In the summer of 2028, a necessary runway renovation at Brussels South Charleroi Airport will silence one of Europe's most quietly essential political arteries for eleven weeks — arriving precisely as Latvia assumes the EU Council presidency and the continent's parties begin their final push toward the 2029 European Parliament elections. What makes this more than a scheduling inconvenience is what Charleroi represents: not prestige, but access — the cheap, unglamorous connectivity that allows the broader EU political class, not merely its senior ranks, to participate in the project of European