High price to pay
On 23-09-2009, in Viewpoint, by steve
Driving to Brussels airport is easy these days and parking is a cinch. The new parking garages are ready and even the ridiculously narrow space between the hotel and the terminal (where were the airport planners when that thing was put there?) has been rearranged to make better use of what is available. Conspicuously missing though is the expanded European hub of DHL…
DHL had great plans for Brussels Airport, unfortunately all of them involving aircraft. They waited a long time while the airport, ministries, local and federal governments and who knows what other organizations wrangled, argued and made impossible claims and counter-claims. At the end, almost unnoticed among the general clamor, DHL packed up and moved to Leipzig where it was welcome to grow.
Some years ago the French authorities were bombarded by complaints about aircraft noise around Nice Cote d’Azur Airport… When they tried to get validated, factual information about the noise levels, it turned out it is rumored that the noise of aircraft could not be measured because of the much stronger sound coming from speed-boats going in and out of the marina.
Several airports in the world, Amsterdam among them, have to contend with visible noise. When the skies are blue, complaints about aircraft noise go through the roof. When there is a nice, grey cloud cover, hardly a twitch. Think what you will, but clouds are not that great a noise insulator…
And now Frankfurt. With construction of its fourth runway finally approved, promising an hourly capacity in excess of 120 instead of the current 80, one might think they are celebrating at Fraport and Lufthansa. No way… Apparently, agreement to build the fourth runway was reached after long negotiations with the surrounding communities and the price was a strict night curfew. The government was planning to allow 17 flights per night and this was now turned down by a state court ruling on the grounds that 17 did not properly reflect the compromise. I bet anything more than 1 would have the same sad end in the courts.
When I started my career and aircraft were becoming more numerous and noisier at the same time, communities around airports were justifiably complaining that they were there first and that they would not take this onslaught from the flying contraptions. But most of those people have long moved to greener pastures where aircraft nose is probably not an issue. Complaints these days tend to come from new houses and new, or at least rebuilt, communities whose occupants were born years after the nearby airport went through its fourth or fifth expansion. Why did they not think when building there?
The answer is simple. They probably knew full well that they will have a strong case with politicians when they started to ask for restrictions on flying in the area. It is the reverse of why people whose back windows look out on railway tracks with scores of heavy freighters thundering down the line every night do not usually go to court. They know that they do not stand a chance in hell having the railways moved or the trains banned.
Mind you, I am not saying that people with houses around airports are not entitled to their rest. What I miss is the voice of all those who lost their jobs when DHL was forced to leave or of those who might face the same fate in Frankfurt if Lufthansa decides to pull out.
Clearly, politicians are dropping part of their constituents all over Europe to favor another part. Creating and keeping jobs is as important as a good night’s rest. The only acceptable solution to the noise problem is one that looks at both sides of the coin instead of just listening to those who shout the loudest.
You are right when you call for listening to each side of the interests at stake.
However, the related noise ICAO SARPS and EU recommended practices are not always followed at the same level in each country. The NIMBY phenomenon is generally the main actor leading politicians, while economic pressure pushes airports restricting their investments as much as possible in this area.
Why not the same playing fields everywhere?
Why delocalisations can be observed towards low employment and low income countries?
Thanks to the ultra-liberal policy… An open economy, yes, but taking into account the people interests, not only these of stakeholders.