Presidential visit to AIFA

The insistence that the official visit of the heads of state of Canada and the United States begin with the landing of their respective planes at the Felipe Ángeles International Airport (AIFA) makes complete political sense, said President López Obrador. And it is true, because technically it does not have a higher value, although it complicates the logistics of moving to the center of Mexico City a bit. But the visit, in itself, is political and the message that the presidency wants to send is that the airport located at the Santa Lucía base is safe and international.

Of course, the same could be done in almost any of the 77 airports that the country has, of which 45 are international and are ready to receive wide-body (or narrow-body, as the case may be) aircraft but with ample capacity, such as the presidential planes that carry the heads of state on their visits. The only one that has not had that luck is the “José María Morelos”, the Dreamliner B-787 that, as far as is known, has not transported AMLO, nor has he used AIFA for his transfers between one city and another.

What is striking is that, up to now, none of the president’s advisers have had the integrity or the ability to sit down with him and explain to him that the AIFA can become a good complementary option to the AICM, if it is allowed to live like what it is: a regional airport that complements the offer in the Valley of Mexico and that has a limited capacity, because that was what was inaugurated on March 21 of last year. With its 14 gates that can theoretically become 28 with the use of two entrances per gate, it will not get very far, unless the next stage is built, which today would sound excessive, until an occupation of at least 80 or 85%.

But for this, as for any work, there must be an occupation curve. That an airport that has not been inaugurated for less than a year has an average of 15 daily flights should be considered a success, but the insistence on pressuring airlines to increase operations without having passengers suggests that the president’s advisers have no idea what that they are asking

Once again: MAKE EASY ACCESS TO PASSENGERS, increase their number and the airlines will arrive alone. If they put the same substance that has been deployed to pressure the airlines to speed up the implementation of the dedicated train, or to install passenger transfer stations (shuttles) that take passengers to AIFA, they would be 100% more effective and not they would hurt our businesses, their workers, and the suppliers that depend on them.

The year that is beginning brings new challenges, but let us hope that -as our officials predicted at the time- we will achieve Category 1, granted by the United States Aviation Administration (FAA) before June and that regional and trunk aviation will be supported so that connectivity is reinforced, that there is a State policy in the sector and a strong authority that listens to the industry.

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