The airline sector has regretted the announcement by the Government to paralyze the expansion of the El Prat airport, which was going to involve an investment of 1,700 million euros by Aena, but which did not have the support of the Government because it meant impacting the area protected from La Ricarda.

The airlines believe that this decision "is disappointing" as

these works were the only way to decongest the Barcelona airport.

"We are disappointed by the poor vision.

The expansion was intended to be able to assume without delays the levels of traffic prior to the pandemic, when they arrive. Also to grow the airport with transoceanic flights. Now it will not be possible to grow more", laments Javier Gándara, president ALA, the Airline Association, which represents more than 80 airlines operating in Spain.

The works were included in the investment plans of the Airport Regulation Document (DORA) of the airport manager Aena.

The objective was to

expand the runway near the sea, which is where the planes take off

.

Being so short, large aircraft, those that make transatlantic voyages, had to exit through the landing strip (the runway near the mountain).

It operates the other way around

and for this reason, Barcelona was before the pandemic one of the most saturated airports with the longest delays.

The expansion solved this problem and also made it possible to accommodate more long-haul flights.

The idea was that it allowed to increase the capacity of 53 million passengers to 70 million.

Complexity

The problem is that expanding this track implies touching the protected area.

"This airport is very difficult to operate and the expansion solved this problem.

It is no longer a matter of making it grow, but of decongesting it," they explain from an airline.

"When the flights arrive and the prepandemic traffic recovers, it will not be possible to take over without delay," adds Gándara.

The sector argues that

this was and is the only possible alternative,

since changing the runways (taking off for the mountain runway, which is longer) would generate noise problems when flying over the urban area.

This option has always been discarded.

"You cannot have everything, you have to choose.

You cannot say that you do want to expand El Prat but that you do not want to invade this area,

when it is the only alternative there is," says Gándara, who recalls that Aena had proposed to offset this impact .

"When traffic recovers, delays will return and passengers will pay for it," these sources say.

The airlines also defend that this operation "was based on technical reasons, it was not a political issue," and in this sense they regret the ups and downs of the central and regional governments.

"The problem is that there are two coalition governments with different ideas

,

"

say sources in the sector, who give as an example the visit yesterday of Minister Yolanda Díaz together with the mayor of Barcelona, ​​Ada Colau, to the La Ricarda area.

Another objective of this work was to turn Barcelona airport into a large international hub, a hub for long-haul flights.

Although Barajas is already in Spain, which is where flights to Latin America are operated from, the expansion gave Barcelona opportunities to grow.

Businessmen

The president of the organization, Josep Sánchez Llibre, charged against the

"irresponsibility" and "negligence"

of the Government of the Generalitat in view of its position in the proposed expansion of the Barcelona Airport.

"We will not stand still in the face of what could be the

ruin of the Catalan economy

," Sánchez Llibre warned about the possibility of not having these 1.7 billion investment in the airport.

Pimec, the organization that encompasses small and medium-sized Catalan companies.

I

also

regret the suspension and demanded that the Central Executive and the Generalitat

"be responsible for reaching a new agreement" to expand the infrastructure.

In a statement, he demanded "an

urgent meeting

between governments and social agents" to find a new way to expand the airport.

The president of the employer's association, Antoni Cañeta, considered it unacceptable that the investment be withdrawn, and called not to renounce "the progress provided by public and private infrastructures, vital for the country and its development.

Joan Canadell, former president of the Barcelona Chamber of Commerce and pro-independence businessman, now a JxCat deputy, criticized the Government on Twitter for breaking the agreement: “After the disaster of the announcement of the stoppage of the airport expansion, it is a good time to talk about the # Catalunya with arguments and deep and technical debates

as a counterpoint to #Noatodo and easy populism

».

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