I travel more often by plane than by bus. Therefore, I will only share a consumer and user view.
It's a matter of convenience and speed. Furthermore, on the bus, on journeys longer than three hours, I tend to feel sick.
Instead, on the plane I easily sleep and I believe that, nowadays, traveling by plane is no longer snobbery or new wealth. It is a necessity and a saving, especially of time.
We can go to Porto and return on the same day for less than €50, something impossible and more expensive if we used the bus, the train, not to mention the car.
From the airport of Faro, until recently, we could go, for a reasonably affordable price, to England, Scotland, Ireland, France, Belgium, Holland, etc.
It is usually cheaper to travel by plane to the suburbs of London than to the suburbs of Lisbon by car.
Of course, all this thanks to the “sinful”, “immoral”, “opportunistic” airlines low cost. Because honorable people with character only travel on airlines worthy of the name, such as our TAP – Transportes Aéreos Portugueses.
That's why we have to support TAP, because it takes us and brings us where we want to go from Faro. We can only want to go to Lisbon, because Lisbon is the world and only then can our flag company transport us to the four corners of the world (so to say, of course we have known for a long time that the world is round).
Just make that choice. For many years, TAP has lived up to its name and only transports people from the Algarve or those who visit us in one direction, and those who use it don't run the risk of getting lost across the country.
Which makes sense, because an airline whose name is TAP – Transportes Aéreos Portugueses won't take Portuguese or anyone else without being from Portugal… And Lisbon is Portugal or Portugal is Lisbon?!… Hmm, the doubt is already old and persistent, especially for me, who like the classics, like ours, Eça de Queirós, a XNUMXth century writer who already noted this methodical doubt that assists the Portuguese, not the Lisboners.
TAP – Transportes Aéreos Portugueses is not a puppet and sinful company like the low cost, who take us to destinations abroad and bring foreign people without going through Lisbon first, to control our nerve center.
But it is impossible for me to understand why our airline does not find it profitable to bring passengers in and out of the airport. Faro – Algarve to other countries, when other companies do it and do it in abundance and with profitability.
Who truly provides a public service: the company that bears the name of the country and that wants to be indispensable for the maintenance of our identity, but which does not put the name into practice? Or other companies, which, despite being private and infamous, bring and generate undeniable wealth to our region?
And I, as an Algarvian patriot, who manages a wallet where the money only pays for what is possible and not for extravagances, I only walk in these bad companies.
And here, a debt is robbed again: will I still have to pay TAP, when I don't use it?
It seems to me that I have a deja vu, when BES comes to mind and the repeated injections of money into this important bank, where I don't have, nor have I ever had an account, but I should have, because a good part of my taxes also went there…
I don't need TAP to leave the Airport of Faro to anywhere in the world. And I already left the airport of Faro to Indonesia and I returned, without needing TAP and without going to control, to Lisbon. And it was 12 years ago. Quite a long time.
As a user, I feel that the Algarve does not need TAP, not even to go to Lisbon or vice versa. The train is faster and cheaper.
Perhaps, as we have the EVA – Algarve Aviation Company, which is private and serves the entire region, taking the Algarve and those who visit us wherever it is needed, I can suggest that we think about creating a TAAlg – Algarve Aviation Transport. We paid, of course, but at least it was useful to us and served our region.
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