I flew into Sydney Airport this morning. Never been a big fan of Sydney, especially flying into / out of there.
We were advised in Melbourne that the flight was delayed due to single runway operations in Sydney. We ended up leaving 20 minutes late. Ah, I thought. It must be because there’s a westerly wind blowing and they can only use the east-west runway.
After an eternity of holding and circling, we finally entered the circuit and landed on one of the two north-south parallel runways. As we were getting off the plane, I asked the captain if they had changed runways during our flight. His answer staggered me. No, they were only using one runway because of Air Traffic Control staff shortages.
You have got to be freaking joking! This is the busiest airport in the country, during the morning peak, and we recently spent billions of dollars to build a parallel north-south runway, and they’re not using it because we can’t get enough people to keep it going.
What a joke! Get me out of this damn city!
Paul Daniel's Views On The World, For What They're Worth 