Birmingham Airport - General Thread

[Silvercity]

Why is Birmingham Airport not realising it's full potential?

New arrivals? Birmingham airport could handle a lot more flights

What to do with a problem like Birmingham

A poor article failing to answer any of the questions posed by itself? Lots of comparisons but seemingly no opinions about the direction that should be taken?

Luton may have seen impressive numbers in recent years but would their locals give up a share of that for direct connectivity to Delhi, Dubai, Doha, New York, Boston, Toronto? Would the good folk of Edinburgh sacrifice a service or two for, not single, but double daily A380 flights?

Maybe Mr Calder misses the point that, numbers wise, BHX has added roughly the throughput of EMA in the last four years alone and, not counting subsidiaries, Birmingham has 40 airlines, Edinburgh 36 and Luton just 13.

I could go on but it's not worth it

I read it too, and felt was a bit harsh, but what do you think about the ' Stratford u Avon ' suggestion , it is very local and a ' must see ' for many tourists. I was also interested that he mentioned Liverpool about that subject with adopting ' John Lennon ' which I think was probably a good move by the airport.

 

[Ray Finkle]

I read it too, and felt was a bit harsh, but what do you think about the ' Stratford u Avon ' suggestion

'Shakespeare's Airport' has previously been used in marketing in countries such as China and the USA. I believe that the Chinese Premier suggested a name change during a visit to the region.

This was the airports position in 2015

Ms Lloyd said the "Shakespeare" tag was for tour operators only - the name "Birmingham Airport" would remain unchanged on departure boards.

"This is a marketing exercise," she said. "At the moment, there is no intention of changing the name.

"We just want people to think Birmingham, think Shakespeare. Tour operators will tell people to fly to Shakespeare's airport. It's a nice, feel-good way of connecting people."

I think the proximity to Shakespeare country is definitely something that should be promoted internationally, whether there should be a complete name change is another story.

As Mr Kehoe put it, 'Birmingham Airport on the tin and Shakespeare in support'.

We have an existing thread about a possible name change linked below.

http://www.forums4airports.com/threads/3239/

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Why is Birmingham Airport not realising it's full potential?

New arrivals? Birmingham airport could handle a lot more flights

What to do with a problem like Birmingham

A poor article failing to answer any of the questions posed by itself? Lots of comparisons but seemingly no opinions about the direction that should be taken?

Luton may have seen impressive numbers in recent years but would their locals give up a share of that for direct connectivity to Delhi, Dubai, Doha, New York, Boston, Toronto? Would the good folk of Edinburgh sacrifice a service or two for, not single, but double daily A380 flights?

Maybe Mr Calder misses the point that, numbers wise, BHX has added roughly the throughput of EMA in the last four years alone and, not counting subsidiaries, Birmingham has 40 airlines, Edinburgh 36 and Luton just 13.

I could go on but it's not worth it

Simon Calder comes out with some odd things at times. A year or so ago he said on the local tv news here that BRS was falling behind its peer group airports.

I look upon BRS's peer group as NCL, LPL, EMA, LBA and (should be) CWL. BRS has far and away outpointed these in the last decade so I never did understand to what he was alluding. Perhaps he thought BRS should be up there challenging MAN and BHX. If so the man is even sillier than he comes across at times.

Unfortunately, the local tv interviewer was just a general reporter and made no attempt to get him to clarify what he meant.

Why is Birmingham Airport not realising it's full potential?

New arrivals? Birmingham airport could handle a lot more flights

What to do with a problem like Birmingham

A poor article failing to answer any of the questions posed by itself? Lots of comparisons but seemingly no opinions about the direction that should be taken?

Luton may have seen impressive numbers in recent years but would their locals give up a share of that for direct connectivity to Delhi, Dubai, Doha, New York, Boston, Toronto? Would the good folk of Edinburgh sacrifice a service or two for, not single, but double daily A380 flights?

Maybe Mr Calder misses the point that, numbers wise, BHX has added roughly the throughput of EMA in the last four years alone and, not counting subsidiaries, Birmingham has 40 airlines, Edinburgh 36 and Luton just 13.

I could go on but it's not worth it

But would including the Shakespeare name bring about the dramatic effect that Mr Calder seems to believe?

