Re: Re: Airports; how many state subsidised airports are required in Ireland

This document has a review of the subsidies to regional airports
http://www.transport.ie/upload/general/4803-0.pdf

including the amazing susbsidy of €560 per Knock-Dublin return trip.

Conclusion
For every €1 in fare paid by the passenger, the Exchequer pays (in round numbers) amounts
ranging from €1 up to €5 in subvention, depending on the route, with the largest subvention
currently applying on the Knock route. These are rates of per-passenger subvention far
higher than those available on other public transport modes. The total subvention to these air
services, which carried 260,000 passengers in 2002, is now close to the total subvention of
the entire Bus Éireann system, which carried approximately 46 million in the same year.
Expressway, the long-distance bus network which competes with rail and air on the main
inter-urban routes, carried 7.5 million passengers in 2002 without any subvention.

Costs and Benefits
We have been unable to locate any studies which establish, for the EASP as a whole or for
any individual route, that benefits exceed costs. Specifically, it is clear from the discussion in
Section 3 that time saved by users cannot contribute a substantial portion towards costs. The
benefits to tourism or to regional development have been stressed to us in interviews and
submissions. However no quantification of these benefits has been offered.