Mayor urges PMto save Ka¯piti Airport
The mayor of Ka¯piti Coast is appealing to the prime minister to save Ka¯piti Airport from potential closure, while former prime minister Helen Clark is urging the Government to give ‘‘careful consideration’’ to the request.
Mayor K Gurunathan wrote to Jacinda Ardern on Tuesday, asking the Government for a commitment over the future of the embattled airport.
In his letter, Gurunathan referred to a 2005 incident in which a charted plane with Clark on board landed at the Paraparaumu airport, a 45-minute drive north of Wellington, after a door opened midflight. He said the incident emphasised the airport’s importance as an alternative to Wellington Airport in emergencies.
Speaking to Stuff yesterday, Clark stopped short of backing Gurunathan’s plea. But she said Ka¯piti Airport’s proximity to Wellington could prove ‘‘very helpful’’ to relief efforts in the city’s northern suburbs if a major disaster, such as an earthquake, were to strike the capital.
‘‘Clearly, the case the mayor is making needs to be given very careful consideration.’’
Gurunathan’s plea to Ardern follows months of speculation that the airport’s current owner, NZPropCo, plans to close the airport soon.
The mayor has been a longtime supporter of keeping it open, as well as returning the land to mana whenua.
The Government took the land from Ma¯ori under the Public Works Act in 1939. The Crown then sold it to a private company in 1995.
Gurunathan has previously warned that lives could be lost if the airport closed, as it is used as a backup runway for urgent medical flights when planes are unable to land in Wellington.
In September, he wrote to five Cabinet ministers, including then-transport minister Phil Twyford and Andrew Little, who was responsible for Te Tiriti O Waitangi negotiations, asking for them to step in and secure the airport’s future.
Dissatisfied with the ministers’ responses, which he described as ‘‘confusing’’, Gurunathan took his case to the prime minister.
He said in the letter it was his ‘‘last plea for your Government to make a clear and comprehensive decision on the current and future role of the Paraparaumu Airport’’.