 

[David_itl]

Any airport that has added around 3 million passengers in a couple of years is not really doing anything wrong! It's always worthwhile looking back on some analysis done by industry professionals to see where they think BHX could improve. In this instance, it's the CAPA article from March 2016 https://centreforaviation.com/insig...etwork-begins-to-reflect-its-ambitions-272007

• Birmingham stands to benefit from further delays to the construction of an additional runway in southeast England (which could even result in the re-emergence of the Thames Estuary new airport proposal);
• Birmingham has the propensity to grow at a faster rate than Manchester, which has almost maxed out on European routes and can really now only increase frequencies on those routes. Equalling Manchester’s route total must be a priority at Birmingham to bring it to parity;
• Birmingham’s route network structure – which is very comprehensive - is heavily focused on short haul (Europe) with some significant gaps, especially in long haul, such as Southeast Asia. However, the rate of increase in new routes during the last year has been faster than at its peers and across a wide range of airline types and regions. With the additional runway capacity that has now been available for two years Birmingham should start to reap the benefits of that capacity in the long haul arena.
  
  

I'm purposefully leaving out the bullet point above those 3 as the implication is that BHX needs to regard itself as an alternative London gateway. There's more than enough people in the catchment area to see BHX prosper in the medium and long-terms for airlines to tap into as well as opportunities for overseas businesses and tourists to see the West Midlands (and more) as a place to do business and leisure, even it there is short-term difficulty with the loss of Monarch. Now's the time for investment in terminal capacity so that it can take advantage of any increased propensity to travel. Can BHX be expanded without recourse to demolition of half a terminal? On the plus side, losing the transatlantic legacy routes who would have been mindful of making sure their London presence wasn't overly harmed but gaining an airline who's fixation will be on BHX should reap rewards.

 

[Brummiegem]

News today that the future of the construction group Carillion is in some doubt,one wonders where this leaves the expansion plans at BHX.
A lot of the current planning is centred on the HS2 site,so with the main construction company in dire trouble,how will this effect the longer term planning at the airport.
I know there are plans on the current site which could help,a lot of the airports’ future operations is tied in with HS2.

 

[Silvercity]

Simon Calder comes out with some odd things at times. A year or so ago he said on the local tv news here that BRS was falling behind its peer group airports.

I look upon BRS's peer group as NCL, LPL, EMA, LBA and (should be) CWL. BRS has far and away outpointed these in the last decade so I never did understand to what he was alluding. Perhaps he thought BRS should be up there challenging MAN and BHX. If so the man is even sillier than he comes across at times.

Unfortunately, the local tv interviewer was just a general reporter and made no attempt to get him to clarify what he meant.


But would including the Shakespeare name bring about the dramatic effect that Mr Calder seems to believe?

I think along with many in the meda he is a bit London/SE orientated too.

 

[rollo]

Simons Calder is the so called expert that the supposidly neutral BBC wield out at every opportunity not a great combination in my view if you live outside of the M25 or even in it possibly!

 

[Deleted member 8862]

He could always apply to become the new BHX CEO and sort it out personally.

 

[Ray Finkle]

Speaking of the CEO yesterday marked the 6 month anniversary of Paul Kehoe stepping down.

If it is correct that he gave 6 months notice then surely 12 months is more than enough time to organise a replacement?

 

[Ashley]

Utter trash journalism. These so called experts who either appear on TV or write their own columns in the national papers don't realise their inaccuracy and narrow mindness can have a negative impact on places like Birmingham who have spent millions of pounds in trying to improve the image nationally and globally.
Ray, was thinking exactly the samething yesterday regarding the CEO. It's unbelievable major airport and still no sign of a new appointment.

 

[Ianbutty]

Write to the Editor. I did recently When they wrote about Birmingham being the hotbed of terrorism which was factually incorrect. I got an apology. Get a letter in the paper that corrects the Calders comments. The paper does have it in for Birmingham. Not the only one.

 

[Ianbutty]

I think along with many in the meda he is a bit London/SE orientated too.

