Spruce Creek: a city where everyone owns an airplane

In the northeast of American Florida there is an unusual village of Spruce Creek. More precisely, it is even difficult to call it a settlement; rather, it is a residential airfield. He is surrounded by more than 1200 houses. Near some of them there is a special garage with a private jet. Yes, for 5 thousand inhabitants there are more than 700 hangars. The main hobby of the inhabitants of this American village is aviation.

There is a runway in the center of the town, and a road leads directly to it from each hangar. There is a familiar golf course, as in other US cities, as well as several flying clubs, as well as aircraft rental.

The most famous resident of Spruce Creek is John Travolta. Fond of flying, he spent several years in this town until the locals asked him to leave: his Boeing was simply huge for their airfield.

And besides the Boeing in Spruce Creek, this collection of rarities: there is a Frenchman Fouga Magister, and light-engine Cessna and Piper, and even the Russian MiG-15 fighter. But, by the way, residents love not only airplanes, but also cars with motorcycles, so there are Lamborghini, Corvette, Porsche.

People in Spruce Creek live together. Most of them are professional pilots. But there are lawyers, doctors and others among them who are fond of flights. Every Saturday in the morning they gather near the runway and take off at the same time three people. All of them fly for breakfast to one of the nearest airports - such an unusual ritual, which is many years old.

Spruce Creek was built here during World War II, and when it ended, people who loved aviation settled here. This is not the only place on the planet where the air harbor has turned into a town. In the United States, there are about 600 residential airfields, but Spruce Creek is still the largest and most famous of them. The fact is that after the war there was an excess of airports in the country, and the pilots whom the war created were still alive. So, after the end of World War II, there were 400 thousand pilots in the country, and before it began - at least ten times less. Therefore, they decided to turn inactive military bands into something worthwhile and gave them up for housing, where people who lived, loving the sky, settled. And the United States is not the only country where there are residential airports. Similar towns are in the UK, Canada, South Africa and Costa Rica.