Mr. Kenny Jacobs:

I thank the Senator for those questions. It was a really interesting set of questions. I will take the drop-off one first. The Senator is absolutely right that it gets a lot of attention. We do not plan to do drop-off. I certainly would not support drop-off in the short, medium or long term. I have six and a half years of my tenure left. I would be very surprised if I were ever back talking to the committee saying drop-off will be a great thing. If the media can drop drop-off, I think we can strike it off the list of things we need to talk about. There was a reason for it, and it exists in Cork Airport and other regional airports in Ireland, but we will try to find a way that solves the operational issues we have with people using the ramp. That is just getting cars moving on the ramp and asking people not to park there for two hours while waiting for someone. That is not how it works. However, we do not plan on charging drop-off any time in the near, medium or long-term future.

On the additional spaces and the QuickPark site, to clarify, this would just bring capacity for car parking back to what already existed, so these would not be new spaces. These spaces existed in 2019, so this is just bringing us back to where we were at that time. It is not a new site that will develop new spaces. If we get the green light on that, we think we will be able to operate those spaces within a week, so we will move really quickly, but the Senator is right to point out that hysteria is not required. There are plenty of spaces still available - hundreds of thousands of spaces, as I said - from as little as €8 a day. The maximum price you can pay for a long-term space is €15. I would love the media to talk about us less. I think we made ourselves a story last year. I look forward to the time when they are just writing about the quality of an egg sandwich at Dublin Airport because we have become boring again because we are giving passengers an improved experience. That is what the mission is and that is what we will continue to focus on.

As to when I think we can come back and talk about the north runway, I suspect that will be the end of the summer, so probably in September we will be in a position to come back and talk about that.

As for the third terminal, if planning, metro north, BusConnects and so on go faster, I think we all agree that is a good thing. That would allow Dublin to take its rightful place as a European capital city with very strong public transportation options from the airport to downtown, something we know and experience when we go to any European capital city. That is obviously what we would like. We have our part ready, and the faster it goes the better for passengers, the better for the public and the better for sustainability. Our plans are critical to how fast infrastructure planning will go in Ireland in the years ahead, but also our plans of sustainability are vital to that. The faster that goes the better, from our point of view.