Queenstown Airport's plans to exceed pre-Covid flight numbers by 2025

Nicole Mathewson Reporter from Otago News

Queenstown Airport expects to exceed its pre-Covid flight numbers within three years – but the growth creates a major challenge for the local council's goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 44% by 2030.

In a plan accepted by the Queenstown Lakes District Council on Thursday, the airport corporation reveals it expects to have almost 2.5 million passenger movements in the 2025 financial year.

That would mean 18,832 flights – an average of about 52 flights per day.

The number is higher than its previous busiest year of 2019 when there were 2.3 million passenger movements.

The full extent of the impact of Covid-19 was not known, and operating conditions remained uncertain, the plan says.

The numbers feature in the airport corporation’s latest statement of intent (SOI).

As tension has risen over the airport and its expansion plans in recent years, the statement has become the focus of intense public pressure as it is the only document the council is required to approve as part of its role as majority shareholder of the council-controlled organisation.

At Thursday’s meeting, councillors voted narrowly to accept the SOI after concerns were raised that it implied councillors would also accept the corporation’s upcoming review of its strategic plan.

Councillor Niki Gladding sought an amendment to delay implementation of the plan until the council had also agreed on it.

Otherwise, the council was approving the plan without seeing it, she said.

“To me that’s a huge risk that I’m not prepared to take on behalf of ratepayers.”

Councillor Quentin Smith said significant progress had been made with the SOI.

Contentious plans to develop Wānaka airport were no longer part of the plan, and it included a strong commitment not to change the air noise boundaries, which had been a significant issue in Queenstown.

Gladding’s amendment did not pass, and the council approved the SOI.

At Thursday’s meeting, the council also approved a new climate and biodiversity plan, which Queenstown resident Anthony Mason argued was “actively deceptive” because it did not recognise the emissions from visitors flying into the district.

Before the pandemic, international visitors emitted 4.4 million tonnes a year flying to the district, he said.

“The entire aspiration of this 30-year plan is a decimal point in one year of our visitor’s international aviation.”

The climate and biodiversity plan had been under development since April 2021 and involved extensive consultation.

Council climate action programme manager Katherine Durman​ said one of the goals was to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the district by 44% by 2030.

“This won’t be easy, but we need to challenge ourselves to avoid the worst impacts of climate change,” she said.

The plan outlined 70 “actions” including reducing carbon emissions through more effective land-use planning and infrastructure design, regenerating native forest, and embedding climate change into decision-making.