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Aviation History
1989
1989 - 0080.PDF
Airports are about politics more than f-\ engineering—local, state, federal, •*" national, and international politics. They generate more noise in their concep tion than in their operation. Because they are hubs for all forms of transport and, generally, for prosperity, airports and their devel opment involve issues to be decided at prime-ministerial or presidential level. So prosperous regions have an airport, and usually several. Even where a region was wealthy before its airports existed, its pros perity would have been unlikely to develop at the same rate had the airports not been built. Air travel is an integral part of modern life. Where demand for it cannot be met from existing sources of supply, these must be enlarged, or restrictions on them removed; or alternative sources provided; or the God of Demand must be declared less than all- powerful, and life modified accordingly. If the latter course is chosen, prices will natu rally react upwards, unless there is a system to restrict them. The scene painted here does not exist yet in its ultimate form, even at the most congested US or European hubs. The need to confront the problem remains, however, because of the lead time necessary for inception and completion of projects to keep airports "ahead of the game". To put the situation in an international perspective, 500 airline delegates from 176 "Demand" is the hungry god whom the airport planners seek to satisfy. In the first part of our airports feature, David Learmount asks whether they are right even to try. airlines met in Montreal two months ago for the International Air Transport Association 1989 summer season scheduling conference, lata used to describe this meeting as one in which airport slot allocations were arranged to tie in with efficient operation and inter lining. Now it describes the meeting's goal as being to "fit in with available airport capacity", and the result as being the best that could be expected. Give and take "Although it was not possible to satisfy all new requests for slots at several European airports and at Tokyo Narita, the Scheduling Conference produced consensus for the majority of locations, for both scheduled and charter movements, involving a spirit of give and take." This conference is one of the much-needed fora which lata provides today for the world's carriers: 40 of the 176 atten dant airlines were non-members. lata director-general Giinter Eser commented: "The airlines have again done their best, working with their colleagues at hub and holiday airports to cope with rising demand, but their ability to find solutions is becoming exhausted. Governments must now do their part urgently to ensure the necessary expansion of [the] aviation infrastructure." There is a limit to the expansion possible for any airport, unless it has available limitless funds and a site as topographically and socially unrestrictive as the centre of a flat desert. From the consumer's point of view, however, there is an advantage in developing a hub airport or metropolitan airport system to its physical and ecological limit, because of the inherent efficiency of hubbing systems. This efficiency shows itself in lower costs for the airlines (thus lower travel prices) and the need for fewer airports overall in a national system. This does not preclude a role for provincial airports. Alongside the full development of the major hubs, the direct (hub-bypassing) point-to-point market also develops. As it does, the main provincial airports become hubs in their own right, and their managements will find themselves starting to defend the hubbing principles. Having decided that a primary component of efficiency in an airports system consists of expansion to each unit's maximum capacity, the problem becomes one of defining "maxi mum capacity". Does it mean maximum with present facilities; or with facilities 22 FLIGHT INTERNATIONAL, 14 January 1989
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