Not just L and the SE. NW also. The independent is worse than the BBC in that regard. It ran articles before the mayoral elections in the cities that were to get new mayors. Full of positive praise for Manchester and liverpool....culture, booming this and that. Brum: poverty and crime. So off I sent another email to the Editor......not saying the stories were not correct, just that they constantly portray the city negatively. It is after all the second biggest city and economy in the bleedin' country! Does the german media treat its cities that way?

Everywhere should be treated equally. Build up our great cities not knock them down.

 

[Ray Finkle]

Interesting video.

London's best airport; Birmingham?

We were introduced to the idea of Birmingham being a LONDON airport from the opening of the cruise holiday based romantic adventure novel AMERICAN PORTRAIT by Sally Katz. So, we tried it, we did our next fly drive Caribbean cruise from Birmingham and Sally is right. We have now just used it for a ski holiday, hence Jean's ski outfit, not quite 'cruise'.

 

[mullion]

Think you may just find that the Manchester economy has now overtaken Birmingham but not in population

 

[Silvercity]

Not just L and the SE. NW also. The independent is worse than the BBC in that regard. It ran articles before the mayoral elections in the cities that were to get new mayors. Full of positive praise for Manchester and liverpool....culture, booming this and that. Brum: poverty and crime. So off I sent another email to the Editor......not saying the stories were not correct, just that they constantly portray the city negatively. It is after all the second biggest city and economy in the bleedin' country! Does the german media treat its cities that way?

Everywhere should be treated equally. Build up our great cities not knock them down.

Agree all cities should be treated fairly , I have to say when I moved to Merseyside in late 80s/early 90s pretty much all the reporting on the Liverpool region was negative including the local NW TV, so I'm pleased to see some positive stories at last.

However I still feel if its not London the rest of the country gets small change. Here's an example how many of you good folk in the Midlands know of the new 6 lane bridge that opened back end of last year over the Mersey at Runcorn ?

It must have been one of the UKs biggest construction projects, Did you know about It? I bet however everyone had heard of London's proposed ' garden bridge ' !?

To be honest the Manchester based NW TV media didn't follow the story much either which was rather disappointing.

 

[rollo]

Interesting video.

London's best airport; Birmingham?

We were introduced to the idea of Birmingham being a LONDON airport from the opening of the cruise holiday based romantic adventure novel AMERICAN PORTRAIT by Sally Katz. So, we tried it, we did our next fly drive Caribbean cruise from Birmingham and Sally is right. We have now just used it for a ski holiday, hence Jean's ski outfit, not quite 'cruise'.

Talking of cruises there's a SAGA brochure in todays Sunday Times specifically highlighting flights/cruises from Birmingham (don't laugh we don't use them, SAGA that is ) but throughout they highlight flights from Brum. To me it's good targeted marketing as older folk would rather not schlep up or down the M40 or M6 and the grey pound is a powerful factor in the leisure market and it's good to have nationally known name pushing the region, Simon Colder take note.

Offers include Canada, don't know which airlines they use but it made me wonder if Primera have or will target the Indian market to Toronto it would surely be a steady streams of revenue.

I presume this advertising is regional so maybe they have done similar in other regions.

P.S. On a different note yesterday's Daily Mail had a voucher for an Airfix model of a Spitfire, got one my 5 year old grandson can help me build it if he get the chance wonder if wolfheze got one.
Lol

 

[IanFarquharson]

Think you may just find that the Manchester economy has now overtaken Birmingham but not in population

Really ?
I work in Birmingham and I have never known so much development going on and comapnies moving into the city !

 

[Ray Finkle]

As the last few posts have absolutely nothing to do with Birmingham Airport they have been moved to the more appropriate Urban Forum, please continue the conversation there

http://www.forums4airports.com/threads/4180/

 

[richard winterbourn]

Thank you Ray, i had bitten my tongue on this one but felt your words masked what our great Midlander, William Shakespeare, would have said: 'brevity is the soul of wit'. Maybe we should name our airport after him....

I could urge people to study the Barclays UK Prosperity Map for 2017 - interesting reading....

 

[andrew.clarkson]

Hi there Ray and all, regarding this debate about renaming of Birmingham Airport, as there's an airport named East Midlands Airport, because airport is in the east Midlands area, so then as Birmingham Airport is in the West Midlands area, so shouldn't be remainder as West Midlands Airport instead, this would then represent all those living in the West Midlands region and area...AndyC