Darren O'Rourke (Meath East, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Jacobs for his presentation. As a TD for Meath East, he will appreciate if I focus on noise mitigation and planning updates. Mr. Jacobs mentioned that the way to deal with noise is to insulate homes. Another way, of course, is to design flight paths that do not pass over homes, are appropriately assessed and are planning compliant. He will be aware that there are specific proposals from the community for alternative flight paths that could achieve just that for the north runway. Has the north runway as it currently operates been environmentally assessed? Have environmental impact and noise assessments been done? My understanding is that a planning application was submitted in 2007 and while assessments were done at that stage, entirely different flight paths are operating at this stage which are impacting on homes and communities. Mr. Jacobs mentioned Ratoath and Ashbourne, for example. There are other communities which were never intended to be overflown.