Melbourne Airport chief executive Chris Woodruff has his hit back at Planning Minister Matthew Guy’s quip that the airport’s car park was so large it should have its own postcode and suburb name.
Mr Woodruff said the government was not doing its share to improve transport links to the airport.
He said a list of transport upgrades provided by Transport Minister Terry Mulder to a business lunch in Melbourne on Tuesday did not include “access upgrades to Melbourne airport”.
“This is woeful, we are a major economic driver in this state and we expect the state to come to the party,” he said.
“We need a rail link and we need road improvements connecting Melbourne airport to the major freeways,” he said.
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He said the airport was not going “take over the state’s responsibility to provide connecting infrastructure to one of its main economic powerhouses”.
“We call on them to accelerate the upgrade of the Tullamarine Freeway, to accelerate building of a rail link to the airport,” he said.
“We call on them to fulfil their responsibilities,” he told the Committee for economic development of Australia lunch.
Mr Mulder said the government was “well aware of the need to maintain good transport connections to our international gateways, which include Melbourne Airport, Avalon Airport and the Port of Melbourne. This was a major focus of our recently released freight and logistics plan, Victoria the Freight State. It was also a part of the recently released Plan Melbourne”.
