This article is from page 2 of the 2009-03-10 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 2 JPG
CAR-PARKING charges at Shannon Airport are now more than double those at Dublin Airport.
Local county councillor, Cllr Patri- cia McCarthy (Ind) has called on the Shannon Airport Authority (SAA) to review its charges. She made her call after it emerged that the Dublin Aiur- OLeummaUe Nee e AAO D.0n0 eel mB Lie OU (eer in response to a private competitor at Dublin Airport.
Last month, the SAA – which op- erates a monopoly at Shannon on car-parking – increased its long-term parking charges from €9 to €9.50.
However, in the past week, the DAA, which operates about 21,000 parking spaces at Dublin Airport, cut the price of long-term parking in half after private operator Quick-Park re- duced its charges.
Passengers who pre-book their spaces online can now park in the DAA’s long-term facilities for just €4.50 a day — the offer is open to a limited number of spaces. This com- pares with the normal rate of €9 a day at Dublin.
Short-term spaces can be booked for as little as €10 a day in Dublin, compared with a normal rate of €40 a day. In Shannon, the cost of car-
parking is €20 per day.
A spokeswoman for the SAA said yesterday that the authority has re- cently spent €800,000 on a new car-parking management system at Shannon to allow passengers to pre- book online. However, she said there is no timescale in which passengers will be able to book online.
Car park revenues have been a cash cow for the SAA over the past num- bers of years as passenger numbers soared in line with economic growth and charges to airlines dropped to at- tract new carriers.
The spokeswoman said there are no plans to reduce the car-parking charg-
es at Shannon. She pointed out that the long-term car-park at Shannon Airport is the most adjacent car-park at any of the three main airports.
Cllr McCarthy said yesterday, ‘People are finding the cost of park- ing at Shannon Airport prohibitive and some are parking in Shannon town rather than at the airport. The authority should review the charges because we don’t want them to be- come prohibitive.”
Last year, it emerged that the DAA earned €52 million in 2007 from its car parks in Dublin, Cork and Shan- non. This was roughly eight per cent of DAA’s overall turnover.