Stopped flying? Take this survey!
If you have given up flying, you’ve doubtless also discovered the costs – and not just financial ones. You can meet uncomprehending attitudes from family and friends, and cut yourself off from activities they enjoy. It can be hard, as I have found since I took my last flight 12 years ago.
But we are not alone. Researchers at the University of the West of England think there are enough of us out there to be undertaking a survey of our experience.
So if you have given up air travel for environmental reasons, take this survey and tell them how you find it. You might find the questions they ask encouraging.
And why not share here why you don’t fly, and how it’s working out for you. Leave a reply below.
For me, the choice not to fly is intimately linked with my faith. It’s about ‘hugging the earth’ which is God’s world and our common home. It keeps my feet (or at least, wheels) on the ground, which is where every goodness comes from.
It opens me up to contact with people, landscapes and towns along the way, and somehow makes the whole experience more ‘real’ and more relational. In short, it’s travel with love.
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Comments on "Stopped flying? Take this survey!"
Euan McPhee:
Hmm! Inspired by other people's comments (above), I decided to take the the survey - only to find that it has closed already! Oh well, perhaps I didn;t want to know what the result might be!
F Kenrick:
One-upmanship: is it motivating? A few years back in 2010 winter when a show about Italian Mannerist Christian art was on at the National Gallery I met a friend who emigrated to Australia with her family; then her children were teens - her reason for taking the trip back was sadly because her mother had died; she needed to attend the funeral. The last air trip I took was 2005 sadly with relatives for a holiday. It wasted hot air, made me realise I had to stay within my adulthood reality and not dash out of my own zones. Re-connecting to our past is nostalgic can be too sentimental.
Melanie Fryer:
So pleased that more people must be thinking about this and stopping or at least cutting down. My record is one flight in 1997, 2007 and 2014. I have no plans to fly anywhere at the moment, I am far too busy with local issues. I have no desire for foreign beach holidays and I don't care what people think of me so these are not barriers for me. As always with environmental issues there is lack of understanding and/or care. The worst I have heard is people trying to justify themselves by saying that they recycle. This is literally, rubbish!! The differences are at opposite ends of the scale. I have re-used and recycled all my life but my flights still don't sit comfortably with me and I will continue to offset my carbon footprint at every opportunity.
Deborah:
I've not flown for 6 years. The last time was to visit my daughter when she was working in East Africa. Since then she's been home for a number of years, but now is working in Asia, indefinitely. This is the difficulty for many families - the "love miles". It's likely that I will visit her in the next year, and I plan to offset my flight with Climate Stewards - it works out at about £5 per 1,000 miles (so for me, £65 is added to the cost of my return ticket of 13,000 miles). This seems a small amount to add to the cost of a ticket, as the carbon generated will be offset by worthwhile carbon-reducing projects in poorer countries. My ideal would be not to fly at all, but offsetting is the next best thing, while at the same time reducing all our carbon emissions.
Deborah:
I've just done this and found it took under 10 minutes - it was very straightforward (no trick questions!).
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