News JVTech 33% of French people never fly: why is this long-popular means of transport less and less appreciated?
Flying is an opportunity to travel more or less far and it is often synonymous with adventure. However, in recent years, many travelers have been disappointed with their experience on planes and in airports, to the point of losing interest in this way of traveling more and more.
Getting to the airport to go on vacation has long been an exhilarating experience for millions of travelers around the world. But in recent years, various observations have called into question the fact of traveling by plane. There was the COVID-19 crisis, which prevented the world’s population from traveling for months or even years depending on the country. And then there is also the economic crisis and finally ecological reflections which lead to disinterest, or even a rejection of air travel by the populations.
In France, 33% of people never fly
A study, carried out in 2022 by the IFOP and the Jean Jaurès Foundationsought to determine what the French think of the plane. It emerged that 33% never take it. 56% take it occasionally (21% once or twice a year and 35% less often). Only 11% of French people take the plane regularly, that is to say several times a year.
When asked about the main reason that prevents them from flying, the French place the financial question first, at 56%. Then comes access to an airport (14%) followed by environmental issues (12%).
Even if today we tend to associate the plane a lot with ecological issues, we see that the main reason that pushes the French not to fly is financial. And even when you can afford a plane ticket, that doesn’t mean that everything goes as planned.
Bad press from airports in the post-COVID era
The resumption of air traffic after the blockages linked to the COVID-19 pandemic has rapidly undermined hopes of those who hoped to be able to travel, again, without incident. Remember: in July 2022, tens of thousands of pieces of luggage ended up blocked and even lost at Roissy-Charles de Gaulle airport. Tens of thousands of travelers were left without their belongings while on vacation, while others took weeks to retrieve them upon their return.
This observation was not made only in France. In the United States and Canada, in particular, similar situations have been observed. This is due to various factors. The first is that airports find it difficult to recruit enough staff to ensure their operation. Then the airlines, affected by the pandemic, have increased their number of daily flights too quickly without waiting for the airports to start operating efficiently again. Finally, travellers, in a hurry to go abroad again, rushed to airports during the summer.
A complicated situation to manage which has led to congestion at airports. The latter has resulted in flight delays and even cancellations. What make travelers regret having wanted to take the plane.
An airport (source: Unsplash)
Negative assessments among Americans
In early 2023 in the United States, the FinancialTimes presented a study highlighting the fact that, for the first time in 10 years that Americans have a more negative than positive opinion of civil aviation. The timing of this study is not due to chance: the Americans were questioned a few weeks after the holiday fiasco. Just before Christmas, a storm brought the cancellation of 17,000 flights because the Southwest company’s software was unable to recalculate traveler connections. Two weeks later, US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) security software blocked flights across the country for two hours, generating 10,800 flight cancellations.
In summary, it was on a global scale that the plane fell out of favor. Ever more expensive tickets, often lost luggage and more frequent flight cancellations tend to discourage travelers from flying. If you add ecology to the equation, that’s one more reason to desert airports.
