The economics professor at TSE, the Toulouse economics school, specialist in the airline sector, discusses the difficulties of small platforms, which maintain their activity thanks to subsidies.
Does the Occitanie region have too many airports as highlighted in a recent report from the Court of Auditors?
We have four large airports: Toulouse, Montpellier, Perpignan, Tarbes. Toulouse is doing very well, there is no subject. Montpellier has experienced a significant reduction in its services, because of the TGV, but is not in deficit. Perpignan is more problematic: the airport is near Girona, we are already starting to use public money to balance the books. Then there is Tarbes, very useful for the Lourdes destination but which is not far from Pau. There is a real problem between Tarbes and Pau: But there is one in Occitanie, the other in New Aquitaine. Nobody wants to close their airport… As for other airports, they survive thanks to the subsidies received to keep these airports in service. We find this problem in Carcassonne, Cahors, Rodez or Castres… Moreover, for Castres there is another problem: we will not be able to both build the A69 motorway and keep the airport. We will have to choose where the subsidies go.
Can all these airports survive?
As long as public money keeps them in office. There was an idea of specializing small airports. In Castres Tarbes we wanted to park the planes and dismantle them, in Nîmes we wanted to specialize it in learning and civil security… But in reality, that doesn’t work. The reality is that if these airports still operate, it is thanks to public money. As a result, the passenger may not pay much more than 30% of the ticket price to travel from Tarbes to Orly.
Even an airport like Montpellier is in difficulty…
It is going into the red because of competition from the TGV. It is not profitable enough, so it cuts frequencies and destinations. However, the less supply there is and the fewer passengers, the less revenue there is. It’s a bad spiral. But, when there is the Toulouse TGV to go to Orly, it will take a million passengers to Blagnac… This risks reducing the interest of Blagnac airport compared to Barcelona for example.
Does the problem come from politics?
The departments and intercommunities, which have their independence, are free to define their public service policy. The politician is accountable to his constituents and very often, he does not want to give the impression of reducing public services and pays to maintain airlines. In the 20 years that I have been following this business, I have never seen a grant reduced. In the end, the public authorities did not manage to specialize airports or reduce subsidies. From now on, elected officials are demanding a form of decentralization, to keep control over these issues, but there needs to be an authority above which oversees all of this.
On what scale?
It all depends on whether we want to regionalize this file. But as long as it remains in the hands of elected officials, nothing will happen. There should be an independent body which does not have electoral aims. This file is an excellent test of whether it makes sense to give more power to the regions.
Is there a solution for small airports?
I see one: the solution can come from the electric plane. Small airports are largely amortized. And their maintenance costs much less than rail. We could very well imagine the creation and development of a regional electric air transport network. We can use a lot of frequencies, because it’s very quick to recharge the planes.
But is the electric plane ready?
Within 4 to 5 years, this will be ready for aircraft with up to twenty seats. It’s a shame not to go further into the region which claims to be that of aeronautics. Countries in northern Europe are ahead. This also interests Spain. This could be a form of revenge for small airports. Especially as I repeat, it costs much less than the train. With an interregional network, flexible, flexible and economical, we could transform the disadvantage of having nine very expensive airports into an advantage. This file could be carried by the Occitanie region, especially since electric planes could be built in Toulouse.
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