State pays over €120,000 a year for idle Galway airstrips

It is costing the state €123,000 a year to maintain the controversial Galway airstrips at Inishbofin and Cleggan – on top of the €9 million it cost to construct them in the first place.

And according to aviation experts, the amount of money that is being spent on the maintenance of two run-down airstrips could have easily made them operational.

The Secretary General of the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, Joe Hamill, confirmed the development costs to the Dáil Public Accounts Committee last week.

And he admitted that the only use to which the landing strips may have had was to aid the coast guard on occasion, and perhaps by unauthorised private aircraft.

But the Connacht Tribune can also reveal the ongoing cost of maintaining the unused facilities.

When the airstrips were constructed, the Government at the time realised that it would cost in the region of €400,000 to construct terminal buildings at each location.

Then there was the additional cost of staffing the two airports and providing full time emergency services at the two facilities. It was then decided that they should not be opened.

In fact the two airstrips have now been put up for sale but at the moment there are no offers.

But in the meantime they have to be maintained and it is costing the Government a small fortune.

Figures revealed to The Connacht Tribune this week show that it is costing €122,754 per year to maintain the two airstrips at ‘Bofin and Cleggan.

See full story in this week’s Connacht Tribune.