Airport to Nowhere: Spain's Costly No-Fly Zone
20.05.12
. By December, officials in Castellón, a region of orange groves and long beaches near the city of Valencia on Spain’s Mediterranean coast, had not yet received permission from Spain’s central government in Madrid to take off and land large passenger jets in the area. And the airport’s director had made a public appeal to the local government for more funds — to offer incentives to airlines. Because, four months before opening day, not one airline had signed a deal to operate flights to Castellón.
Just a few months before the scheduled start of operations, and more than a decade after the plan’s conception, few in the little region of Castellón had demonstrated interest in having a local airport.
Who had? Ask that in Castellón, and one name comes up: a local politician named Carlos Fabra. Fabra, 66, is the latest patriarch in a line going back centuries in Castellón. A leader of the local Populist Party — the same center-right party that won Spain’s national elections in November — he had first assumed leadership of the local legislature in 1995. It was a position his father, grandfather, great-grandfather, and various uncles had held on and off since the 19th century. Fabra soon announced a legacy project: an airport for Castellón.
Source: Miller-McCune.com