[Forum] This new review by Central Coast Council into Central Coast Airport is a phony.
Now we’re getting into la-la land.
What is Council up to?
Another review, because they can’t make a decision by themselves?
They are wrapping up Warnervale airport with the long-defunct Kiar Ridge proposal and bundling the two airports under the banner of Central Coast Airport Review.
They’re also calling for submissions, separately from the Department of Planning’s review of the Warnervale Airport Restrictions (WAR) Act.
Notice how they are using smoke and mirrors by showing a photo of Warnervale airport to confuse?
(ED. The photo was selected as a visual by the newspaper not council.)
The anti-airport mob have, for years, deliberately made out that a big jet regional airport, which was proposed for Kiar Ridge, was going to be built at Warnervale.
Now, what is really weird is that this Council has long had an agenda led by Crs Smith, Greenaway, McGregor and others, including Central Coast Labor, decrying the “great big jet airport”.
This had been their game plan, aimed at getting rid of Warnervale airport and even the spokesman for the anti airport group, Laurie Eyes, has for years been banging on about a great big jet airport being unnecessary and unviable.
Well, yes, the regional airport at Kiar Ridge balloon, as floated by previous councils, was absolutely ridiculous.
It would never have got off the ground mainly due to air traffic conflicts, let alone the madness of a big jet airport in competition with the two large passenger airports within an hour and a half of the Central Coast.
The Councillors know this.
It has been said that the Kiar Ridge land, purchased by a previous Council for some $17M, had been tendered out for sale a few years ago, and that the deal was under contract.
We don’t know for sure, without getting legal advice and seeking information under FOI, but you can bet that Council will cry “commercial in confidence”, just as they did with the hugely expensive AAI contract buy-out.
The anti airport mob cry about lack of transparency, yet here they are putting up a proposal for submissions without any background as to why.
The first thing to suspect is their so-called “independent consultant”.
For one thing, we will never know, until the end, the name of the consultancy, the terms of reference, the scope, timeframe or cost.
All this will be done in secret, so what is the chance that it will be truly “independent”?
You can bet it will come up with a report supporting the Council’s position to abandon the Aviation Hub, Kiar Ridge will be rejected, but that doesn’t matter as it’s a red herring anyway, the works undertaken for the airport upgrade will be reported to be a waste of money, and the decision to remove the airport from the Wyong Employment Zone endorsed.
Just watch.
Two most important things about this development are that the anti airport mob in Council have obviously concluded that the review of the WAR Act will deliver a recommendation to repeal the Act.
Or they will amend it to make it irrelevant to Warnervale airport and they are feeling the growing negative opinion out here in the real world about their dysfunctional approach to Warnervale airport and the Aviation Hub.
So, they are taking another tack, kill any chance of advancing the Aviaton Hub at Warnervale with a phony review.
It will take a new bunch of forward thinking, non-Community Environment Network or Labor-biased councillors to junk this review and just move forward.
Please, please prove me wrong.
Email, Feb 3
Geoff Robertson,
The Entrance