Move Wellington Airport to the Hills....
 

So a local Councillor and property "investor" think it would be a great idea to move NZWN up into the hills above Wellington harbor where apparently the constant cloud and wind wouldn't affect operations at all and make for a much improved situation!

Airport proposed up in the hills | Stuff.co.nz

Looking forward to watching them sink a few million into a fruitless feasibility study for this one.

What? An airport 200 metres above sea level? Frankly I dont see much of a problem with that.

This looks like the aviation equivalent of Transmission Gully .....

thats a fairly cloudy part of the world in a moist southerly john.

cat2/3 ops come with what would be some fairly restrictive wind limitations

still, they'll think about it, study it, design it, cost it and wonder whos funding it and finally when a lot of public money and time has been spent someone will think perhaps running the idea past someone vaguely associated with aviation might be a good idea.

and in any case, god permitting i've got about 20-25 years flying left in me. i doubt it'll be built in time for me to land on it.

Based on the amount of cloud (and turbulence) you can get sitting on Newlands ridge, you would hope they do their maths on adverse weather conditions affecting operations at the proposed site...

Cat 3 ops with a 40 knot crosswind. Yahoo!

They can't even get a new road built, I can't see a whole new airport happening

Newlands ?? DC8 ?? mmmmmm !!

Waahhaahhaaahaahaah. You've got to be kidding. As a poster said above, transmission gully! There is no money to build anything in NZ. The last major capital works were during Muldoon's era of 'think big', when a few dams were built and the main trunk line was electrified..the motorway into Wellington was built around the same time, in the 40 years since there have been a few trifling extensions and that is it…Victoria tunnel anyone!

When you think about it, the majority of NZ's infrastructure was built during WWII, with help from the US. Since then, hardly anything has been built.:ugh:

A bit like Australia really!!!!!!

27

What infrastructure was built in aus by the us ?

I hear it was the septic tanks. No?

That concrete road out near Kandos

sounds like we all need another war. get the yanks back again to get sh1t done

It's NZ, they aren't allowed in because of the won't confirm or deny policy !

Has anyone heard anything lately about the planned runway extension for the current airport? Havent they already spent a ton of money on thinking about that?

Just look at the 'occupation' of the person making the proposal - a property developer. He wants to make money on the sale of land for the proposed new airport, and make money with the redevelopment of the 'old' airport site. Simple explanation for the proposal is blatant self-interest.

Pine Gap,Nurrungar,North West Cape Naval Communication Centre ;)

Surely the proposal to extend the runway at WLG isn't at all serious.
They can't extend the 16 end due to the Newlands versus the approach issue, so they would have to extend the 34 end.
Which rapidly heads out into a deep and very rough piece of sea.
Imagine the earthworks!
And instead of lovely, cold southerlies on approach, you'd be getting horrible turbs from the warm northerlies.
As a point of discussion - to get in and get out a reasonable range of different wide-body types at economical take off and landing weights, how many metres would they theoretically have to go out into the Strait?
What's the depth of the seafloor there?
I remember seeing a NIWA 3D sonar printout of the floor of Cook Strait once... it looks like a broken piece of glass because there are so many fractures off the main Alpine fault.
(And yes, I know you can already land a 747 at WLG if you really need to.)

Hmmm - answered my own question.
So they ARE looking at going North an extra 300m - hoping that RNP will allow an approach - presumably straight down the Hutt Valley, then curving onto finals?
But they couldn't take off to the North cos they still can't clear Newlands one engine out, and turning over the Hutt Valley on one donk isn't a good idea :confused:

tartare ... the Hutt valley SE TFP idea is already in-place and has been for some time.