Do you think the government should curtail cheap and short-haul flights?

I was greatly interested to read the latest results of our regular poll.

44% of people who took part said no, it should be down to the consumer. This is interesting and is a lot higher than I had been expecting, especially in light of recent articles and news reports about the cost of such flights and air travel in general on the environment.

With sites like Plane Stupid campaigning against short haul flights and companies like Ryan Air looking to expand it looks like we will see a long and brutal battle between environmentalists and those wanting the freedom short haul flights can give.

Maybe its time for other forms of transport to step up to the plate and take a look at themselves. After all it is generally cheaper and quicker to fly south to north in the UK than it is to use the train. Whilst researching the costs of rail travel I found an instance where it was in fact cheaper to travel to New York with Virgin (about 3500 miles) than it was to travel from Swindon to Newcastle 1st class on the train (about 270 miles).

Maybe there is a case for upping the tax on air travel, or maybe we should look to make other public transport cheaper and more efficient.

Food for thought…

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 5th, 2006and is filed under Eco Living, Environmental Awareness, OrganicLinker Site. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.