Time, risk, crowded skies - good reasons to kick flying addiction

LONDON - "So, how was the trip?"

Right now, those are five words you don't want to utter in any office. Expect, in response, an hour of moaning about cancelled flights, missed connections and security procedures that make flying look more like a scene from a James Bond movie than a way of getting from one place to another.

For the past week, global air travel has plunged into chaos, following the British police's discovery of a terrorist plot to blow up commercial planes.

During the first day of the alert, European airlines called off more than 1100 flights as London's main airports ground to a halt. Severe restrictions were placed on hand luggage. Even early this week, as some of the emergency measures were loosened, journeys were still disrupted, and companies such as Ryanair and British Airways were struggling to get their schedules back in order.

The terrorist threat suggests one answer that nobody is discussing: Maybe business should wean itself off its addiction to constant air travel.

Even with the growing inconvenience, people are jetting around more than ever before. The International Air Transport Association says air travel is likely to grow at an average of 5.6 per cent a year from 2005 to 2009. Much of the expansion will come from business travellers.

Here are four reasons to find a different way of getting to those business meetings.

One: Terrorists target airlines.

Terrorists loosely associated with al Qaeda appear to be against modernity and globalisation. There is no more potent symbol of either than airports and the planes that fill them.

For the foreseeable future, stringent security will be standard.

Two: Travel times will lengthen.

You will have to get to the airport earlier and spend time being searched, possibly more than once. You may not be allowed to carry your laptop or even your BlackBerry on the plane with you. When you disembark, your bag won't appear as quickly as before - and you can forget about taking only hand luggage for an overnight trip.

Three: The environmental impact of air transport.

Exactly how much planes contribute to global warming is hotly disputed between environmental campaigners and their opponents in industry. But there's no doubt, plane travel uses up a lot of fuel and damages the environment.

Four: The skies are too crowded.

A major business centre such as London now has three big airports with the smaller London City Airport serving the financial district. As anyone living close to the flight paths will testify, there are limits to how many planes can be squeezed into the sky.

But companies don't need to force their executives to spend as much time in the air as they do.

The internet has made video conferencing more practical. It may not have the intimacy of physical contact. Yet it is fast and reliable, and you can include a lot more people.

It isn't even clear that we need so many meetings. Do they really achieve anything or do they just happen because no one stopped to ask why? If business can have leaner workforces and shorter supply chains, why not fewer conferences as well?

People will always have to travel for work - and the plane will sometimes be the fastest way to get there. Yet the days when air travel made it simple to nip over to Sydney for lunch are now over. Business will have to start adjusting to that fact and kick its addiction to flying.

- BLOOMBERG