Good News Story - Perth Airport

While we know how wonderful our city is, it is true that Perth remains Australia’s, if not the world’s best-kept secret.

Two years ago, Perth Airport decided to take the lead in the challenge to reinvent Perth by becoming the Core Funding Partner of the Hashtag Perth project. Little did we know how the world would change from then to now.

The pall of coronavirus has been felt across the community. The aviation and tourism sectors were among the first to be impacted by the COVID-19 outbreak and they will be among the last to recover.

Perth Airport has lost 98 per cent of its interstate and international passengers, which has been devastating financially. It also means there are four million fewer international passengers coming in and out of our city. That has major implications for the higher education, tourism, hospitality and general business sector, but also importantly, the vibrancy of our city.

We don’t know when the COVID-19 crisis will pass, but now more than ever, we need to seize this opportunity to create our own future. Although Perth Airport has shouldered its share of pain, we have made a bold and decisive start to reinvent ourselves.

It all begins with the passenger journey, focusing on giving passengers the confidence to travel again. Hand sanitiser stations have been installed across our terminals, protective screens have been installed at the check-in desks to ensure contact is kept to a minimum, there are physical distancing reminders throughout the terminals with signs, floor markings and public announcements, and we are exploring the future of biometrics.

Perth faces the same challenge - how to reimagine itself and how to project our natural confidence to the world. Hashtag Perth and the resulting Boorloo Kworp ‘Perth is Good’ report could not have been better timed. It has helped identify and understand what others think of us, and what we think of ourselves.

Let’s reimagine Perth and Western Australia as the obvious place for world leading research into renewable energy technology – a Silicon Valley, if you like, for efforts to harness and commercialise clean, green energy.

Let’s reimagine Perth as the indigenous cultural heart of Australia – the natural stage to showcase, celebrate and honour a unique culture that dates back 60,000 years or more.

Let’s reimagine Perth as a safe, clean and vibrant hub for financial services, trade and commerce, linking Australia to the growth markets of Asia.

This crisis has given us a great opportunity to reset and recast our image to the world.

Every Australian major city will be facing the same challenge and be looking for the same path to recovery.

Boorloo Kworp gives Perth an incredibly valuable head-start on them all.

The challenge now is for governments, industry, universities, exporters and the broader community to drive forward the nine recommendations of the final report.

We want more than just recovery. We want to reimagine and reinvent our capital city and in doing so write our own future.