A private company which is proposing to build a £50 million second terminal at Dublin Airport is to seek a High Court order this morning to have a Bord Pleanala hearing into the plan adjourned. Huntstown Air Park Ltd is seeking to suspend the hearing on the grounds that it has not received documentation on future plans for the airport which have been drawn up by its operators, Aer Rianta.
It is also seeking an order from the High Court that the documents should be made available to the hearing.
Mr John Gibbons, acting on behalf of the developers, said that their case was being hindered by the unavailability of the airport's "master plan".
Mr Bernard McHugh, for Aer Rianta, said it was not in a position to release the documents, as they contained confidential and commercially sensitive information.
The developers' decision to seek a High Court order followed the refusal yesterday of the Bord Pleanala inspector, Mr Kevin Devereux, to adjourn the hearing.
The developers are appealing a Fingal County Council decision to reject planning permission for the terminal.
In a submission to the hearing, Mr McHugh said that the proposal was "intrinsically defective". Although Aer Rianta had begun land acquisition for a second runway, it did not intend to construct this until it was certain it was necessary, he added.
Aer Rianta is considering a number of options for a possible future terminal: one to the south of the existing terminal, one to the west and one between the two parallel runways.
Mr McHugh said that the question of a second terminal would not arise until at least 2005, when the airport expected to handle 14 million passengers annually.
Earlier, the hearing was told by independent airport planners employed by the developers that the proposed second terminal would be in the "prime location".
Mr David Stanley, a director of developments at Manchester Airport during the 1980s, said the terminal would make Dublin a "unique airport facility in a European context". He said Dublin had the potential to become a "European aviation centre" at which flights from the west coast of America and Asia would make their first stops.
He was "particularly concerned" that Aer Rianta was considering building a second terminal to the south of the existing one. This would replicate mistakes made by other international airports.
Mr Paul Mossman, a British air traffic controller, said that Aer Rianta's prediction that it would handle 14 million passengers by 2005 "severely underestimated" the projected growth rate. With growth in traffic of 13 per cent last year, he said that Dublin Airport would have to cater for up to 13 million passengers by the turn of the century.
The hearing continues today.
