Shannon Airport Calls For Change To Aviation Policy Which "Bizarrely Penalises" Smaller Facilities

Shannon Airport says Ireland must re-examine its aviation policy which it claims "bizarrely penalises" smaller airports experiencing growth in passenger numbers.
The Clare base and a major Irish airline have issued a joint call for the passenger cap of the Government's Regional Airports Programme to be increased so as to ensure Shannon can continue to avail of State funding.
The call comes as Ryanair has unveiled its summer 2025 schedule for Shannon Airport which features 26 routes including a new route to Madeira.
Increased frequencies have been confirmed for eight other routes, specifically Alicante, Edinburgh, Faro, Kaunas, Krakow, Malaga, Porto, and Reus.
The airline has also announced that extra seats have been added to and from La Rochelle in April ahead of Munster's highly anticipated European Rugby Champions Cup match with the French side.
Having operated out of Shannon for 38 years, the announcement sees Ryanair's traffic growth at the Clare facility grow by 17%.
The airline's Chief Marketing Officer Dara Brady says if more routes are to come to Shannon, the region must demonstrate that tourists want to come here.
Coinciding with the schedule's release, a joint call has been issued by Shannon Airport and Ryanair for a seismic shift in Irish aviation policy.
Over the past number of years, Shannon has benefited from the Government's Regional Airports Programme which supports facilities carrying up to one million passengers.
As Shannon saw 2.1 million passengers pass through its gates last year, it now falls outside the eligibility criteria for the programme.
Both the Clare base and Ryanair are now calling for this cap to be lifted to three million, and the inclusion of a commitment to conducting a review of National Aviation Policy in the Programme for Government has offered hope that this could become a reality.
Shannon Airport Group CEO Mary Considine says the facility mustn't become a victim of its own success.