On September 19, 1916, the first three military aircraft landed at Schiphol. Within fifty years, the small airfield in the swampy polder grew into an airport for the jet set, to then serve the mass tourist. How was that possible?
The first pilots and passengers were real heroes. Pilots were the astronauts of today and made the headlines every time they visited a new destination. Their small and open planes only had room for four people, so they could only accommodate a maximum of two passengers. They also risked their lives and received a certificate after landing as proof that they had dared to take the flight and survived.
Airports looked sparse. Schiphol was established in 1916 as a military reserve site and facilities were minimal. Until the mid-twenties there was little more than a large bare grassy plain with a large white circle in the middle. To the side stood wooden sheds where the planes were parked. Schiphol was no exception in Europe because flying was not economically profitable anywhere.
Economy class
After the Second World War, colonies all over the world declared themselves independent and in 1949 Indonesia was no longer part of the Netherlands. This meant considerably fewer flights from Schiphol and a gradual change in the passenger target group. Until the 1950s, passengers were mainly wealthy thrill-seekers, businessmen or government officials who flew to the overseas colonies. Airlines shifted their focus and focused on the commercial potential of tourism.
Elite transport started to show cracks with the introduction of a 30 percent cheaper Tourist Class in 1952 and an additional twenty percent cheaper Economy Class in 1958 on flights between Europe and the United States. This was a golden opportunity and for the first time more people traveled to America by plane than by boat.
Because of this price difference, a clear distinction had to be made in the different transport classes. Travelers saw this especially in the interior of the cabin by famous designers and the personal service of the flight attendants. Coffee and tea from thermos and cold sandwiches, as most European airlines served after the war, were no longer good enough for first class. The French first served hot meals on board in 1948 and found that high altitude conditions, such as air pressure, did not improve the taste of the food and wine. After a few improvements, a tasty seven-course champagne dinner became normal in first class.
Day out
The glamorous image people had of flying was given to them by advertising posters and films that showed only the first class:the flight attendant walking around a spacious cabin in her designer uniform with all kinds of snacks and drinks. This worked so well that people automatically connected luxury and aviation, even though even the first class passengers got off the plane tired after a noisy 24 hour flight.
In those years, most Dutch people could only dream about a plane trip and marveled en masse at the take-off and landing planes at Schiphol. Between 1945 and 1955, 7.7 million people went to Schiphol to watch planes as a day out, compared to 4.2 million actual air passengers. This made Schiphol the most important tourist attraction in the Netherlands at that time.
Super fast jumbo jet
The economic growth that began in the 1950s marked a turning point in the Western world. Luxury items such as refrigerators, washing machines, televisions and cars found a place in more and more households. Leisure time increased, people had more money, were more mobile and got more of the world through television programs. Between 1960 and 1970, world trade even doubled in size and wages continued to rise. This influenced the number of trips and the desire of tourists to visit further and sunny destinations. Within ten years a complete international travel industry emerged with the airplane as a mass transporter.
This was also possible because technology had not stood still. At the end of the fifties, the fast jet aircraft was developed and this completely changed aviation. These large jumbo jets were very expensive and in order to cover the costs, more passengers had to be brought in with cheaper tickets. As a result, flying holidays came within reach of the middle class. For them only no lounge chairs and walk to the bar, but seats with only 86 centimeters distance from back to back that gave the plane the appearance of a crammed bus. Nevertheless, the 'ordinary Dutch' wanted to travel in the same way as the new international jet set they saw on television:the movie stars, famous bands, popular politicians and other rich from the tabloids who continuously flew over the smaller and smaller world in fast and luxurious jets.
To the sun
The introduction of the charter flight also helped to further increase the tourist numbers. The first flights of charter airline Martinair departed from Schiphol from 1958, and Transavia was added in 1966. In the same year they accounted for 17.5 percent of the transport to and from Schiphol. Charter flights were cheaper because, unlike regular airlines, charter companies were allowed to resell large numbers of seats to tour operators in advance. As a result, they were able to offer complete and cheap holidays, including airfare and hotel, to sunny places.
Another reason for the cheaper charter tickets was the purchase of cheap outdated propeller planes from the regular airlines, which invested massively in the new faster and larger jet airliners. The Boeing 747 from 1965, for example, carried up to four hundred passengers and the unprecedented dimensions of this aircraft made everyone stand out.
Oil crisis
While airlines in the 1960s were still fond of associating flying with luxury and celebrity, cheap mass transit won out over first class in numbers. The jet set, the wealthy who flew in the first class of jet airliners were no longer the largest group of travelers.
The number of people able to travel great distances continued to grow, and such numbers of travelers were unprecedented in history. This development continued into the 1970s, despite a disruption caused by the 1973 oil crisis. The price of oil skyrocketed, causing airline ticket prices to rise as well, while at the same time the economy stagnated and the number of business and leisure trips declined.
The economic crisis persisted, but the number of air passengers quickly rose again. In 1977, half a billion passengers flew around the world, a milestone. Hordes of tourists from cold northwestern Europe flooded the sunny Mediterranean countries in the 1970s. As a result, the economy grew in the holiday mood, but also picturesque Mediterranean coastal towns became unrecognizable with an abundance of concrete hotels.
Aviation comes of age
Today, tourists fly to all corners of the world. Schiphol is a major player in this respect as the fifth airport in Europe with more than 58 million travelers in 2015. What has happened in the cultural-historical field since the rise of mass tourism? Historian Marc Dierikx, researcher at the Huygens ING research institute for history and culture and specialized in aviation history.
Has air traffic at Schiphol changed our lives further after the 1970s? “From the second half of the 1990s, budget airlines such as Ryanair have emerged, operating from 'cheap' countries and succeeding in expanding the market further downwards by landing at cheap airports. The new political conditions in Europe are favorable for the emergence of seasonal migration transport of temporary workers. So another new category of travelers has been added, but now without sunscreen. These increasingly cheaper air travel enables a physical interpretation of the internationalization of our lives initiated by the communication revolution.”
Are such major changes currently taking place as the turnaround in the 1960s and 1970s? “Where in the 1960s television opened the window and projected a general picture of a larger world beyond national borders, today social media opens everyone's personal window on the world:constant contact with everyone is possible, regardless of where a person is located. Never before have distances and boundaries been so absent. That certainly affects the number of travelers.”
What are the differences between elite and mass transport in air traffic today? “Aviation developed as elite transport and the mass traveler came much later, but has now apparently become dominant because of the numbers. Airport operators are responding to this and today airports have become shopping gutters. Special measures are also being taken for the elite, such as faster check-in with iris scans and secluded accommodation areas at the airport.”
“The business market is slowly declining, under pressure from falling margins in business, making business travelers more likely to economy fly. Only the very rich don't mind. They can afford to book a bedroom-with-shower in the Airbus A380, or they can go with their own jet. That last category, the private jet users, is now large enough that Schiphol has set up a separate departure hall for this type of travelers.”
Can we still do without Schiphol and air traffic? “Of course we can still do without air traffic, but whether we would like that is another matter. Young adults, in particular, are much more internationally oriented than, say, forty years ago when their grandparents first flew to the Spanish Costas. Where aviation once developed because of business transportation and government officials, that same aviation has matured through the leisure traveler.”