Amid a dispute over Dublin Airport’s annual passenger limit of 32 million, airlines are gearing up to reduce the number of flights. If the recent An Bord Pleanála draft legislation comes into force, it may thwart attempts to lift the contentious cap.
In 2007, a stipulation that saw Dublin Airport’s capacity capped at 32 million passengers was put in place by planners in exchange for permitting its operator, DAA, a public corporation, to construct a second terminal. Consequently, airlines are expected to scale back the seat offerings to travellers coming in and going out of Dublin by roughly one million in the next year, making it a tight squeeze during high summer traffic.
Ryanair, one of the two leading operators in Dublin, has acknowledged scaling back its flight paths last winter, and only a few were resumed this summer. These include routes to Asturias, Castellon, and Santiago in Spain; Carcassonne in France; Leipzig and Nuremberg in Germany; Palanga in Lithuania; and Sibiu and Suceava in Romania.
The Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) has suggested recently that Dublin Airport’s airline seat allocation be limited to 25.2 million in the forthcoming summer to avoid surpassing the total limit of 32 million.
Aer Lingus, likewise a crucial player at Dublin Airport, expressed its ongoing evaluation of the IAA’s draft measure on reducing seat allocation for summer 2025. The airline assured of its participation in the consultation regarding this matter.
Should these consultations ascertain the 25.2 million limit in the near future, the authority predicts minimal, if not zero, opportunities to provide new take-off and landing slots at Dublin in the coming year.
Insiders in the industry maintain that patrons will see little variety in new routes next year as current flight plans have stalled, thanks to the cap. Some have highlighted the likelihood of airlines reducing the frequency of flights, especially where there are numerous daily flights, leading to squeezed capacity, and fare hikes. Experts caution of the long-term repercussions of the dispute, as airlines map out their plans significantly ahead of time, thereby excluding Dublin airport from their future expansion ventures until the cap is increased or completely removed.
Furthermore, this month’s An Bord Pleanála preliminary ruling on aircraft noise limits at Dublin could obstruct efforts by Fingal County Council planners to raise the passenger limit.
The strategic blueprint suggested by the planning committee proposes a significant reduction in the number of annual night-time flights at the airport, proposing a number of 13,000 which is a stark reduction from the 36,000 flights previously accommodated by Dublin in 2023. The Dublin Airport Authority (DAA), however, contends that this will create a major hindrance in their attempts to meet a set deadline of November 15th. The target is intended for the submission of additional information to the Fingal County Council that pertains to an application the company lodged previous December. The objective of the application is to get the passenger limit increased to 40 million.
Furthermore, the company points out that the decision also muddles its course of action regarding its plan to petition Fingal for temporary authority to upraise the cap to 36 million whilst last year’s application is under assessment. The company also stated that it was currently examining the intricacies of both issues.
The travel sector is progressively expressing their concerns regarding the adverse effects of the ongoing dispute, not only on different businesses but also on the reputation of the Republic as a holiday hotspot. An observed opined that this, in general, seems to be a political matter; thus, a political solution shall suffice.
The coverage was revised on September 30th to correct an erroneous implication that Ryanair had decreased routes in the forthcoming winter season rather than the previous one.