Airports boost business and tourism, but air traffic also causes noise and pollution. As airports are often located close to cities, and a popular and lucrative location for business parks, they also create a demand for urban development, including dwellings. Good examples are Heathrow and Schiphol. Both airports were initially located at a safe distance from residential areas and only served the happy few who could afford to fly. Since, urban sprawl and skyrocketing numbers of air traffic movements has blurred the strict division between city and airports. As the number of people who can afford to buy flight tickets is still on the rise, the apparent ever-close union between cities and airports will unlikely on the short term. Inherently, this erodes the quality of residential areas in the proximity of airports in terms of aircraft noise and air pollution. One of the main questions for airport regions in the 21th century is how to balance airport activities and the quality, health and sustainability of the areas around the airport, in the Amsterdam Metropolitan Area and beyond.
Martijn joined AMS Institute in January 2019 as a part-time Research Fellow. Martijn obtained a BSc and MSc at TU Delft and worked as a doctoral researcher at the University of Cambridge and the Dutch Aerospace Centre (NLR). Aside from his work for AMS Institute, Martijn works as a freelance consult on the interface between acoustics and spatial development for various cities.