Continuation of: http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthr...200552&page=13
Clearly, the DAA is trying to shoe-horn this terminal into the lands it owns at DUB; it considered the area of the old EI hangars, but came to the conclusion that the cost (and time involved) of cleaning up the area would be prohibitive. This new area, although small, was all that's available; don't forget that the area on the other side of the airport is owned by other people, such as the McEvaddys, who want to build a terminal themselves; they do have a 50 acre site, but whether that is good enough is unclear.
I personally think that the big issue here is government oversight; the govt has said in the past that DUB is part of the state's critical infrastructure, yet it has repeatedly allowed the DAA to have its head; the DAA has done nothing on cargo capacity, runway length and the govt has itself been obstructive and disinterested in opening the airport to competition, something which I believe needs to happen.
Next Summer will be a very busy one as far as t/a traffic is concerned. The govt is expected to be successful in getting EU approval to expand t/a flights, based on the US/Irish agreement of last November and this will allow t/a airlines operating from SNN to treble the number of flights they operate from DUB (i.e. they must be operating from SNN to avail of this); there is another factor too, very much to DUB's benefit, which is that under an agreement reached last week, Irish-US flights will arrive into domestic gates at US airports, which will make it a lot easier to connect and this should make DUB a much more popular connection point. The big Achilles Heel: Dublin Airport.
With the construction of the new pier and terminal, the airport is losing widebody parking stands and is the existing Pier B big enough (particularly the area currently used by US Immigration) to handle the expected significant passenger influx/throughput. The current airside connection channel is barely big enough for two people to pass, side by side - that needs to be worked on.
I don't want to be seen as complaining gratuitously, but clearly, nothing is going to happen as long as FF is in charge of aviation policy; they simply will not apply the metaphorical pitchfork with anything like enough determination.
Ultimately, what needs to happen is that the operation of both terminals needs to be by professional, experinced, independent operators and the DAA should be relegated to the regulatory side of operating an airport, for which it would get service charges/rental from the terminal operators.