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French MPs have voted to axe domestic flights on routes that can be travelled by train in less than two and a half hours. Macron’s climate commission now looks set to up the ante throughout 2021.
As of April 10th, the French government has declared a ban on short domestic flights where other transport options are available.
Specifically, the new legislation states that flights across the nation which can be travelled by rail services in less than two and a half hours will be scrapped.
This signals the end of popular domestic flights from the south of Paris to Nantes and Bordeaux, though the bill states connecting flights through Charles de Gaulle north of the French capital will continue.
Arriving as a watered down version of President Emmanuel Macron’s initial proposal, which recommended the banning of all flights where rail services could offer alternate journeys under four hours, several airlines and French states strongly objected and eventually settled on this new compromise.
Throughout the last year, the aviation industry has frequently butted heads with climate campaigners. Internationally, airlines have tittered on the edge of financial collapse due to travel restrictions, while NGOs and climate activists have hastened demands for stronger environmental action – as our 2030 carbon reduction targets draw closer.
Socialist MPs led by Joel Aviragnet claimed in a heated standoff that domestic flight bans will have a ‘disproportionate human cost’ in terms of job losses in the travel sector. The Green party meanwhile bemoaned decisions to cut the threshold from four hours to two and a half, claiming the initial proposal would’ve halted routes responsible for emitting ‘the most greenhouse gases.’
