Dutch plan could hit air fares

Date: 15/05/1997

By Tim Jones

THE Dutch government is hatching radical plans to discourage people from taking short plane journeys and persuade them to let the high-speed train take the strain instead.

Outspoken Transport Minister Annemarie Jorritsma is going so far as to suggest that extra taxes should be levied on short-haul flights to increase ticket prices, while some should even be banned.

“Such an approach would have the combined advantages of reducing aircraft noise, discouraging excessive fuel use and emissions and also encouraging the railways, which is a strategic aim of the European Union,” said a Dutch transport official.

Jorritsma's staff are pushing her plans in an attempt to put teeth into the EU programme to save European railways from extinction, but they are unlikely to be accepted by either the European Commission or other member states.

With 'open skies' only six weeks old, the Commission will not want to put extra obstacles in the way of new European airlines seeking to capture a slice of the market.

The Dutch minister has given her wholehearted support to Transport Commissioner Neil Kinnock's campaign for a major shift of freight and passenger traffic on to trains, initiating a network of rail freeways stretching from Rotterdam to Milan. But she wants to go further.

The Dutch have also taken the first steps to combining rail and air transport. KLM Royal Dutch Airlines is already piloting a new scheme with rail operator Nederlandsche Spoorwegen (NS) to attract customers to Amsterdam's Schiphol airport from Brussels and Antwerp. People wanting to take intercontinental flights can choose to use Schiphol rather than Brussels' Zaventem airport and take a three-hour ride on the new Thalys fast train. Once the Amsterdam-Brussels high-speed rail link is complete in 2005, the journey time from the Belgian capital to Schiphol will be reduced to just over one hour.

Foreseeing this development, Jorritsma wants the train to be at least as attractive as short-haul link flights.

“The airlines themselves are not dissatisfied with this development,” said a spokesman for NS. “They make most of their money on the intercontinental flights, but they are having to pump millions into keeping these short-haul operations going to bring customers to the international airports.”

KLM, for example, is seeking to expand capacity on its intra-European networks by as much as 12&percent; in the coming years. The company is adding to the fleets of its smaller 'partners': Air UK, KLM Cityhopper, Eurowings and Transavia.

Small start-up airlines with no intercontinental activities, such as KLM's competitor easyJet or Brussels operator Virgin Express, will be a lot less happy with the suggestion that the EU should discriminate against short-haul flights.

Both have already complained to the Commission about the fondness of national governments for imposing flat-rate airport taxes. Since these levies are not graded according to the price of the ticket, low-tariff airlines are hit harder than flag-carriers.

Seeking to impose further taxes on aircraft fuel for short journeys would have these small but vocal airlines up in arms. Jorritsma has already asked the Commission to report on what would happen if the exemption of aircraft fuel from normal international tax rules were lifted.