The Mopa airport if allowed to come up will be another big white elephant
at the taxpayer’s cost and a destruction of scarce land resource. With the
world wide price of oil skyrocketing, the airlines in turn increasing fares to
pass the costs on to customers, and with some airlines closing down on certain
routes or reducing the number of flights on both domestic and international
routes, airport traffic congestion is bound to decrease. Goa itself is a
witness to many cancellations of both domestic & international flights. Cargo
flights too will drop as transportation will not be cost effective. It will be
foolish to speculate that the prices of oil will come down and air traffic will
increase, as oil is a natural commodity and resource not replenishable.
Authorities who have made speculative statistical estimates of the congestion
that will take place in the coming years at Dabolim airport seem to lack in
factual knowledge of effective statistics. The statisticians may have taken
into account the Mega-housing projects to come up all over Goa which would make
non-Goan owners shuttle up and down. Dabolim airport should be capable to
handle air traffic for another 20 years comfortably with a little of expansion;
both for Goans and tourists. And after that, if fuel is available.
One suggestion from my side would be to come up with a non polluting
Mega-garbage disposal project at Mopa, right near the border, the feasibility
of which needs to be weighed out. Garbage could be transported from all over by
rail. Goa should be treated like our home, In Goa, no one built a home with
toilets in every room.
Dr. Ferdinando dos Reis Falcão.
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