How Airplanes and Air Transport have Made Our Lives Easier

Air travel is a relatively new invention. It has only been in the last couple of generations that it has become affordable for the average person and that it has reached the stage where it makes sense to send goods by air instead of by sea. There are people alive today who were born in a time when air travel was not commonplace, and they have seen first hand how air travel has changed the world in which we live.

The World is a Smaller Place

Today, it is possible to fly from state to state in the USA in a few hours, or to fly from the United Kingdom to many countries in Europe in less time, and for less money, than it would cost to use the train system. The world feels smaller now and it is easier to visit people who live in different countries, travel for work, and travel for leisure. We can meet people from different cultures, see monuments and world wonders first-hand, and learn more about the world around us. We are better informed (or can be if we choose to pay attention) and we have more exposure to other cultures.

Air travel is faster than travel by ferry, greyhound,train or car. It allows us to make in-person visits for work or pleasure quickly and efficiently, and trips by plane are becomingso affordable that even those who are relatively small earners can often make journeys that would have been considered a once in a lifetime trip to their parents or grandparents.

We Have Better Access to Goods

Air transport doesn’t just cover humans, though. It can also cover goods, including foods. Indeed, there is a concept known as ‘food miles’ which debates the idea of sending foods internationally. On the one hand, transporting food across continents is useful, because it means that people can enjoy varied diets all year round. Why worry about whether strawberries are in-season where you live if you can import them from a foreign country? If there has been a drought or an issue with a crop in your country then you can always import crops from elsewhere.

Whether or not this is a good thing is a subject of debate. To some, having the ability to import exotic foods is a huge boon. It allows migrants to enjoy foods that are staples of their homeland. It allows people to enjoy whatever they feel like, all year round, instead of waiting for a specific time of year. It is convenient and it makes our diets more interesting and varied. To others, however, it raises questions of ethics. Is it really sensible to pollute the environment to ship strawberries internationally when we could eat blackberries instead?

A Global Economy

Early aircraft were used for transporting mail, and passenger transport came along later. Today, aircraft transport both freight and people, and that is a part of the reason that flights are so cheap for passengers, even if the aircraft isn’t always full. The flight would be happening anyway.

Today, we can manufacture goods in a country with a low cost of living and cheap labor, and transport those goods from that country to their desired destination. Yes, that was possible in the days of cargo ships being the primary means of transport but now that we can use aircraft which are much quicker, and this means that we can take advantage of ‘dropshipping’ from the manufacturer to the customer, saving a lot of money. We can also use ‘just in time’ supply lines. This means we can keep fewer products in stock and have new stock delivered when we need it.

A huge portion of the world’s economy relies on ‘just in time’ supply now. Supermarkets keep just enough for three days worth of sales in their own warehouses, for example. Even the process of going from parts to manufacture to sale involves a lot of ‘just in time’ delivery. In some industries, the practice is called ‘lean production’. We waste less time and space on storing things that are not being used, and we buy only what we need to get the job done.

Improvements in Medicine

Air travel is a boon for many industries and many parts of modern life. Medicine is one area. We can import medicines that we do not make in our own country. We can send air ambulances to remote areas to pick up patients who need urgent care. We can send a specialist to perform an operation on a seriously ill patient in a different hospital and be confident that he will get there promptly. The ‘small world’ means that people have access to better care when they need it. Information and expertise can be shared more readily.

Keeping People Closer

Aircraft allow people to see their friends and family more easily. They make socializing more convenient and more fun in a lot of ways. It means that people who have only met online using their gadgets like laptops or smartphones actually have the opportunity to meet them face to face. Everyone, adults and children, have the opportunity to see more of the world and to enjoy more variety. In some states, such as Alaska, taking a small aircraft is as commonplace as taking the bus, because of the remoteness of the areas where some people live and work.

International Aid

While some of the things that air travel offers are things that are simply ‘nice to have’ such as the ability to go to a foreign country instead of a local national park for a holiday, there are other things that we have not come to depend on, such as the ability to import medicine, and even import food. Air travel can be vital during natural disasters, too, because it gives people the opportunity to offer, or benefit from, international aid.

The Challenge of the Environment

For all that aircraft have massively benefited the western world, there are some challenges. The carbon footprint of a flight is quite significant, and there are campaigners that are asking people to reduce unnecessary business travel and to think about where they go for leisure too. There are also people who are campaigning to see a reduction in ‘food miles’ for the average meal and to get people to buy locally grown produce and locally made goods. This is seen as better for the environment.

These initiatives make a lot of sense, and the world would be better off if we were more conscious of waste and pollution. That’s not to say that aircraft are bad, however. There is a balance to these subjects, and we can compromise in a lot of ways, reducing waste, and being selective is not the same as going back to the dark ages.

If airplanes had never been invented then we would lose a lot of what we enjoy about modern culture today. Multiculturalism, the ‘right now’ access to almost anything we want or need, knowledge, commerce, politics, and entertainment are all heavily influenced by flight.

Yes, before airplanes we had airships, but these were not as safe and had a lot of problems. We can also travel on trains (and there are huge bridges and tunnels to cross certain bodies of water), but the volume of traffic that can be transported by those is limited. Aircraft offer more freedom, more flexibility, and more scalability to transport people and goods on a regular basis. We are lucky to be alive in a time when aircraft are common, affordable, and also incredibly safe and reliable.