This reluctance to change is especially bad in Ireland and is primarily due to poor service frequency and reliability.
The idea of an express diesel shuttle on a third line makes more sense than just thinning out the Malahide DART service. I really don't think the airport spur idea makes very much sense at all without DART underground. If they went ahead with this spur on a stopping DART service, you would need an average 7 minute wait followed by a 30 minute journey to Connolly. Plus wherever they put a station in the airport is likely to be a 5 - 10 minute walk and possibly a 15 - 20 minute walk from the more distant terminal.
Compare this with a 20 minute door-to-door taxi spin through the tunnel to the financial district and you know which route the business travellers will take. The 30 quid for the taxi is still less that the Heathrow Express. Southside passengers are adequately served by Aircoach and intercity travelers for a lot of the country are very well served by Bus Eireann.
But as part of a properly integrated city transport system, an airport rail service becomes a far more important link than as simply an outpost of half of the city's rail service that poorly serves about a quarter of the population.
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