't wait to eventually fly to this airport.

The runway is about 3.7km and will be able land and any aircraft. However, the airport does not have gates able to hold A380s. Below are some photos of runway and tarmac taken on the 26 April on the runway walk day.

On the tarmac looking back at the terminal

Looking southward down the runway

Looking northward while centred on the runway.

 

Service & Transport

The airport with no curfew which allows for operation at anytime of the day, which unlocks flexibility for airlines. The only airline to initially take advantage of this will be Singapore Airlines who will operate a midnight flight from Sydney, like they do from Brisbane, Melbourne and Perth. They start operating daily flights from 23 November. 

As mentioned earlier, Air New Zealand will operating 3 weekly flights to Auckland from 26 October serving WSI on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays.

As for domestic routes, only the Qantas group have announced flights with Jetstar flights commencing to the Gold Coast, Brisbane and Melbourne from the 25th and Qantas starting flights much later starting 28 March. Melbourne will be only domestic route to launch with daily flights from the same airline (Jetstar) with an additional flight on Mondays, Fridays and Saturdays. (see flightconnections for more detail)

The initial service is surprisingly limited in my opinion and I'm surprised virgin didn't even want to offer any initial service. Furthermore, no Perth or Adelaide service was surprising to me as well. I'm sure future service will expand and change, assuming people would actually prefer to fly out of WSI.

Maybe, once the metro opens later, after the airport has opened, people might prefer to fly out of WSI, especially if there's no surcharge. However, without a direct one seat ride to Paramatta and potentially beyond to Sydney the attractiveness of the airport is diminished. However, there is a new motorway that isn't tolled and parking and free bus until the metro opens, so it's not all bad.

Travel blog

On Sunday the 26 April, dad & I had booked a same day return ticket from BNE to SYD with Jetstar, we took the first flight 07:00 morning flight and booked the last flight back leaving at 20:15, however, this last flight was further delayed to 21:40 which didn't bother us and caused us less stress. On the flight down, we were upgraded to exit row seats was amazing and super lucky as we didn't reserve seats, this meant that the 50 minute flight down was even more comfortable especially for a taller person like me. 

Once we landed, we got a hire car and drove around Sydney to explore some areas I'd never seen before, namely, the suburbs to the east of the CBD. This was because our runway walk check in time was at 15:45, so we had time to explore. After that, we found a park around the CBD (and got mildly ripped off) and took a ride on some public transport. We rode the trams, the metro and the trains and ended up eating lunch at Chatswood. Sydney Metro is a gorgeous piece of infrastructure and I was really impressed my central station, it is incredibly special that Sydney public transport infrastructure that is like art. I was blown away at the scale of some of the CBD stations in Sydney.

Metro Platforms Sydney Central

Opera House view from Harbour Bridge on train

 Once we returned back to our car, at about 14:00, we made our way over to the airport not paying tolls. This was a good drive as I was seeing new areas of a city I haven't visited much. Eventually, we made our way to the new M12 and we were near. Eventually we made it to our turn off, marked what I can only describe as a metal globe.

 

 After that, we found our park and lined up. I was pleasantly in awe at the scale of the airport and I think that will be the first and last time in my lifetime that I will be ever touch the runway, and I’m incredibly grateful that I could be able to enjoy this moment on such a clear and pleasant afternoon. Here are few more photos I took on the day below.

We probably spent about an hour here, to repeat this was such a cool experience and I will never forget this experience. I have a lot of hopes for the future of this airport and I hope to see it expand. 

 

After that, we headed straight back to the CBD (and getting slugged with tolls) as with the delayed flight, I could meet a friend in the CBD to quickly meet up and have some dinner with them. Then, we drove back to the airport for our delayed flight home. 

 

This day was marvellous, as the weather was great and I saw parts of the city I had never seen before, and I got to see and touch the runway of a future airport! I hope this isn't the first and last time I'd get to do something like this in my life, and I also hope that I will be able to fly more in the future as I love commercial aviation as well as public transport. 

 

If you have read to the end, thank you. I hope you enjoyed and share my excitement for this new airport.