daa CEO warns of "significant impact" on flight prices and routes as Dublin Airport set to breach passenger cap
Measures to reduce the number of passengers at Dublin Airport won't have too much of an effect on travellers returning home for Christmas but will have a "significant impact" next summer, the daa CEO has warned
The CEO of the operator of Dublin Airport, daa, has warned of a “significant impact” on the price of flights and the number of routes operating out of the airport next summer as it looks set to breach its passenger cap this year.
A statement issued by daa on Wednesday morning warned of the impact of Dublin Airport exceeding its cap of 32 million passengers this year, with the effects likely to be most keenly felt in the summer of 2025.
Speaking to Morning Ireland on Wednesday, Daa CEO Kenny Jacobs indicated that necessary measures being taken to limit the number of passengers, as well as airlines reducing operations due to uncertainty, will not have too much of an effect towards the end of this year, but will have a “significant impact” next summer, including on the price of air fares.
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"The slots for the winter have been determined. The two big carriers here, Aer Lingus and Ryanair, have the same slots that they had last year, so I don't expect any difficulty in the coming months in terms of people getting home for Christmas," said Jacobs.
"There may be one or two or several more routes that will fall off, so there'll be a drop in connectivity. We are flagging no issue in the short term, but a significant impact next year," he added.
Between May and August this year, according to the daa statement, over 10 million passengers passed through the doors of Dublin Airport. This brings the total number to 22.7 million passengers so far in 2024. As of the end of August, passenger numbers are trending 5.5 per cent ahead of 2023, and this trend is forecast to continue into September.
A dampening of passenger numbers is expected from late autumn as a result of the Irish Aviation Authority’s (IAA) winter slot decision, which reduces the number of seats airlines flying into Dublin Airport can offer to passengers between November and March.
Daa has applied to Fingal County Council to increase the passenger limit from 32 million to 40 million as part of a broader infrastructure application (IA) to “facilitate the projected growth of passengers through Dublin Airport”.
Daa is also preparing to lodge an Operational Application (OA) which seeks to increase the passenger cap only, without the additional sustainable infrastructure developments detailed in the IA, if this could hasten the lifting of the cap. The moves to increase passenger numbers has faced opposition from local residents concerned about noise and also from groups concerned about the environmental impact.
In the daa statement, which also hailed Cork Airport as the “fastest-growing airport in Ireland” and flagged the “opportunity to grow Cork by 40 per cent in the next six to eight years”, Jacobs said: "At Dublin Airport, like every month so far this year, a new monthly record was set in August with more than 100,000 passengers flying most days, and more than 120,000 plus on a number of days. If we had these passenger numbers every day, then Dublin would already be a 40-million-passenger airport.”
“This summer shows that we can successfully handle that amount of passengers operationally, and I want to thank all of our teams at the airports for their hard work, as well as our airline customers,” he added.
“Overall, I’m optimistic about the future except for one thing: the fact that growth at Dublin Airport is now being stalled by an outdated passenger cap, a very lengthy planning process and a lack of joined-up thinking on critical infrastructure in Ireland.
“This leaves Dublin Airport caught between a rock and a hard place. We want to grow so we can continue to connect Ireland with the world and support FDI, tourism and jobs. But while we wait for planning to be granted, we are doing everything we can to comply with existing planning conditions. While our actions to dampen airline demand have reduced passenger numbers by approximately 650,000, we do not control the slot process. We now forecast that passenger numbers will exceed 32 million and will be closer to 33 million in 2024.
“It is in no one's interests to curtail tourism and investment at a time when so much public and private money is being spent to do the complete opposite. We are a small, open, island economy on the edge of Europe that has always punched above our weight but we need more joined-up thinking in the development of critical infrastructure.
“It’s time to all come together to realise an ambitious vision of Ireland that sets us up for the future. This includes support for growth at Dublin Airport, so we can keep delivering for Ireland, and growth at Ireland’s great regional airports at Cork, Shannon, Knock, Kerry and Donegal.”
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