These routes have not yet been shared with the House of Representatives, but the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management (IenW) has already had them analyzed for feasibility.
One of the proposed measures to make Dutch airspace future-proof is a fourth approach point for landing air traffic from the southeast. Landing traffic now enters Schiphol’s airspace at three locations. The intention is to add a fourth point: ZUDOS, just south of Doorn in the province of Utrecht.
Sensitive (approach) point
According to the Airspace Revision Steering Group, this will ‘lead to traffic above parts of the Netherlands where this is currently less or not the case’. In other words: flying nuisance will increase in places in the Doorn area, making the fourth approach point ‘sensitive’, the steering group realizes.
The intention is that landing traffic via the fourth approach point will travel to Schiphol via fixed routes as much as possible. And depending on the direction in which they have to land there and whether one or two runways are in use at that moment, those routes look something like this.
Schiphol generally handles air traffic using the so-called 2 + 1 principle. At the same time, there are two runways and one runway in use, or two runways and one runway. In the more distant future, the airspace revision should make it possible to use two runways and two take-offs simultaneously. Then more air traffic can be handled than is currently the case.
Vianen, Oudewater, Alphen
When landing in a northerly direction and in the variant in which one runway is used in combination with two runways, traffic approaching from Doorn flies to the Kaagbaan runway. It then flies via Vianen, Oudewater, Alphen aan de Rijn to turn in front of Lisse. When two runways are in use, it goes via Nieuwegein, Montfoort, Woerden, the Groene Hart and Aalsmeer to the Aalsmeerbaan.
When landing in a southerly direction, traffic follows a different route. It then goes via Zeist, de Bilt, Utrecht and Breukelen, before turning north at Mijdrecht, via Amstelveen and Amsterdam. At or above Wormerveer it then turns to the Polderbaan or the Zwanenburgbaan. The Polderbaan is the landing strip when two runways are in use; the Zwanenburgbaan runway if one runway is in use.
Not reported to the House
The fact that these routes will be analyzed in 2022 is not stated in progress letters that the Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management sends to the House of Representatives about the airspace revision. In the last letter, dated October 2023, IenW reports that work is being done on ‘among other things, the first design of the new airspace design and the search areas in which fixed approach routes can be located’.
“The draft design is expected to be ready at the beginning of 2024 and describes (…) the location of the traffic patterns to and from Schiphol, including approach points,” the letter to Parliament states.
Already mapped out
These points and fixed approach points therefore appear to have been mapped out by officials for a long time. It was simulated in real time and the feasibility was analyzed by an external agency.
The political decision-making about it has not yet taken place. According to outgoing Minister Harbers, ‘the possible publication of the draft design and the design space is up to the next, missionary cabinet’.
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