Community open day at Western Sydney Airport

Hundreds of community members have been given exclusive access to Sydney’s newest airport and were among the first to get behind the gates and onto the future 3.7km runway at the Western Sydney International Airport (SWZ) Community Open Day.

Around 600 local families and residents were welcomed on the Western Sydney Airport construction site to see its progress, learn about current and future opportunities at the airport and get up close to some of the machinery that has worked across Australia’s largest earthmoving project.

Getting a selfie in a dump truck, participating in an artefact dig, learning about the site’s cultural heritage and conducting water testing were among some of the hands-on activities enjoyed by the community. Face painting, bee-hive making, food trucks, bush-tucker tasting and a ‘junior tradies activation’ made for a fun-filled day on the airport construction site.

Locals climbed aboard fire trucks on display while learning about safety and wellbeing from community representatives at NSW Police, Fire and Rescue NSW, the Rural Fire Service and St Johns Ambulance.

Western Sydney Airport General Manager of Community Engagement and Social Impact, Katy Hannouch, said a highlight for many was seeing the under-construction runway and terminal begin to take shape during a guided tour of the site.

“The Community Open Day is a great chance for the public to see the progress on this region-shaping project that will benefit this community and the Sydney basin for generations to come,” said Hannouch.

“Earthworks across the 1780 ha site are almost complete with 24 million out of the total 26 million m³ of earth moved so far.”

Hannouch added it was also an exciting opportunity for the community to learn about the thousands of local jobs the airport is creating during construction and into operations and speak to some of the people working on the project.

“Western Sydney Airport has a strong commitment to the community and is the catalyst for unprecedented investment in the region. The airport has directly injected more than $100 million into Western Sydney businesses during construction so far, and around 50 per cent of our workforce live in the region.

“Days like today really reinforce that the airport will be an airport for the people. Whether that’s our passengers, the airlines they fly with or our cargo partners, we’re taking every advantage of building a new airport from the ground up to ensure the experience we offer our customers is unlike any other Australian airport.

“We’re calling on the community to be a part of bringing the airport to life by contributing their opinions on different elements of the airport experience as part of our Western Sydney Airport Customer Panel.”