Second terminal points airport in the right direction

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

PAUL MILLS’S column headlined ‘Inefficiencies see money poured down drain’ (November 12) contained a number of inaccuracies relating to the Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) and the construction of Terminal Two (T2) at Dublin airport.

The first is his suggestion that the DAA "decided" to build T2, almost as if on a whim. The facts are that the Government decided in May 2005 that the DAA should build both a new passenger terminal and the boarding gate facility, Pier D, which was opened in October 2007.

The Government’s decision was in response to the double-digit annual growth experienced since the late 1990s and the severe congestion this caused due to inadequate terminal and airfield facilities at Dublin airport. The pressure to take this decision came from a broad range of stakeholders, not least passengers who suffered most as a result of the congestion.

Mr Mills’s claim that none of the airlines "seemed to want" T2 is completely without foundation. During 2006, as the plans for the new terminal were being drawn up, the DAA consulted widely with its airline customers and other key stakeholders. Aer Lingus not only welcomed the plans but engaged actively in the process that determined the design, functionality and operational capacity of the new terminal.

Only one airline of the large number that use Dublin airport voiced any opposition to the plans for T2. The airline in question, Ryanair, typically and for its own purposes, opposes all improvements in the airport’s passenger facilities. It is also worth recalling that many other groups, including those representting the interests of the tourism industry and the business community, advocated strongly that a new terminal comparable to the one currently under completion was essential to improve the passenger experience at Dublin airport and to make Ireland a more attractive location for business and leisure travel and for foreign direct investment.

Indeed IDA Ireland specifically cited the poor facilities then in place at Dublin airport as a potential impediment to winning additional overseas investment projects.

Mr Mills also makes a spurious presumption that Dublin airport charges are a barrier encouraging tourists to come to Ireland. A series of independent studies by Airports Council International (ACI), the Commission for Aviation Regulation (CAR) and others have all affirmed that Dublin airport’s charges are among the lowest of comparable European airports and that it is one of Europe’s more efficient large airports.

Airport charges at Dublin have fallen by 30% in real terms over the past 20 years and even with the level of charges required to fund the development and operation of the new terminal, the airport’s passenger charges will remain highly competitive compared to its major European peers.

Passenger volumes are driven principally by GDP trends in Ireland and in our major trading partners and clearly the Irish economic landscape has changed dramatically since the DAA lodged its plans for T2 in the summer of 2006.

However, to view the new terminal purely through the prism of the current downturn would be a grave error.

T2 was designed to transform the passenger experience at Dublin airport for decades to come. The tourists that Mr Mills refers to, and the millions who will in time be attracted by its new facilities on new direct long-haul routes, will be using the cost-effective new terminal not just in 2010 but also in 2020, 2025 and 2030.

Paul O’Kane
Director of Public Affairs
Dublin Airport Authority

This story appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Tuesday, November 17, 2009