A MAJOR international airport in Newport would bring up to 50,000 jobs to the area by 2030, it was claimed yesterday.

The company that wants to create a new airport at Llanwern says its £2bn proposal could open by 2010 - just in time for the Ryder Cup tournament at the Celtic Manor.

At an informal briefing at the National Assembly yesterday, Severnside International Airport outlined its proposals to representatives from Newport, Torfaen and Monmouthshire councils, AMs and and local people.

The company said it had no business plan for the airport yet, and will only submit a planning application to Newport city council next summer, after the government white paper on a new airport for Britain is released.

The chairman of the company, Michael Stephen, made the presentation to try to gain support for the airport. He claimed it would complement plans for a £750 million mixed development on the opposite side of the site, announced in August by developers Broadhall Hampton.

He said it would not affect the operation of the Corus steelworks. Although plans for an airport on the Severn Estuary were first mooted 30 years ago, Mr Stephen said the time was now right.

The Welsh economy had been badly hit by closures in the coal and steel industries, he said, and a new driving force was needed.

Mr Stephen added that recent Department for Transport studies had shown that the UK urgently needed more airport capacity.

He said they were breaking away from the building up of existing airports to create one which has excellent road transport links.

Road access, he said, would be from the M4 and M48 motorways via a dedicated spur. Company director Peter Charles-Greed added that he had previously spoken to British Rail - replaced by Railtrack in 1994 - about the possibility of upgrading the rail link to London.

"They said they could accommodate anything we wanted up to a maximum of 40 million people a year and they would upgrade the lines - through the tunnel in particular - so people could move from Severnside to Paddington in one and a quarter hours, and Reading could be reached in 45 minutes," he said.

A Newport council spokeswoman told the Argus: "We would be interested in receiving more details of the proposed scheme."

But Llanwern ward councillor Steve Down said: "I've got the video, the T-shirt and a lot of books on it, and I'm as unconvinced now as I was before that this is realistic," he said.

PICTURED: The area of land at Llanwern steelworks which could be redeveloped under the plans for a new airport.