Airport runway benefits and costs

Stuff reports:

The $300 million price-tag for Wellington Airport’s runway extension could blow out to $458m, and may even soar as high as $507m, an independent expert says.

This is not of great concern to me, so long as any cost over-run is met by the Airport Company, not ratepayers or taxpayers.

The much-vaunted $2.3 billion in economic benefits expected to flow from the extended runway may have also been overstated to the tune of almost $800m, according to a new council-commissioned report on the project.

This is the bigger issue. If either local or central Government contributes money, they should only do so after commissioning their own independent advice on likely benefits.