It has been talked about for decades, and a year and a half out from its opening, WesternSydneyInternational is looking more and more like an airport.
This week, press gathered to mark the completion of its runway.
Built 1 metre deep with a range of materials including a base layer of crushed sandstone salvaged from road tunnelling projects in Sydney; a section of 140,000 tonnes of asphalt above it; and 73,000 cubic metres of concrete paving, the 3.7km runway is strong enough to accommodate A380 and Boeing 747-8 jumbos.
Meanwhile, its freshly built terminal looks futuristic, a building with rows of aerobridges that extend on to the tarmac, ready for the planes that will one day fly millions of passengers. Driving up to the building, there are already signs to the arrivals and departures area.
However, there’s plenty still to be done.
While ride-share pickup points have been established, getting an Uber to the terminal is impossible, in large part because roads haven’t been named yet.
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The existing roads to the airport via the town of Luddenham feel semi-rural, passing homesteads, paddocks and plenty of cows, before the environment quickly shifts to hi-vis and fresh asphalt of roads not yet recognised on Google Maps.
But for now, it’s just construction workers who have learned the daily commute travelling to the airport.
Perfecting the experience of driving to the airport 44km west of Sydney’s eastern CBD will be crucial – the airport is scheduled to open in December 2026, before the dedicated Metro rail link, which has been delayed, potentially until up to a year later.
It’s one of many of the logistical hurdles the government-owned airport faces on its home stretch, before bringing 24-hour commercial aviation to Sydney and shaking up a core dynamic that has hamstrung Australian aviation.
Standing on the freshly-laid runway, the airport CEO Simon Hickey this week said most of the construction of the airport itself had now been completed. Western Sydney International was on budget and on track to open by the end of 2026, he said.
Most of the task ahead lies in bolstering roads on the so-called “land side” – as opposed to the airfield – but most of the works will be filling out the rest of the airport precinct, which includes a business park, cargo area and the broader Bradfield city being planned by government authorities.
One thing that does not need to be built is an air traffic control tower.
The airport will be Australia’s first operated as a “digital aerodrome” – thanks to more than 20 high resolution cameras broadcasting the airport and immediate airspace in real time to a centralised control room off-site – as part of plans by Airservices Australia, the government body responsible for managing airspace.
Some things, however, cannot be done remotely. Airservices – which is also tasked with providing specialist aviation firefighting services to all major airports – will soon build its fire station there.
While major construction works are nearing completion, Hickey said efforts were shifting to a testing regime, which will include welcoming progressively larger aircraft, as well as drills mimicking everyday airport scenarios.
These drills will canvass mundane occurrences, such as staff responding to deliberately staged incidents such as dropped suitcases or injuries, with hired-staff posing as travellers.
The drills will also include crisis simulations, to stress test how the airport’s infrastructure and staff respond to incidents such as security threats or cyber-attacks.
The other crucial element will be securing airlines to fly to the airport.
So far, Qantas, its budget carrier Jetstar, andSingaporeAirlines have signed up. Hickey said the airline had been in discussion with more than 30 airlines.
While more airlines are expected to announce services to WSI soon, Hickey this week was coy as to whether a lack of rail connection at the initial opening, and distance from central Sydney, was proving a sticking point in attempts to woo more global carriers.
“We’ve got great connectivity from day one,” Hickey said, talking up the M12 motorway which allows travel to Sydney’s eastern CBD “without going through one set of traffic lights”.
“[There are] 2.5 million people in Western Sydney. It’s one of the most vibrant communities in Australia. It’s one of the fastest growing communities in Australia … So actually, airlines recognise that this is a great place to be with a great catchment,” Hickey said.
In the early months of operating, operations are expected to be small, before gradually ramping up. Before the rail connection opens, many in the industry expect the airport to be mostly popular with western Sydney locals, especially those looking to avoid long trips and toll spends getting to the existing Kingsford Smith airport in Mascot.
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The concept of a second major airport serving a large Australian city is relatively foreign, apart from south-east Queensland’s array of airports serving Brisbane, the Gold Coast and north-east New South Wales.
The closest model is Victoria’s Avalon, for which tickets are sold as a Melbourne destination but which is in reality much closer to the city of Geelong.
While Avalon is Melbourne’s second busiest passenger airport, it resembles more of a regional operation, with roughly a dozen Jetstar services, mostly to Sydney, each day.
On a recent trip to the airport, Guardian Australia observed multiple passengers puzzled by its small size, wondering whether they had in fact landed in Melbourne.
Another in the arrivals hall frantically asked a Jetstar employee why they couldn’t find their family – who had, it transpired, instead turned up to the larger Tullamarine airport about 50km away. “It happens all the time,” the Jetstar worker later told Guardian Australia.
Avalon’s relative failure to grow into a major second airport has much to do with its origins, initially as a military airfield, then training base, and logistics hub run by Linfox. It began hosting passenger services with Jetstar in 2004, but repeated attempts to lure international airlines have not lasted.
Conversely, western Sydney airport is being master planned as a primarily passenger airport with an accompanying CBD to serve an area already looking for alternatives to the long commute to the eastern part of the city.
Additionally, the 24-hour operations at WSI are set to trigger a dramatic shake-up of Australian aviation.
Currently, Sydney’s existing Kingsford Smith airport ishamstrung by strict movement limits of 80 take offs and landings – known as slots– in any one hour, plus an 11pm-6am curfew, to curb noise pollution for residents.
The scarcity of slots in Sydney, particularly in peak travel times, has been highlighted as a key barrier to new entrant airlines establishing a foothold to compete withQantasgroup and Virgin.
While its flight paths will be slightly tweaked at night, WSI will operate at all hours, with careful planning to ensure comparatively less noise for residents compared with the city’s eastern airport.
Many in the industry are hopeful that beyond allowing for cheaper and more convenient flights for those willing to travel during the night, less constrained slots could allow new airlines to form a base in Sydney and meaningfully compete with established carriers.
“Late-night departure capacity, for instance, could allow Singapore Airlines business travellers to finish a full day’s work in Sydney, take an overnight flight and arrive in Singapore before their first morning meeting the very next day,” Hickey has said.
Competition among airports over the prices they charge for access and retail rents could also drive prices lower for business which could flow on to customers, a dynamic seen in European countries where competition from secondary airports allow for more carriers and cheaper average air fares.
WSI will initially operate with just one runway, capable of handling up to 10 million passengers a year, but with growth plans to allow for a second runway to be built.
Tens of thousands of jobs will be directly or indirectly supported by the airport and precinct.
There are plans for WSI to eventually become Sydney’s biggest international airport, to handle more than 80 million annual passengers, similar to the load handled by London’s Heathrow.
However, in the short term, Sydney’s Kingsford Smith is expected to remain dominant, with demand at Western Sydney to take time to form.
This has been seen in Qantas’s planning, with the airlineconfirming to Australian Aviationthat when the airport opens it will operate services with QantasLink, its regional brand which has smaller aircraft.
For now, Catherine King, the transport minister, is optimistic the airport will grow, not cannibalise, Sydney’s air travel market, and help make western Sydney a destination instead of an appendage.
“Each [airport] will operate in their own markets. I’m sure they’ll work competitively with and against each other as well,” King said.