Badgerys airport plan finally takes flight An aerial photograph of Badgerys Creek Rd, Badgerys Creek / Pic: Craig Greenhill Source: The Daily Telegraph BADGERYS Creek is firming as the site of Sydney's second airport, with the state government yesterday flagging a new town with 12,000 homes at Wilton - the spot south of Sydney where some believe a new airport should be located. NSW Planning Minister Brad Hazzard yesterday unveiled plans of the new suburb - Wilton Junction - to be built on land including the Wilton Aerodrome. At the same time the government revealed plans for a new 10,000ha employment hub in Sydney's west. Detailed planning documents reveal the western Sydney employment area surrounding Badgerys will be more than quadrupled in size and cannot be used for anything that would stop the site "being used for an airport in the future', despite Premier Barry O'Farrell angling for a fast train to Canberra instead. "The objective ... is to avoid incompatible development in the vicinity of a potential second Sydney airport at Badgerys Creek," the draft plan states. Planning proposals must not contain provisions that enable the carrying out of development, either with or without development consent, which ... could hinder the development of a potential second Sydney airport. Plans for the employment area protects land corridors for new roads, two freight corridors and two potential sites for intermodal facilities, where freight would be transferred between road and rail. It would protect three route options for the possible Outer Sydney Orbital, a north-south corridor connecting the F3 north of Sydney with the Hume Highway south of Campbelltown, as well as a potential passenger rail corridor running through the employment land and "the Commonwealth land at Badgerys Creek." The "broader western Sydney employment area," encompassing Blacktown, Fairfield, Liverpool and Penrith has been identified as "one of the nine city shapers" - a region to dramatically change Sydney under a draft metropolitan plan that needs to find room for 315,000 new jobs in Sydney's west by 2031. The expanded lands would be equivalent in area to the land between the CBD and Kingsford Smith Airport, or Parramatta to Liverpool, allowing freight, agri-business, logistics, research, development and industry. The plans were released as the state government began investigations into a major new town near Wilton with room for 12,000 new homes. Wollondilly Mayor Col Mitchell said the council backed building a new town at Wilton, dismissing an airport as simply "political" and unlikely to be brought up after September. He said it would cost an extra $1 billion to build an airport at Wilton rather than Badgerys Creek.A spokeswoman for Mr Hazzard said Wilton airport would involve significant challenges. "It is understood the Commonwealth will now explore opening up Richmond RAAF Base to civil aviation," she said.