Kralendijk – By far the largest part of the inhabitants on the island seem in favour for the construction of a new terminal for the Flamingo airport. This conclusion can be drawn from the result of an online survey organized by the Dutch VWO student Mees van Winssen as part of a paper for school.

In total, the survey was completed 715 times. Of the 715 respondents, 413 are residents, 213 respondents live in the Netherlands, 54 live partly in the Netherlands and partly on Bonaire. 27 respondents reside in another country of the Kingdom and 12 people live outside the Kingdom.

Van Winssen shared the results with Bonaire.Nu and BES-Reporter, who also helped launch the survey through her news media.

For the analysis of the results, a filter has been applied to residency. The results shown here concern only the inhabitants on the island. It should be noted that most answers do not provide an important different picture when looking at the results of the overall group, versus the group of inhabitants.

New terminal

In general, respondents living on Bonaire are in favor of a new terminal for the airport. 61.5% think that a new terminal should be built anyway. 29.3% are still in doubt and 9.2% of respondents do not need a new terminal.

62.7% of respondents also believe that a new airport building is important for strengthening the economy. In addition, 55.2% of respondents believe that the population will benefit from a new terminal. Moreover, 54.2% of respondents also think that Dutch and foreign companies will benefit from the project.

Participation

It seems some work is in order both for the government and the airport when it comes to communication and participation about future plans for Flamingo Airport. For example, a very large majority of respondents (69.5%) said they were aware of what BIA’s plans entail when it comes to the possible construction of a new terminal.

In addition, 56.2% of respondents felt that the population was not sufficiently involved in the development of the airport’s plans.

Satisfaction and concerns

The respondents in Van Winssen’s survey also gave an opinion on customer satisfaction with the Flamingo airport. In addition, they expressed their concern at the further development of the tourist industry. The BES-Reporter will discuss these results in a number of subsequent articles