PS deputy Pedro do Carmo, elected by the Beja constituency, wrote to the heads of three airlines with the aim of “raising awareness” of the use of Beja airport “as an alternative” to Lisbon or Faro.
The letter from Pedro do Carmo, to which the Lusa agency had access, was sent last week to the administrations of the airlines low cost Ryanair, EasyJet and Transavia.
“Like them [companhias aéreas] they cannot be forced” to fly to Beja, but “must be seduced and informed of the potential [do aeroporto]that is what I did”, the socialist deputy explained to Lusa on Monday.
Pedro do Carmo also said that the letter gave the three companies a “rating” for “the potential, the virtues and the added value of flying” to the region.
“Beja airport may therefore not be an alternative, but a complement to Lisbon and Faro airports in this ‘high’ season, when our airports are exhausted,” he added.
In the letter, the Alentejo deputy stressed that, given the “obvious exhaustion” of the Lisbon Airport, “the absence of a strategy to assess Beja’s infrastructure is unacceptable“, managed by the company ANA — Aeroportos de Portugal.
The PS deputy defended in the letter that the Beja airport be used as an “alternative” to Lisbon and Faro, giving examples such as the airports of Frankfurt Hahn and Munich West (both in Germany) or Oslo (Norway), all of them more a hundred kilometers from the final destination.
Beja airport “is 181 kilometers from Marquês de Pombal, in Lisbon”, in addition to the fact that Alentejo is “a region rich in leisure, culture, adventure and beaches”, and is also “very close to the Alqueva dam, the largest artificial lake in Europe”, he highlighted.
In addition, Pedro do Carmo continues in the letter, the Beja airport “has a passenger, cargo and aircraft maintenance terminal”, being “prepared to receive all kinds of operations with a high level of efficiency”.
The PS deputy also mentioned that the infrastructure of the Alentejo is “directly” linked “to the vast road network that connects the city of Beja with all parts of the country”.
In this context, “given the lack of appreciation of Beja Airport by those who manage it and should value it even more as the country’s airport infrastructure”, Pedro do Carmo asked the three airlines to consider “its use as an alternative to destinations” that they already use in Portugal, “with obvious gains” for their operation.
“I trust there will be feedback“, concluded the PS elected to Lusa.
Source: Observadora
