BAC chairman Bill Grant said the corporation had signed a contract for the next stage of the new parallel runway, dredging and reclamation, and work would commence on site within weeks.
The runway represents $1.35 billion of private investment in national infrastructure. It will create 2,700 jobs at the peak of construction and 7,800 new permanent jobs in the Brisbane/Moreton Region by 2035.
The claimed economic benefit of the project will be in the order of $5 billion per year by 2035.
"In the last 10 years, BAC has spent more than a billion dollars on BrisbaneAirport, and in the next 10 years we'll spend another $2 billion. As the primary gateway for the state's business community and a key enabler and catalyst for economic prosperity for the whole state, this investment is essential," Mr Grant said.
The new runway will be 3.3km long, 60m wide, located 2km west of, and parallel to, the existing main runway.? The project consists of the new runway, more than 12 km of taxiways, navigational aids and other airfield infrastructure – all of which is being developed on a 360ha greenfield site adjacent to the existing system.
BAC CEO and managing director Julieanne Alroe said the company had almost finished preliminary enabling civil works on the site and works under the dredging and reclamation contract would begin within weeks.
The total cost of the works to the end of phase one will be around $500 million.
The dredging and reclamation involves the placement on the site of 13 million cubic metres of sand up to a maximum height of eight metres above ground in order to consolidate the soft underlying soils to form a stable platform to construct the runway.
The final phase of the project, the construction of the runway and taxiway pavements, will commence once the ground has consolidated. This is expected to be around 2016/17. The new runway is on schedule to commence operation in 2020.
