LAST UPDATE | 9 Sep 2025

RYANAIR HAS APPLIED for a judicial review in the High Court against Dublin Airport’s cap on night-time flights.

The overarching passenger cap is a limit on the number of passengers who can pass through the airport in a given year. The cap was set at 32 million per year in 2007 and hasn’t been changed since.

In July, An Coimisiún Pleanála made a final decision on the use of runways at nighttime at the airport. It decided on an annual limit of 35,672 aircraft movements between 11pm and 7am – an average of 98 aircraft movement a night.

It also decided on a noise quota system for nighttime operations at the airport, and no use of the new north runway between midnight and 6am, except in exceptional specified circumstances. 

An insulation scheme for eligible property owners was also decided.

The passenger cap has long been an opponent of both Ryanair and the DAA, the airport’s operator. The nighttime cap on flights has been described by Ryanair as an “illegal” second cap on the movement of aircraft at the airport.

In a strongly worded statement, the airline’s CEO Michael O’Leary called the cap “unlawful planning stupidity” and said Transport Minister Darragh O’Brien has “[sat] on his hands ‘pondering his options’ during nine months of useless inactivity”.

O’Leary said the planning authority’s “blunt” cap “reduces consumer choice, damages connectivity, and punishes investment, while doing nothing to encourage airlines who operate newer, quieter aircraft”.

He added that it will “strangle transatlantic traffic, damage growth and short-haul connectively at Ireland’s main gateway airport.”

Ryanair set out that it has use of new aircraft that cuts CO2 emissions and noise while carrying more passengers and this has not been taken into consideration with the sweeping cap.

“These two artificial caps at Dublin Airport are unlawful. They are in of breach the EU’s fundamental right to ‘freedom of movement’ and they are also in breach of the EU – US ‘open skies’ flight agreement.

“Any competent [government] would by now have already scrapped the original (2007) 32m traffic cap at Dublin Airport, given that the January 2025 [government] program, promises to do so “as soon as possible”.

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“Not alone has Transport Minister Darragh O’Brien done nothing for nine months, but now the incompetent bureaucrats at An Coimisiún Pleanála have imposed a second illegal cap which limits early morning arrivals between 5am to 7am, when most transatlantic flights arrive in Dublin,” O’Leary said.

Ryanair has “every confidence” that the courts will overturn the second cap, he added.

The DAA said it would not be joining Ryanair in seeking the judicial review, despite it viewing the nighttime flight cap as “unnecessary” in addition to the noise quota. It said it would be focusing on its Infrastructure Application, where it is trying to appeal the overarching passenger cap.

The airport is on track to exceed the 32 million passengers it is allowed to host in the airport each year. 

DAA CEO Kenny Jacobs said the authority is “stuck between a rock and a hard place” and must focus on its infrastructure application and getting the passenger cap lifted.