On Friday, Ryanair called on the Irish Government to scrap the 32 million Dublin Airport passenger cap, which they say is now damaging growth in Irish tourism, and increasing the cost of air travel. Over the past 2 weeks, the airlines at Dublin Airport have been warned they will not receive extra slots for Christmas flights this winter for sporting events such as Rugby Internationals and Premier League matches. Now the IAA has suggested that in order to comply with the 32m traffic cap, Summer 2025 traffic at Dublin must be reduced by up to 1 million passengers. The airline said that such reductions will damage Irish tourism and jobs, and will lead to much higher fares for passengers and Irish families going on holidays in 2025.
Ryanair highlighted that this 17-year-old traffic cap should no longer apply because it was introduced in 2007 to address then concerns that road traffic to/from Dublin Airport would exceed road capacity when Dublin reached 32 million passengers. No such strain exists and road traffic around Dublin Airport is moving freely, thanks to a large switch to public transport (bus services) to/from the airport. Since the circumstances have changed, and there is no threat to road traffic, the airline has said that the Irish Government should now act to scrap this unnecessary but deeply damaging 2007 traffic cap.
Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary said: “We have been calling for 2 years on Transport Minister Eamon Ryan to scrap this stupid 2007 traffic cap. Sadly, he has failed to act, preferring to hide behind “the planning process”. This planning restriction, which dates from 2007, was designed to address fears that road access to/from the airport would not be able to facilitate traffic over 32m per year. It is clear that this concern is no longer valid and since road traffic is not an issue, Minister Ryan should instruct the IAA to ignore this 17-year-old cap.
Dublin Airport has recently opened a 2nd runway, taking Dublin’s capacity up to 60m passengers p.a. yet our Transport Minister refuses to act to scrap this outdated traffic cap to let Dublin Airport grow. Since the Transport Minister won’t act, we now call on the wider Govt, led by Simon Harris to take urgent action to scrap the cap to allow Irish tourism and jobs to grow in 2025. It is vital that Dublin Airport traffic is allowed to grow so that we can keep air fares low for Irish families going on holidays in 2025.
If the latest proposals from the IAA to comply with this outdated cap proceed, then airlines based at Dublin will not be able to add extra flights this Christmas, and more worryingly, the number at seats at Dublin Airport will be cut by 1m in Summer 2025. Any such cuts will do real damage to Irish tourism and Irish jobs, and will result in much higher air fares for Irish citizens and their families going abroad in Summer 2025.
Irish tourism and Irish jobs should not be damaged by a 17-year-old, defective planning restriction, or an incompetent Transport Minister. An effective Transport Minister would scrap this cap. Since he won’t, we now call on the wider Irish Govt to scrap this cap and allow Dublin Airport, Irish airlines and Irish tourism to continue to grow Irish traffic and jobs in Winter 2024 and Summer 2025.”
