Aer Lingus's decision to relocate its Heathrow route leaves the impression of one airport on the rise and another in decline. But is it that simple? Carissa Caseyreports from Belfast on the city's delight, while Gerry Byrneanalyses the true impact on Shannon.
BELFAST:
Northern tourism bosses can be forgiven a certain Schadenfreude at the decision of Aer Lingus to shift operations from Shannon to Belfast International.
In both the travel and tourism stakes, the South has all the aces. The most visible evidence of the imbalance is that shiny new motorway to Dublin, accessible from Belfast via a mix of single and dual carriageways to the Border. Lured by the ease of getting south, a million or more holiday-makers from the North fly out of Dublin airport rather than use any of the local airports. But most painfully of all for the North, 80 per cent of visitors to the island, or seven million tourists a year, never stray beyond the confines of the Republic.
As Sue Ward, marketing manager of the Northern Ireland Tourist Board puts it, "Northern Ireland is only getting itself on the tourist agenda". The Aer Lingus expansion at Belfast International will make a significant difference.
Four years ago there was just one international flight into the airport. Now there are 30. In one fell swoop, Aer Lingus added a further eight new routes, which will attract an estimated one million new passengers.
"Four years ago Northern Ireland wasn't seen as a comfortable place to visit. It wasn't seen as safe and secure. That's changed now and we're playing catch up," says Ward.
For all the beauty spots around the Shannon area, there are as many to be found in Northern Ireland. The Glens of Antrim are as breathtaking as the Cliffs of Moher; Like the Burren, the Giant's Causeway is a remarkable natural phenomenon. From the burial place of St Patrick to the Mourne mountains sweeping down to the sea, Northern Ireland is as rich in history and beauty as anywhere else on the island.
It also badly needs tourists. As politicians reiterate on a near weekly basis, Northern Ireland needs more private-sector jobs. According to Ward, a rough rule of thumb used in the travel business is that an extra one million passengers creates 1,000 new jobs.
John Doran, managing director of Belfast International, is also aware of the flip side of the deal. He believes that between one and 1½ million passengers head south to fly off the island, tempted by cheaper tickets and greater availability of flights. He's hoping to claim back at least half a million of those travellers.
"Until recently we haven't had a whole lot to offer them," he admits.
From January, when the Aer Lingus service begins, they can avail of £5 (€7) flights to Heathrow and £8 (€12) flights to Amsterdam.
When local media began to speculate that a deal was in the offing, the airport was inundated with calls from would-be employees, says Doran. More than 100 jobs are immediately available, including 75 cabin crew, 25 pilots and up to 10 ground staff.
Local MLA Thomas Burns of the SDLP is delighted with the boost to the local economy. Belfast International lies about 40 minutes outside the city, in a relatively affluent commuter belt. It's a mixed area religiously and, like many other parts of Northern Ireland, has experienced a recent influx of eastern European immigrants.
But for Burns the real benefit is to the wider community on either side of the Border. "Try explaining to a tourist that the northern-most point on the island is in Donegal, which is in the South. It gets far too complicated. We need to think on an all-island basis," he says.
Burns wants local tourism bosses "to get on the bandwagon right away" to improve the infrastructure around the airport.
At the moment, the terminal is linked to the motorway via a single carriageway, and, while a train line passes within half of mile of the terminal, there's no local station.
Burns wants the motorway from Dublin to be extended to Belfast and then on to the airport. "What Aer Lingus has really done here is create a second Dublin terminal at Belfast International. We need to make it easy for travellers." Despite his excitement he also has sympathy for the plight of people in Shannon.
"We do a lot of work together. They've come to tourist conferences here and we've gone there for the same. I'm sorry to see this has been at the expense of Clare."
SHANNON:
Aer Lingus's decision to take away the Shannon-to-Heathrow route in the New Year is a significant setback for the midwest, but it hardly signals the beginning of the end for the area. More than 50 other routes continue to be served from Shannon, making it the busiest regional airport in Ireland. Unlike Cork, which draws on an equally large catchment area, Shannon even boasts routes to North America, where it serves seven cities.
Claims that the departure of Aer Lingus from the Shannon-Heathrow route will lead to a dramatic loss of jobs in the region can probably be taken as hyperbole.
The Heathrow route provides hundreds of links to places not served directly from Shannon. Despite this, losing the route is not the end of the world for the airport. Ryanair links Shannon to Stansted, which was once predominantly a charter airline destination, but now offers significant scheduled links to many international destinations, including eastern and western Europe and North America.
And Ryanair also links Shannon to Gatwick, which is an even more significant route. While it plays a poor second to Heathrow, Gatwick is still remarkably well served, offering hundreds of scheduled links to major eastern and western European cities, to northern Africa, North America, South America, Asia and the Middle East.
While government for years had the power to artificially inflate traffic at Shannon by maintaining the commercially unpopular transatlantic stopover, the advent of the international Treaty on Open Skies, which outlawed State interference in the aviation market, has reduced its ability to influence aviation affairs.
Commercial decisions by Aer Lingus, no longer the policy plaything of politicians, cannot be overturned by government, even when acting as a shareholder.
Shannon must now stand on its own, and there is little doubt that, post-Open Skies, it will have quite a struggle. Its immediate catchment area, counties Clare and Limerick, has a population of less than 300,000 people, hardly sufficient to sustain a large international airport.
Counties Donegal and Sligo, with combined populations of 207,000, need Government subsidies to maintain far-from-satisfactory air links.
A replacement Heathrow operator would be fantastic news for Shannon, but if Aer Lingus cannot make a decent profit from it, how, one might ask, will anyone else? The same applies to an operator feeding Shannon traffic into an alternative large hub such as Paris, Frankfurt or Amsterdam. An airline possessing the bonus of rare traffic rights, or slots, at any of these airports will be tempted to deploy them on lucrative routes to large centres of population, not on a comparatively thin provincial route such as Shannon.
Ryanair, now the largest operator at Shannon, has no slots at any major European hub, nor does it appear to want them.
Yet a glimmer of hope lies in proposals to boost Heathrow traffic by 50 per cent by building a third runway there. If built, it would free up extra slots that could be used for a new Shannon service. The earliest this can be in place is 2011 and it is meeting vociferous environmental opposition, but a delay might still be good news for Shannon, as it will force airlines seeking to extend or start new routes out of London to move to Gatwick or Stansted. Until a final decision is reached on the third Heathrow runway, expansion of these airports remains official British government policy, so it is likely that Ryanair services to alternative London airports, especially Gatwick, will become more, rather than less, attractive for Shannon.
Ironically, the efforts of the Shannon lobby to bring a Ryanair hub to Shannon probably tolled the death knell of the Shannon-Heathrow service. News that the airport had cut a deal with Shannon after the break-up of Aer Rianta (which had resisted doing a special Shannon deal with Ryanair) was greeted with some jubilation by the Shannon lobby, but the extra competition for London-bound passengers significantly reduced Aer Lingus's profit on the Heathrow route and led to the decision to abandon it.
Many Shannon businessmen dislike flying Ryanair because they prefer Aer Lingus's service standards. They can, of course, still reach Heathrow by catching any of several daily return flights to Dublin for onward Heathrow connections, although this means the added hassle of an extra takeoff and landing.
It marks, if you want to be cynical, the advent of the Dublin stopover.