Reykjavik's new airport – inertia, geography, geology, safety, train tracks, and elves on the line

Iceland is in the unusual position of having two airports - courtesy of wartime efforts - serving its capital, Reykjavik, which has less than 250,000 people.

All international capacity is located at Keflavik (KEF), far from the capital. Domestic capacity is exclusively at the domestic airport (RVK), which is right next door to downtown and perfect for visitors.

Domestic flights have been tried into KEF, but they didn't work out.

Now the authorities are looking again at a new domestic airport located along the A41 road to KEF, and almost halfway along it, at that.

That doesn't seem to make sense, but from a safety angle it does, because diversionary procedures at KEF have been shown to be inadequate and need to be improved.

The ultimate answer might be to build this new airport and connect it by way of a long proposed high speed rail line to the city and southerly suburbs in one direction, and KEF in the other.

But who would pay for that in the current economic climate is the 64,000 dollar question.