Sheila Terry (Fine Gael)

I agree with Senator Mansergh's comments about the frontloading of the provision of infrastructure. While Senator Finucane raised the matter of sewerage treatment plants around the country, the lack of public transport in Dublin is the issue of concern to me.

This morning I had to bring two people to the airport at 5 a.m. While there was not much traffic around at that time, once I reached the airport, I found there is a new car park there, namely, the slip-road leading to the set down area for departures. All three lanes of traffic were stopped, so people had to leave their cars and walk up to the terminal. The fact there is no public transport link to the airport is crazy. With the numbers of tourists coming to Ireland growing on an annual basis, it is a disgrace that our airport is in such a state. Why can we not take the decisions that are obviously needed and provide public transport?

When something goes wrong at Dublin Airport, it throws all flights off and delays them for hours. We must question the idea of a second terminal. If a major disaster happened, the place would close down. Why can we not build underground car parking and deal with the traffic properly? In this day and age it is unacceptable. If a drop of rain falls, people jump into their cars because they have no faith in the public transport system. It is either overcrowded or inefficient. It is not good enough and we should front-load our infrastructure.