BUILDING giant BGC has started legal action against Perth Airport in a battle over land at the end of a proposed runway development.
BUILDING giant BGC has started legal action against Perth Airport in a battle over land at the end of a proposed runway development.
The company, owned by magnate Len Buckeridge, wants to build a factory for modular housing on a site leased in 2006 from the airport, which already houses its new brickworks.
BGC claims it went so far as to order materials to build its factory and delivered them to the site after being assured in January by an airport official that the planned building would be approved if it were lowered by 200mm.
But last month, airport owner Westralia Airports Corporation opposed the development on the grounds that the proposed building, which would sit in an existing landing flight path, may hinder a future runway extension included in its 2009 Perth Airport Master Plan.
As previously revealed by WA Business News, the airport and BGC have been negotiating to resolve the issue since February, but Mr Buckeridge says he has now lost patience over the matter, which he believes is urgent due to commercial considerations.
Mr Buckeridge said he had asked the airport to consider land swaps with two different sites within its precinct, but that had not resolved the issue.
“I had four months of summonses to talkfests,” he said.
Mr Buckeridge said losses were mounting by the day and would be in the millions of dollars.
BGC wants to build a 24,800-square metre factory on a site at the north-eastern perimeter of the airport precinct to meet the upturn in demand for modular housing from the resources sector.
In its statement of claim lodged with the Federal Court last week, BGC claims it has suffered a loss in ordering building materials it (now) can’t use, and that the airport breached its lease agreement by failing to ensure its master plan was consistent with its 2006 agreement.
The airport declined to comment on the matter.
BGC took the 41-year lease in 2006 after previously struggling to get planning permission to build its brickworks as the housing boom took off.
With the airport owned by the federal government, the company was able to bypass much of the state’s approvals process.
But the airport has its own federal planning process, including a master plan, which looks out up to 20 years to provide for future growth of the vital infrastructure.
In the 2009 master plan, one map clearly shows a series of dots and lines, which are marked ‘HIAL’ – believed to be high intensity approach lighting to guide aircraft on landing, crossing the land BGC has leased.
The lighting would be part of a potential extension of an existing 2,163-metre runway to a length of 3,000 metres towards the BGC site.
According to the master plan, such an extension was not expected to take place before 202.
