Sir, – Frank Clohosey (October 15th) raised some points in relation to the Dublin Airport Authority's ownership of Cork Airport and passenger traffic at the airport.
Mr Clohosey appears to believe that ongoing efforts by Cork Airport and DAA to grow passenger traffic have been unsuccessful. That is not the case.
Earlier this month, CityJet launched a new 18 times a week service to London City Airport and it has also announced it will operate new summer services from Cork to Nantes and La Rochelle in 2016.
Norwegian has announced that it will operate new Cork-Boston and Cork-Barcelona services from next year and introduce a Cork-New York service from 2017.
Aer Lingus will operate a new Cork-Dusseldorf service next summer and is also adding 30,000 extra seats to sun destinations from Cork.
Flybe started a new service to Cardiff in June.
These new routes and services have returned Cork Airport to passenger growth in the current quarter and are expected to deliver a full year of passenger growth next year.
In relation to a potential Cork-Dublin service, Cork Airport offers generous incentives for launching new routes, and has talked to a number of Airlines in relation to such a service. The final decision on whether to provide any given service rests with our airline partners.
Government policy – as set out in the recently published National Aviation Policy for Ireland – is that ownership of Cork Airport will remain within the DAA until 2019, at which point the current position will be examined as part of a wider review of State-owned airports.
Cork Airport will only separate from the DAA if it makes financial sense for both Cork Airport and for the DAA, the policy adds. – Yours, etc,
KEVIN CULLINANE,
Head of Communications,
Cork Airport.