IATA director general, the Glasnevin born Willie Walsh, has said that Dublin’s restrictions will divert growth elsewhere.
The debate about capping aviation seems to be almost solely associated with European airports. The three airports that have issues at the moment are Schiphol in Amsterdam, Brussels, where the government wants to reduce slots, Brussels where the government is making changes to how it operates, and Dublin Airport, which has a passenger cap relating to surface access to the airport.
This cap has nothing to do with runway capacity, terminal capacity, or how the aircraft operate, but how people get to the airport. The idea that you’re going to suppress growth opportunities because of restrictions which, in the case of Dublin, date back to 2006, restricting the growth at Dublin Airport because of the decision that was taken 18 years ago, which is completely different from the environment that we’re operating in today, I don’t think makes sense and I think the Irish economy will suffer as a result because the growth will just go somewhere else.
It is not as if the grwoth isn’t going to happen, it just moves. So in the case of Dublin, Ryanair will move aircraft to other airports where there are growth opportunities, Aer Lingus will not expand their transatlantic operations, but people will still be flying, they’ll just be bypassing Dublin and Dublin will miss out on the opportunities.
We need to keep a close eye on this but we don’t see at this stage similar discussions in other parts of the world, the opportunity that many countries see to expand their network and expand connectivity, which is quite different from some of the things we’ve seen in Europe.
