The impact of aircraft noise and complaints on Brisbane residential property performance

Problem/Purpose - Any increase in airport operations or development, combined with increased flight movements, tends to be an issue in major cities and towns. Whenever such proposals are first advertised there is usually a very strong public backlash based on the premise that they believe that the value of their residential properties will decrease and it will become more difficult to sell their properties. Design/methodology/approach - The paper provides a full analysis of residential property sales transactions that have occurred over the period 1988 to 2013, across a range of Brisbane suburbs subject to varying levels of aircraft noise complaints. These sales have bene analysed on the basis of suburb location under existing flight paths, as well as suburbs that will be subject to flight paths when the new Brisbane Airport parallel runway commences operations and suburbs that have no exposure to aircraft noise. Findings - Over the past 27 years the capital return for Residential property across Brisbane has been determined by a range of factors, with socio-economic status of the suburb having the greatest impact on the investment performance. When suburbs with significant exposure to aircraft noise and aircraft noise complaints are isolated there is minimal if any decrease in property capital returns or median house prices compared to non-affected suburbs. Even those suburbs closest to the airport and directly under existing flight paths had similar growth in residential house prices compared to similar socio-economic locations indicating that factors such as location to the Brisbane CBD, schools, services and recreation facilities have a greater impact on house values than aircraft noise. Research limitations/implications - This study only looks at residential property markets on a suburb basis and this includes streets that are directly under flight paths and those streets that are adjoining and not impacted to the same extent. Further analysis has been undertaken to address this limitation and will be presented in future research. Originality/value - This is the first longitudinal study carried out on the impact of aircraft noise across an extensive study area in Australia. The analysis covers a range of Brisbane suburbs from low middle socioeconomic status through to High socio-economic residential locations