curfew freight concerns
Gold Coast Airport has a curfew in place under the Air Navigation (Gold Coast Airport Curfew) Regulations 2018 which limits aircraft movements between 11.00pm and 6.00am by restricting the types of aircraft that can operate, the number of flights permitted and the types of operation allowed. This enables some aviation services to be provided such as freight movements.
We believe the curfew is a vital operational condition that provides residents living close to a growing airport surrounded by a growing city a good night’s sleep. The serious health and welfare effects of interrupted sleep are well documented in the medical literature, including reports by the World Health Organisation.
In 2022 QANTAS sought a long-term exemption from curfew times to allow air freighters to land inside curfew hours, following on from this practice during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Gold Coast community sent a very clear message to the responsible Minister that there should be no air freighter flight movements at the Gold Coast Airport during curfew hours.
The Minister acknowledged this by refusing the application by Qantas to conduct such flights. However, the Minister declined to address the legacy enabling provisions of the Gold Coast Curfew Regulation which allow four air freighter movements per week during curfew hours.
We argue these provisions are a relic from a time when they were required to facilitate delivery of weekend newspapers printed in Sydney to the Gold Coast. This need has not existed for 20 years, and the regulations need to be updated to remove this provision.
In our submission to Gold Coast Airport’s Preliminary Draft Master Plan 2024, we wrote that it is our strong view that the legacy provisions of the Air Navigation (Gold Coast Airport Curfew)
Regulations 2018 must be amended to remove the provisions for any freight jet movements during curfew hours.
We asked that the following clarifying wording be included in the Draft Master Plan: “There is no change proposed to the existing curfew arrangements as part of the Master Plan, with the exception they be amended to remove the provisions for any freight jet movements during curfew hours.”
Our community supporters continue to advise us that they strongly value the curfew and do not see any justification for the disruption to it that would necessarily come from exemptions of the sort in the recent Qantas application.
