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Why is it so hard to build an airport?

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Re: Why is it so hard to build an airport?

#441

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why wouldn’t you? It’s a land arb. You get cheaper land then use political power to raise its desirability. Common trick. You can do it a few ways. Get a place near a nightclub then force the club to shut down. Almost certainly they have some regulation they’re not following. Same with schools etc. Or sometimes the city will be planning an affordable housing thing on a lot. No one likes that so you’ll get the homes n…

This is not "arbitrage" though. It's not risk free, etc.

Rent-seeking is a better term for what the OP is describing.

Re: Why is it so hard to build an airport?

#442
post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is shocking to me https://www.cbsnews.com/news/narita-airport-farm-takao-shito... "The best outcome would be for the airport to shut down," he said. "But what's important is to keep farming my ancestral land." I imagine most countries would just use eminent domain?

that article says that what he refers to as his ancestral lands have been farmed by his family for only a 100 years. hard for me to get worked up about such a short time

It doesn't matter if you or I get worked up about their land, it matters if they get worked up about their land and their heritage.

Re: Why is it so hard to build an airport?

#443
post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is shocking to me https://www.cbsnews.com/news/narita-airport-farm-takao-shito... "The best outcome would be for the airport to shut down," he said. "But what's important is to keep farming my ancestral land." I imagine most countries would just use eminent domain?

that article says that what he refers to as his ancestral lands have been farmed by his family for only a 100 years. hard for me to get worked up about such a short time

Gotta start somewhere, and I'm sure it means way more to him that it does to you. 100 years is a lifetime, do you never get worked up at all? Why bother, such a short lifespan we all live.

Re: Why is it so hard to build an airport?

#444
post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you discount Heathrow, Europe doesn't even have one in the top 10, whereas the US has 5 in the top 10. What a silly statement. "Europe doesn't have one in the top 10 if you remove its one entry in the top 10."

Not even that, Istanbul airport is in the top 10 too. Maybe he meant EU? But that’s not really Europe as a whole

[deleted]

Re: Why is it so hard to build an airport?

#445
post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you discount Heathrow, Europe doesn't even have one in the top 10, whereas the US has 5 in the top 10. What a silly statement. "Europe doesn't have one in the top 10 if you remove its one entry in the top 10."

Not even that, Istanbul airport is in the top 10 too. Maybe he meant EU? But that’s not really Europe as a whole

Only half of Istanbul is in Europe (yes, the side with the Airport) and the other half and the rest of the country is Anatolia/Asia Minor.

Turkey has many of the political markers of being in Europe but is really a unique situation and its leaders like to take the best of being European and not-European where it suits them.

Do most people consider it a European country? Doubtful. I've never known any Turks who considered themselves European...even the super cosmopolitain globe-trotting kids of Turkish diplomats that I grew up around.

Re: Why is it so hard to build an airport?

#446
post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think you ever traveled international or your plane got delayed or cancelled. I don't want to carry 4 big bags in the train when I travel international I don't want to travel 30 miles if my plane get cancelled.

I certainly understand that sentiment, but a ton of people commute 30 miles daily (or more). Even if you live "near an airport", you probably live 15+ miles from an airport. Tottenham London to Heathrow is 24 miles by car. The British Museum to Heathrow is 19 miles. Columbia University on the Upper West Side to JFK is 17 miles. DC to Dulles is 26 miles. Downtown Denver is 25 miles to the airport. SF to SFO is 14 mile…

I will vote against whoever tried to make my flights less convenient

Re: Why is it so hard to build an airport?

#447

I would be pretty upset if all of a sudden my house was under the flight path of a new airport (and the associated economic consequences) but I always find it surprising how annoyed people get that put a house near an airport and then complain about it, where one of my parents lives there is a small but fairly busy private airport that has been there close to a hundred years, so almost no one that lives by it now can…

That's similar to people who move to the countryside then complain that the farms nearby stink.

That's happened to my area.

It used to be the countryside; now's it's the suburbs.

But now the suburbs complain about the smells from the few farms that are left.

Re: Why is it so hard to build an airport?

#448

I would be pretty upset if all of a sudden my house was under the flight path of a new airport (and the associated economic consequences) but I always find it surprising how annoyed people get that put a house near an airport and then complain about it, where one of my parents lives there is a small but fairly busy private airport that has been there close to a hundred years, so almost no one that lives by it now can…

I used to live above a Japanese bar in the centre of Melbourne, Australia. It was a busy street in a busy part of town. (Robot, for the locals.) Of course this place was sold, both to renters and buyers, as ‘hip’, it was ‘the inner-city lifestyle’, it was ‘everything on your doorstep’. And yet the neighbours. My god what cretins. Noise! On a weekend! They couldn’t bear it. I think it should be flat-out forbidden to c…

I wonder if landlords should be required to disclose noise sources.

As a renter there's no easy way for you to know that every Friday night the bar a block away has music so loud you can hear it in your apartment til 2am or that a band practices at the school down the street etc...

You generally have about 5 minutes too look around a apartment and a few more to look around the neighborhood and then sign a contract for $60k not knowing the place will be unacceptable once you actually spend a week there.

maybe this is only a problem in expensive cities like SF/NYC/LA where when you find a place you have to take it immediately nor lose it to the line of people ready to rent

Re: Why is it so hard to build an airport?

#449

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US is also much, much bigger. Germany is about the size of Nevada. France is about the size of the entire Eastern seaboard. The US would definitely be better served with better rail infrastructure, but there's no getting around the fact that Seattle to Boston is 200 miles longer than Lisbon to Moscow, and slightly longer than Edinburgh to Aleppo.

If you look east of the Mississippi, the overall population densities aren't really that bad, and should be able to support high speed rail easily. ...except for the fact that within metro areas, US cities are designed in a very sprawly way that's hostile to public transit. This is an entirely unforced error that has nothing to do with geography and everything to do with culture. We deliberately chose to make our cit…

The Acela corridor is well suited for HSR. A few years ago Amtrak was trying to divest its long haul routes that lose money and reinvest in upgrading Acela, which would make it profitable. Unfortunately the plan fell through for political reasons.

Re: Why is it so hard to build an airport?

#450
post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is shocking to me https://www.cbsnews.com/news/narita-airport-farm-takao-shito... "The best outcome would be for the airport to shut down," he said. "But what's important is to keep farming my ancestral land." I imagine most countries would just use eminent domain?

that article says that what he refers to as his ancestral lands have been farmed by his family for only a 100 years. hard for me to get worked up about such a short time

What would you consider a medium amount of time?

Also https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/cf343b06-f4a8-46fc-b124-1c61392...

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