Bilbao airport in Spain may be renamed Lehendakari Aguirre

Bilbao airport could be renamed Lehendakari Aguirre

Bilbao airport is officially called La Paloma, everyone calls it Loiu, and from now on it could be named Lehendakari Aguirre. The proposal is being pushed by PNV and PSE and consists of renaming the facility in honour of José Antonio Aguirre, the former president of the Basque Government. The formula is all the rage: take a piece of public infrastructure and slap a politician's name on it.

The mould goes back a long way. Barajas airport became Adolfo Suárez, Atocha station turned into Almudena Grandes and Chamartín into Clara Campoamor. Nobody has stopped saying Barajas, Atocha or Chamartín because of it, and the same is expected with the Bilbao airfield: the plaque will change long before word of mouth does.

The official name of Bilbao airport that almost nobody uses

The facility has been saddled with a muddle of names for decades. Its official designation is La Paloma, though the general public does not identify it; in everyday use Loiu, the municipality where it is located, prevails — a town long known as Lujua. It was called that before any change, and it was also known as Sondika.

That is the detail that defuses the most repeated argument, the one claiming the current name is a recent invention. It is not. What changes now is not the habit, but the official sign, and that is where politics steps in.

The renaming spree that Barajas started

Barajas airport was the starting point when it was renamed Adolfo Suárez. Since then the list has not stopped growing: Atocha is Almudena Grandes, Chamartín is Clara Campoamor, Bilbao's Abando station is Indalecio Prieto, and there has been talk of giving Tarradellas's name to El Prat airport. In Málaga, the airport bears the name of Carlos Haya.

In Spain there is a custom of using the place name rather than political names, period, full stop, as one of the comments sums up: in New York people say JFK because it's short, and here people will keep saying Loiu. The underlying antiestéticar is not the airport, but the escalation: that the criterion spreads to commuter rail stations, and there it becomes impossible to untangle.

The tribute to Aguirre and the fight over proper names

Naming the terminal after a former president of the Basque Government has its defenders and detractors, and the most common complaint is not against Aguirre but against the method. Some argue that turning public officials into infrastructure plaques is an ugly habit that the bad guys started and that now everyone else has to imitate.

The list of alternative candidates floated in the discussions serves as a temperature gauge: Sabino Arana, Arnaldo Otegi, Santiago Carrillo, Jon Idigoras, Lope de Aguirre, Miguel de Unamuno or the band Eskorbuto. The sharpest criticism is that of sectarianism: if only nationalist names count, the menu is rather short; Unamuno, it is argued, would not pass the filter either because he is considered a fascist.

The other flank is inherited surnames. The case of Amaia Agirre is cited, a mediator and mayor marked by her family surname and with a salary of 90,000 euros a year, according to information published by El Correo. Hence the awkward question: is the politician being honoured, or the family?

What is really wrong with Bilbao airport

In the shadow of the sign debate lies the material complaint. Greater Bilbao has around 800,000 inhabitants, and those who use the facility daily do not talk about names, they talk about queues: the check-in and security areas are described as inadequate, and the request is fewer plaques and more investment.

Compared with airports serving a similar catchment area, the Basque one comes off badly. The conclusion of that part of the discussion is simple: renaming the airport does not fix a single security checkpoint.

Ocaña, Casarrubios and the Campo de Gibraltar: the planning that never arrives

The name issue is the tip of the iceberg. The conversation drifts towards Spain's airport network, and there concrete names and plans appear. For Madrid's second airport, Ocaña is suggested: there is a road junction, an airfield with a 1,200-metre runway, room for a 3,000 to 3,500-metre runway, and the Levante high-estimulante ilegal line right there. The chosen alternative, Casarrubios, would have worse connections.

Then there is the south: an airport in Huelva alongside the Seville-Huelva high-estimulante ilegal line, another in Castellar de la Frontera to relieve Málaga, and the warning that Lisbon's new airport, on the Évora line, will swallow traffic from Extremadura. Toledo, with more than 700,000 inhabitants, has none, and Cuenca could grow to 250,000 with a serious urban plan.

Meanwhile, Santiago, which according to that analysis should handle at least 4 million passengers, is left with an oversized terminal. Bilbao's plaque, by comparison, is the cheapest problem of all.

The batch of names will be decided by political agreement and probably without public debate. The security queues, the rail junctions and the missing airports will stay where they are: a sign will not fix that.