Such is the community concern over proposed flight paths above Noosa Shire that residents overflowed a public meeting organised on Saturday at Peregian Beach Community House to such an extent two sittings were conducted.
Led by former councillor Vivian Griffin the meeting was orchestrated with the major aims of informing residents of the impacts of proposed flight paths and urging them to submit objections by the consultation deadline of 30 April to Airservices Australia (ASA), a government-owned body tasked with providing safe, secure, efficient, and environmentally-responsible air navigation services to the aviation industry.
Backed by a team formed from, local community organisations Vivien outlined the flight paths proposed over Noosa on route to the Sunshine Coast Airport’s new second runway following its completion in 2020.
She said ASA proposed to enable 16-17 passenger flights daily to cross the coast around Marcus-Castaways beaches at 3000ft then descend toward the airport.
In a residential area that has not previously had overhead flights the impact would be a “massive degree of significance”, she said.
Vivian said according to ASA principles, of paramount importance was safety and sound air traffic management practices with noise and environmental impacts to be minimised. It’s own environmental impact study (EIS) states significant noise impact was an issue when jets flew over residential areas below 5000ft, she said.
Attendees heard consultation conducted by ASA in 2014 needed to be redone according to ASA protocol to fully include Noosa Shire residents and an EIS on sensitive sights such as Lake Weyba which should have been done, had not.
She said resident action had changed flight paths proposed for an airport in Hobart and in that case the ombudsman had been scathing of ASA’s consultation.
Vivian said the key messages from the meeting were that the flight paths were “not a done deal”, it was not a battle between flight paths on the hinterland or the coast and to succeed everyone needed to make a submission and alert other levels of government to the issue.
Three experienced pilots who live locally also addressed the crowd and put forward alternate flight paths that would contain arriving planes to flight paths within the Sunshine Coast Shire with departures heading over the water and would be within safety and air traffic requirements.
Sunshine Coast Airport expansion project director Ross Ullman said he would like to see the consultation processes happen and also urged residents to put in their submissions.
Vivian urged submissions to include calls for an extension to the consultation deadline and the reopening of a dialogue around the consultation.
