Dublin to gain from Shannon loss

THE Dublin Airport Authority (DAA) group, which includes the three State airports Dublin, Cork and Shannon, would be loss-making were it not for Aer Rianta International (ARI), its 2011 annual report shows.
ARI was started by Shannon-based executives in the late 1980s but the Clare airport is about to lose any claim to it or its profits, when it exits the DAA group in the coming months. It is something that Shannon interests have railed against, claiming it is a severe injustice to take something developed in Shannon under the Aer Rianta structure and present it to the airport with most passengers and advantages.
According to the DAA annual report, published at the weekend, Shannon had by far the lowest passenger numbers of the three State airports last year (at 1,625,453, compared to 2,361,947 at Cork and 18,740,593 at Dublin) but a DAA spokesman said Cork is making far greater losses.
“Cork Airport lost €14 million last year after interest and depreciation costs, Shannon lost €7m after interest and depreciation and Dublin Airport was marginally loss making,” he outlined.
Intriguingly, the whole group would be in a loss-making situation if it weren’t for ARI, as the DAA recorded a profit of €30m last year with ARI’s overseas business bringing in a profit of €31.8m. The ARI profit was boosted by the disposal of its shareholding in three Russian businesses.
The loss of ARI is something that Clare Fianna Fáil TD Timmy Dooley has criticised. “It [ARI] was born in Shannon and built its base in Shannon. It should be a considerable contributor to the bottom line and it’s completely out of kilter to do that.”
Former airport director Liam Skelly has also been critical of the Government decision. “I’m just shocked at what they’ve done. It beggars belief that they would come up with such a crazy decision.”
The annual report also states that passenger traffic at Shannon declined by 7% to 1.6 million last year, with terminal traffic (passengers who started or finished their journey there) down by almost 8% to 1.3 million. A little over 17% of Shannon’s passengers were people in transit to other destinations, a far higher proportion than at either Cork or Dublin.
It shows that 753,000 passengers went to and from Britain, with 270,000 going to and from continental Europe. Transatlantic passenger numbers were down 8% to slightly below 320,000.
The report states that Ryanair and Aer Lingus provide most of the business at Shannon, while reductions in services by both airlines have hit the airport.
“The impact of Ryanair’s significant reduction in services at Shannon continued into the first quarter of 2011 and Aer Lingus also reduced its transatlantic capacity from the airport during the year. Transit and business aviation traffic remained strong and continued to provide an important revenue stream for the airport during the year.
“There were 16 airlines operating to 33 destinations from Shannon during the year, including six scheduled airlines operating 22 scheduled routes. Ryanair’s market share at Shannon declined from 37% to 28% during the year, while Aer Lingus’ market share increases to 36% when passengers who travelled on the Aer Lingus Regional franchise are included.”
The report shows that transatlantic passenger numbers have declined by more than 50% since 2007, when the Shannon stopover ended. However, the decline in traffic to continental Europe has been even more dramatic. In 2007, there were 746,551 transatlantic passengers from Shannon, while the 2011 figures were 319,856. There were 1,066,630 passengers to and from continental Europe in 2007 but this has fallen by nearly 75%, to 269,718 last year.
The amount of commercial air transport movements at Shannon was down by 2.4% last year to 27,846 but this is way down on the 48,114 seen in 2007.
During a visit to Clare last Friday, Fianna Fáil leader Micheal Martin said he empathised with those angered by the loss of ARI to Shannon, although his party were in government when Shannon was put under the DAA umbrella in 2004.
“I understand the anger fully. It is well merited and people are right in their position on this. It is very serious for the region.”
ARI is an important part of Shannon’s story, he claimed. “ARI was quite a significant part of the success story in Shannon for a long time. It had the expertise and the multidiscipline, which underpinned the whole operation. I think it is a wrong decision.”