A “velorution” is the word chosen for this mobilization this Saturday afternoon. By bike, the group of about twenty people went to theTours airport to demonstrate against the subsidies paid by the region, the department and the metropolis. The action was named “above seasonal norms“.
Departing from Tours Cathedral, the group cycled five kilometers to reach the airport. Marion, an activist who decorates her bike with a flag, finds it important to mobilize, “summer, it became hell. Winters are gonna be hell__. We won’t even have enough to heat ourselves, and to pay for the heating… It’s going to be hard.“
© Radio France
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lauretta
Dju is participating for the first time in this kind of mobilization. But for her, it is important to act. A few tears come to her, “I think like many here, I’m really starting to get very, very scared of what will happen. But that freaks me out. I think we’re destroying everything we have…“
An action at the airport
The group arrives at the airport, unfurls a banner. Paper planes, folded in advance, are thrown in front of the airport as a symbol. Then after a few moments, the group calmly returns to the airport. Loc takes his microphone and challenges the travellers. “The objective was to come and show the stupidity of continuing to give subsidies to the airport and to the most polluting transport. 3 million euros per year by the Department, the Region and the metropolis of Tours. It’s an aberration that we want to denounce.“A pacifist, he even ends his speech with”have a good trip anyway!“
© Radio France
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Laurette Puaud
A traveler nods, “I support, of course. Afterwards, I get on a plane that is full, it’s not a private jet“, before continuing, “subsidies are still good, economically, but ecologically, of course…“
For these activists, it is possible to travel differently, especially in Tours. Rodolphe, who is part of the movement, “we are 1 hour and a half from Roissy thanks to our rail connections and about as much to reach Orly. And despite that, there is an airport. Our fight is for the climate, for biodiversity. But from an economic point of view, it does not stand up! It is a very small population that uses the plane…“
The mobilization took place within the framework of the October and November International Rebellion (RINO)
which the Extinction Rebellion organization was carrying out in several cities in France.