Many Dutch people are done with the ever-growing aviation. 49 percent of them are now in favor of a decline in air traffic, twice as many as a year ago. Only 14 percent still think that the number of flights should be able to rise above the level before the corona crisis.
These figures come from a survey that agency Motivaction conducted in August. It was commissioned by Minister Cora van Nieuwenhuizen (infrastructure). But he doesn’t care much about the results.
This is evident from its Aviation Memorandum, with which the cabinet agreed on Friday. If aviation starts to grow again after the crisis – that is difficult to predict – the minister wants to allow room for this. Just as she had planned in last May’s draft note.
Aviation must earn its growth
The minister’s point of departure is that aviation must earn growth: reduce noise pollution and environmental damage first, then grow. But her demands are not strict. The CO2emissions, must be halved by 2050 compared to 2005. That was a peak year for aviation and therefore it is not an overly ambitious target – much less ambitious at least than the climate targets for most other sectors, because they are set of 1990 as a reference year.
The aviation sector is satisfied with it. It is also important for Schiphol and KLM that the minister fully endorses the strategy of the two. Schiphol must remain a ‘hub’, a place where passengers come from other airports to transfer to planes with destinations further away. This is the only way Schiphol can maintain its large network, and that is important for the economy.
KLM has already announced that it is ‘delighted’ with the long-term perspective outlined by Van Nieuwenhuizen. Except for one point. According to the memorandum, the number of night flights at Schiphol should be reduced from 32,000 to 25,000 and those flights should not be postponed to late evening or early morning. This will cost us a lot of money, KLM warned, while residents’ organizations point out that this reduction is the result of agreements made years ago.
Where is the key question: how much aviation does the Netherlands need?
The criticism of the Aviation Memorandum now sounds the same as in May, on the draft memorandum: it has no vision. The minister is tinkering with standards on noise and emissions, the critics say, but the underlying question is not addressed. It reads: how much aviation does the Netherlands need? Does aviation have to grow?
On that design note, Van Nieuwenhuizen received 434 ‘views’, comments from those involved. This expressed a lot of dissatisfaction with the nuisance caused by aviation. The unusually large number of these views alone – from provinces and municipalities, residents’ and environmental organizations – is an indication that resistance is growing.
The minister took little notice of this either. “The views do not change the Aviation Memorandum,” is the most common phrase in the 204 pages in which she deals with the comments. She did not allow herself to be seduced into the vision of aviation so desired by critics.
Perhaps also illustrative is the ‘Action Agenda for Train and Aviation’ that Van Nieuwenhuizen also published on Friday, with plans to make the train more attractive as an alternative to air travel to six cities: Brussels, Paris, London, Frankfurt, Düsseldorf and Berlin. If everyone who now flies to those cities takes the train from now on, that will save 14 percent of flights from Schiphol. Yet there are hardly any concrete plans in the action agenda. On Twitter it was already called: “Just leave out that word ‘action’.”
Also read:
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