Glasgow Prestwick - General Thread

[red dug]

At long last the hideous signage that said pure dead brilliant on the front of the terminal building has been removed :yahoo:

 

[Aviador]

Crikey, I remember when you or GlasgowMan posted about it when it was put up.

 

[News Guru]

David Reid

Aviation historian and founder member of Prestwick Airport Aviation Group

David "Davie" Reid, who has died aged 93, was an aviation enthusiast and historian and one of the founder members of the Prestwick Airport Aviation Group, which is still going strong after more than 60 years.

In addition to the founders, including Wilf White and Donald MacDonald, the original members were a mixture of schoolboys and lads just beginning their apprenticeships at Scottish Aviation Ltd.

Read more: http://www.heraldscotland.com/comment/o ... d.23222358

 

[Aviador]

Ministers lend £10 million to Prestwick Airport

The Scottish Government is to provide an additional £10 million to a struggling airport that it bought last year for £1.

Deputy First Minister Nicola Sturgeon announced a £7 million investment for repairs and improvements at Holyrood in June - but warned MSPs that it could be a long time before they see a return on the investment.

A Government spokesman confirmed that it was "investing in Glasgow Prestwick Airport to ensure that it can continue to meet all of its current financial obligations".

It's a sorry state of affairs when governments have to prop up airports. I do wonder if this is the right thing to do in long run? Clearly the infrastructure involved with running airports requires significant and continued long term investment to remain viable. Why on earth doesn't the UK government look at making some non profit making airports into joint RAF/civilian airports like many other countries do? Surely the two would assist each other bringing down costs for both?

 

[TheLocalYokel]

I know it's not all passenger traffic at Prestwick and that jobs are at stake but it's not as if Glasgow doesn't have a thriving airport just outside the city.

There is no 'vanity project' issue here either because, unlike Wales, it's not as if Scotland doesn't already have a number of airports.

If there was no other airport in the Central Belt I would empathise and, although I'm not a believer in state aid, I could understand the reason.

I'm sure that Plymouth and Blackpool would love to have kept their airports open but there is no English fairy godmother in the form of state aid that Scotland and Wales enjoy.

It all seems a bit unequal especially as English tax payers provide the overwhelming majority of money to run the UK.

 

[Aviador]

Losses increase at Prestwick Airport

I can't see how the Scottish Government can continue to sponge up the losses from Prestwick airport and in the longer term something will have to change.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

I can't see how the Scottish Government can continue to sponge up the losses from Prestwick airport and in the longer term something will have to change.

Jobs (lost ones that is) would be the driver no doubt, something the Scottish Nationalist party would be reluctant to contemplate after their successes in the recent Westminster election.

The Welsh Assembly is speculating many more millions on CWL having spent over £50 million buying the place. To an extent I can understand that as CWL is the only airport worthy of the name in the Principality but Scotland has several large airports (by UK provincial standards), including one important one just up the road from Prestwick outside Paisley.

 

[Aviador]

Prestwick airport should shut - says Largs councillor

Prestwick airport is ‘bleeding’ flights and should be closed, Largs councillor Tom Marshall told a national radio audience.

Not being from the area I don't know how representative of the area the Conservative Cllr. Tom Marshall's opinion is but I imagine the airport will still be responsible for a sizeable number of jobs in the area. He is probably right in that Glasgow International airport could easily accept the entire Prestwick airport flying schedule.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Prestwick airport is ‘bleeding’ flights and should be closed, Largs councillor Tom Marshall told a national radio audience.

Not being from the area I don't know how representative of the area the Conservative Cllr. Tom Marshall's opinion is but I imagine the airport will still be responsible for a sizeable number of jobs in the area. He is probably right in that Glasgow International airport could easily accept the entire Prestwick airport flying schedule.

We have too many airports in the UK, many situated in the wrong place. They grew piecemeal, often the result of civic aerodromes pre-war or military airfields after the war.

However, we are where we are and it's easy to say that an airport should be closed without thinking of the wider repercussions.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Prestwick Airport costing taxpayer £750,000 a month

The airport that was bailed out with a £1 Scottish Government buyout is costing taxpayers £750,000 a month and is now over £21m in debt.

The latest Scottish Government accounts show Prestwick received £21.3m from Holyrood up to March 31, up 24 per cent increase on the figure of £17m revealed in August.

Prestwick Airport is being run on a commercial basis by an arms-length organisation, TS Prestwick Holdco.

Full article at:

http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/...50_000_a_month/?ref=mrb&lp=11#comments-anchor

Interesting use of public money given that Scotland has thriving airports in the private sector including one not a million miles from Prestwick. I can understand the Wales government supporting CWL because without it Wales would have no airport worthy of the name.

 

[Aviador]

Can the Scottish government continue to foot the bill for Prestwick indefinitely?

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Can the Scottish government continue to foot the bill for Prestwick indefinitely?

They're politicians. If it suits them they will.

 

[Seasider]

I am surprised the people of Scotland haven't been asking searching questions about the use of "their" money.

 

[Jerry]

I am surprised the people of Scotland haven't been asking searching questions about the use of "their" money.

Do the majority even know that the airport is supported by the government? And do they care?

 

[ca4]

Don't imagine GLA is very happy with its closest rival being subsidised. If they cut another deal with Ryanair then PIK will be finished as a passenger airport. Ryanair are launching 10 routes from GLA within the next 6 months, only a matter of time until the PIK routes are moved.

 

[Jerry]

Don't imagine GLA is very happy with its closest rival being subsidised. If they cut another deal with Ryanair then PIK will be finished as a passenger airport. Ryanair are launching 10 routes from GLA within the next 6 months, only a matter of time until the PIK routes are moved.

Does PIK really have an effect on GLA?

 

[ca4]

Does PIK really have an effect on GLA?

More likely than not all the pax at PIK would be using GLA so around 600,000 pax a year being lost at GLA. Very little commercial viability for PIK in the passenger side, they should focus on cargo and training etc.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Do the majority even know that the airport is supported by the government? And do they care?

Perhaps the majority of people in Scotland are not aware of their government support for PIK, but I suspect that a good many would not be happy were they to find out given that Scotland is, like the rest of the UK, struggling to meet its budgetary commitments.

As Scotland is well off for airports, especially in the populous Central Belt, it does seem a curious thing to do.

Wales is different in that without Welsh government support the country may not now have an airport worthy of the name (at least that's what the First Minister intimated although I never really believed that) but even here, as Wales aviation followers will know, not everyone in the country supported the use of public money in this way.

If PIK can improve its lot to a considerable degree, although passenger services seem unlikely to contribute much, then if the airport is subsequently sold back into the private sector the Scottish government might - might - see a return on its £1 purchase price and considerably larger cash injections.

 

[Jerry]

As Scotland is well off for airports, especially in the populous Central Belt, it does seem a curious thing to do.

I'm guessing when they bought the airport that it was more political as the Scottish government probably didn't want to be accused of losing Scottish jobs and thought it would've been easier than they thought to turn it around. The Welsh government probably thought the same with CWL.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

I'm guessing when they bought the airport that it was more political as the Scottish government probably didn't want to be accused of losing Scottish jobs and thought it would've been easier than they thought to turn it around. The Welsh government probably thought the same with CWL.

It was certainly political in Scotland with PIK as it was in Wales with CWL but for a different and more easily understood reason.

The previous owners of CWL had reduced it to the point where no private sector buyer was interested in purchasing it, hence the only option if it was going to regain its lost million passengers and build on that was for the government to purchase it, with the idea that a thriving airport would be a driver of the Welsh economy.

Scotland already has thriving airports that aid the Scottish economy.