No More Brollies - Adelaide Airport

November 13, 2003

No More Brollies
South Australia Advertiser, Australia


AIRBRIDGES will soon be a familiar sight for travellers at Adelaide Airport.

The new passenger terminal will be 750m long, taking up to 27 aircraft at
once, 14 of them served by airbridges.

The terminal will be one of South Australia's biggest building projects –
a $240 million undertaking that had its sod-turning ceremony yesterday.

Replacing the 21-year-old international building – once famously described
as a tin shed by former premier John Olsen – is well overdue.

At the first scraping of the ground by a grader for the combined regional,
interstate and international terminal, the smile would not leave Adelaide
Airport Ltd managing director Phil Baker's face.

"I always knew it was coming," he said of the start. "I just didn't know
when."

Mr Baker and AAL took over running the airport in mid-1998 and came in
with an understanding that plans were well under way for a new terminal.

But plans were not as advanced as he believed.

He and his team have spent years negotiating with airlines, building firms
and banks to achieve a new terminal.

"We were ready to go in September 2001, but you all know what happened
then," he said, referring to the collapse of Ansett Airlines shortly after
an agreement had been reached with them on the new terminal.

Peter Kennedy, chief executive of construction contractor Hansen Yuncken,
said the new terminal would be the biggest project his firm had handled in
the state.

"They don't come much bigger than this," he said. "It's probably the
largest commercial building contract done in South Australia."

As well as stretching 750m, the terminal will be up to 110m wide and have
two storeys plus a mezzanine level, totalling 75,000sq m of floor space.
It will have 40 check-in desks and five arrival baggage carousels.

Mr Baker said few people had any perception of how big the terminal would
be – roughly Victoria Square to Parliament House in length. Mr Kennedy
said people going to the airport would be able to see its progress unfold
over the next 23 months.

Premier Mike Rann said the terminal would be a new front door "and SA
deserves the best possible front door to the world".

"It's going to be a massive construction project, employing 820 people and
will have a floor area three times bigger than Adelaide Oval. It's a giant
project," Mr Rann said. "It is something we will be proud of."



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