Council's survey on Whenuapai Airbase a 'set-up'

By WAYNE THOMPSON

The Whenuapai Airbase Action Group has slammed a council's attempt to test public feeling about the base's future as "a set-up and a waste of money".

Action group leader Ann Forrester said the North Shore City Council's plan for a telephone survey of 850 households next month was aimed at justifying a push to make the base a commercial jet airport.

Residents in the flight path - from Paremoremo to East Coast Bays - scrambled to meet today's deadline for public submissions on what the Government should do with the 311ha base when the Air Force moves out within five years.

The council won extra time for stating its views - after appealing to Prime Minister Helen Clark that not enough information was available on a matter that will have direct and significant impacts on Auckland.

Mayor George Wood said yesterday that he had never known a controversy like it on the North Shore.

The future of the base land had split public opinion - and the council - right up the middle, he said.

The council needed time to find out what citizens felt about the options before it made a stand in March. The $20,000 survey would help that, Mr Wood said.

Mrs Forrester said the survey was "more a political marketing strategy than any form of referendum".

North Shore and Waitakere City Councils had prepared the ground for a favourable survey response with propaganda that supported the commercial airport option, she said.

Other uses suggested by the Defence Force included an industrial or housing estate, or rural lifestyle blocks.

Mrs Forrester said the real concern was that as residents did not know about anything except the airport option, they could not properly consider a response to the survey.

"Given that the council does not have enough information to make this decision, how can residents?"

Mr Wood said yesterday that the council was being responsible by conducting a survey to gauge a city-wide representative view.

Asked whether the survey showed a lack of courage by his council to make a decision, Mr Wood said:

"You can say that but with such a finely balanced view in the council, it would be hard to make a binding decision and the council has clear guidelines to follow the wishes of the community."

Waitakere Mayor Bob Harvey wants Whenuapai to become Auckland's second commercial airport and has formed a mayoral taskforce to win public and Government backing.

"Save Whenuapai" campaign billboards have gone up.

One billboard on the route to Auckland Airport reads: "If you had taken off from Whenuapai you'd be there now."

Taskforce head Brian Mogridge said the base land should be used for an airport in conjunction with an industrial and commercial park to generate wealth and jobs in the northwest of Auckland.

"This would compensate for the $250 million a year loss when the Air Force leaves."

Base plans

* The Government is set to decide in April what it will do with the Whenuapai Air Base.

* The 311ha base has three runways.

* Airport investor Infratil and the Waitakere City Council want to run it as a commercial airport. They say it would suit budget airlines flying to Wellington, Brisbane and Sydney.

* Submissions to the Defence Force on uses for the land close at 5pm today.