Ryanair challenges decision to block building of new terminal

Ryanair, announced today that it has applied for a judicial review of An Bord Pleanála’s decision upholding planning permission for a €800m second terminal in Dublin Airport.

The airline has also applied for a judicial review of the Commission for Aviation Regulation’s (CAR’s) decision to allow the majority of Dublin Airport Authority’s massively inflated costs for T2 to be recovered through higher passenger charges.

Both applications were filed with the High Court this afternoon.

Ryanair’s Head of Regulatory Affairs, Jim Callaghan, said: "These two applications for the High Court are aimed at preventing further passenger charge increases and inefficiency at Dublin Airport.

"The basis of both of these legal challenges is that the T2 facility as proposed by DAA is massively oversized, as CAR has now confirmed, it costs approximately four times what it should and will double passenger charges at Dublin Airport. Moreover, there is still time to allow DAA to provide facilities that meet the requirements of users but do not increase passenger charges further given that the existing facilities have enough capacity until 2011/2012.

"If the DAA monopoly goes ahead with this ridiculous development, then the users of T2, i.e., Aer Lingus, should have to pay for it, not Ryanair’s low fares passengers who will continue to use the old terminal".