Do you think people need to see their family? And I’m not just talking about foreign holidays. I’m talking about people having to move where the work is even within the U.S., Canada, and Australia, which can easily put you thousands of miles from your family. Europe you can get away without being able to fly. We could def. reduce it by having better rail service, of course, but people can’t take the time off work for 4 to 5 day drives or train rides. I certainly couldn’t afford, financially, to take a boat across the Atlantic pretty much…ever. By the cheapest option, it’s $100 a day for a trip that takes 7 to 14 days. Each way. During which I would somehow have to work. Then I could afford to take 2 days with my family before getting on the boat back. Many people in my situation only get 2 weeks vacation time a year, total.

There are some regions — Iceland comes to mind — for whom foreign tourism is a key part of the economy and there would be significant hardship if it was stopped or curtailed. And we’re talking permanent employment drops that would necessitate basic income (if the country could still afford it). Foreign holidays might be a luxury, but when done right they are an engine for moving money around the planet. Nobody needs a foreign holiday, but hoteliers need jobs. As for business meetings…some are better off held virtually, but we don’t yet have the technology to do good spontaneous networking in a virtual space.

There are some parts of the world where aviation is the only feasible transportation. There are islands in Europe which are only accessible by boat tidally or when things are unusually calm.

Airplanes are often the only way to get humanitarian aid relief to an area after a disaster. They are often the only way to get somebody a transplant organ in time. In developing countries where there aren’t yet good road or rail routes, they can be the only way to get anything not produced in the local area.

Even in the developed world, a lot more cargo (not to mention mail) is carried by plane than you might think. Mail is carried on passenger flights, typically. How do you think we distributed covid-19 vaccines around the U.S.? Hint, it wasn’t on trains.

Dirigibles would be great for cargo and for shorter trips, but the helium shortage precludes using helium and I doubt most people would get on a hydrogen blimp (and I do mean precludes, there is not enough helium available on the entire planet for significant use. We’ve even pretty much had to give up using it for decorative balloons).

All of the ground machinery can be electrified anyway. There’s certainly no reason luggage trains have to be internal combustion…those are *perfect* for electric and probably already are in some places. Most internal airport ground transportation is electric or at the very least hybrid. I didn’t talk about airports because they aren’t the sticky wicket…they’re fixable and will be fixed as electric ground transportation moves to being the standard.

Air travel has brought massive benefits to society. You seem to think stopping it would only force people to give up a few little luxuries.