Park & Ride service from Galway Airport is axed

 A valuable experiment which probably generated money for the State while providing lessons to Galway City Council is how the head of the Galway Chamber of Commerce described the park and ride service operating from Galway Airport, which was brought to an end yesterday.

 Four months into the six-month pilot service, the park and ride from Carnmore to the city was axed after nearly €86,000 was spent through a subsidy from the National Transport Authority (NTA).

Michael Coyle, Chief Executive of Galway Chamber – the majority shareholder of Galway Airport – confirmed that the service had been pulled because of the low takeup from the public, even after schools returned after the Summer.

No more than 30 cars per day were parking at the airport, which had space for 600 cars. Farrell Travel was providing the service at no cost, on the agreement that it would take all proceeds from motorists, who were charged €2 per bus journey.

Mr Coyle said the airport had been receiving €16,500 per month from Galway City Council – funding provided by the NTA since mid June – with a further €20,000 for marketing provided by the Government agency.

“Very valuable lessons were learned. This was a period of research as much as anything else,” he stated.

“When we began to look at the airport when it lost its PSO [subsidised] routes, the local authority was considering a park and ride on a greenfield site off the motorway that would have cost millions, €88,000 might seem like a lot of money but it’s not as if the company got €88,000 to run a park and ride.

“It was money to help it stay in business, to employ five people, continue air access to the air corps, Coast Guard, medical evacuation emergencies, albeit in small numbers. The money spent on park and ride helped keep people in employment . . . how much did the exchequer gain through PRSI for staff and VAT from fuel sales?

“It [the €88,000 funding] is certainly a much smaller figure, it’s likely to be in positive territory.”

Pointing out that that a journey time of 20 minutes was achieved 90% of the time with high quality transport laid on according to very strict timetable, Mr Coyle said he was not certain that location was the reason the public were not deterred from parking in the city.

Read more in today’s Connacht Sentinel