Dublin Airport

Jason, you live a long way from Dublin, so you can attest to this.

I'm so lucky to go to games, but that drive home on Sunday night from Dublin Airport was...

Jesus Christ, lads, that was so hard.

I actually got home and watched, because of the time difference, watched Sunday Night Football and somehow didn't conk out.

Conor Quinn is Head of Operations at the North Atlantic Communications Centre at Ballygreen.

He lived under the flight path into Dublin Airport and in school was caught more than once staring out the window at airplanes flying overhead.

A teacher once told him that no one would pay him to watch airplanes all day.

Aviation, however, is in his family's blood and Conor always had his eyes set on following in their footsteps.

And in this episode, we are going to be chatting to Louise O'Leary, who is a volunteer campaigner with a relatively new campaign in Ireland called Children's Rights Over Flights.

They're basically advocating to keep the passenger cap that currently exists at Dublin Airport.

So we'll be delving into all the kind of work and why they're doing what they're doing.

And they have a couple of petitions, which I have linked in the show notes as well.

I'm a mum.

I have a little boy who is three.

And I campaign with a group called Children's Rights Over Flights, which formed really in response to the very aggressive campaign by vested interest to increase polluting flights from Dublin Airport via lifting of the passenger cap.

despite the climate emergency and our campaign is all volunteer it's grassroots and we very much focus on emphasizing that children's rights to grow to survive to have a good life to have a stable climate has to be prioritized over really harmful aviation expansionism And then I also am involved as a parent in Parents for Future Ireland with other parents and grandparents and carers.

I mean, I mean, talk about being late.

And I needed that book to be with me going flying out from Dublin Airport on the 8th of October.

And in fairness, David posted it out and it didn't arrive.

So you approved the book cover on the 6th and it went in the post to arrive in Kerry on the 7th.

Oh no, sorry, on the 7th.

7th.

Because you were heading to Dublin Airport.

Yeah.

So the likes of the NSCI is a public sector body here.

So my own role, the health service, the Department of Education and some local authorities are Some airports as well, Dublin Airport, for example, the likes of Transport Infrastructure Ireland.

So some of the larger organizations or some of the early adopters we'll have one or two people hired already for these roles, but some of the local authorities or some of the more junior roles within this framework still need to be hired.

So if I was to guess how many specific BIM people in the Irish public sector, it wouldn't be too many, I would say somewhere between 15 and 20 at present, but I see a lot that are advertised at the moment so people are hiring for them.

So what has happened, what's traditional within Ireland is that the contractor sets it up and manages it.

But some lessons learned, not so much from Ireland, but from international lessons learned is if that's established by the contractor and the client doesn't pay the contractor like they should, that access can be turned off and then the client can be left without information.

Now we're starting to see a shift where it's already happened with the health service here, Department of Education, Dublin Airport Authority.

A lot of the clients are now procuring and setting up their own common data environments, which is great to see.

The streets were thronged with both locals and visitors as the city was in the midst of hosting a major religious celebration, the Patrician Congress, that drew thousands of clergy and laypeople alike.

The papal legate Cardinal Gregor Pierre Aghajanian had flown into Dublin Airport a few days previously, where he was greeted by Archbishop John Charles Macquaid and Taoiseach Sean Lamas.

He then made his way to Oras-on-Ougtiron to meet President Eamon de Valera, as thousands of people lined the route and waved papal flags.

A series of events were planned across the city, including an exclusive garden party in Blackrock College.

So on the M1 take exit 9 or 10 and you will get to Oldbridge Park Run in the Boyne Visitor Centre pretty easily.

Well under an hour from Dublin City Centre and it's actually only about a 30 minute drive from Dublin Airport if you were looking to fly in that morning.

But Old Bridge itself, it's a fantastic event.

It's like a cross-country style park run.