Leeds Bradford: Ryanair Flights, New Routes & Base Updates

[lbaspotter]

Hi

I'm taking a wild guess that ryanair.com may take a really good look at a Las Palmas-Gran Canaria service as non of the current airlines and tour operators serving LBA serve this route in the winter months as Thomas cook only operates it once weekly in the summer.

The second of the new routes I guess maybe an to a Eastern European destination to say some where like Wroclaw in Poland as like again nobody currently serves the route from LBA but would go up aginst the Wizz Air flights from Donny.

 

[yorkshire]

On the news this morning ryan air to release there winter flights some time today

 

[dmrodgers]

Flights to Dusseldorf, Gdansk and Fuerteventura announced. On the LBA website.

 

[012tom012]

Also Girona has been replaced by the 'real' Barcelona. Will be interesting to see what happens there becuase Girona has always done very well.

 

[Aviador]

For goodness sake, Dusseldorf? Why didn't they go for another German city. Germany is so under served as it is. Fuerteventura should be OK because it's underserved. Gdansk, at last something new!

 

[012tom012]

Agreed, why couldn't they start Berlin!? So the routes dropped from the summer are - Limoges, Montpellier, Nantes, Ibiza, Palma, Murcia, Pisa. Quite surprised that Murcia stops but Carcassonne continues?

 

[Aviador]

Carcassonne can be used instead of Girona I think.

Or for Ryanair marketing purposes 'Carcassonne (Girona)' 😆

 

[Bigman]

Gdansk and Fuerteventura should be good. I agree about Weeze...why not Hahn??

 

[White Heather]

There has been much speculation on here that Knock would be scrapped, yet it is continuing through the winter, so it can't be doing so badly can it? Nice to see Malta continuing year round, but it is disappointing that Palma is dropped for the winter. What I do hope is that the likes of Fuerteventura, Gdansk (some competition for Wizz out of Donny) and Weeze continue in the summer, on top of the existing summer routes, and hopefully with a couple more added, giving us over 20 routes next summer, which is pretty much as implied by Ryanair a couple of weeks ago.

 

[backtrack]

I dont see why weeze, yes okay it will compete with LS DUS service but what about Hahn, berlin, munich etc? Gdansk, a new route, welcomed but not sure how well it will do. FUE a definite good choice, but would of though LPA and TFS would also be on the cards.

Do we know if this is it? I mean for winter, or will they decide some more new routes before the end of the summer?

 

[News Guru]

[textarea]Boom times at Leeds Bradford Airport

AN EXTRA 250,000 passengers are expected to flock to Leeds Bradford Airport after it was declared one of the fastest growing airports in the country.

Low-cost airline Ryanair on Tuesday announced plans to operate four new routes from the airport to increase its winter schedule.

Flights will operate to Gdansk, Fuerteventura, Dusseldorf and Barcelona as its winter schedule is expanded from three routes last year to 13.

Ryanair will operate two aircraft on 13 routes which it says is expected to bring an additional 250,000 holidaymakers to the airport and by this time next year over three million people will fly from Leeds.

It is thought the additional routes will create up to 1,000 jobs and pump millions of pounds into the local economy.

The news comes after Ryanair have reduced the number of flights from Stanstead Airport.

Michael Cawley, deputy chief operating officer of Ryanair, said: "Leeds Bradford in England is the exception.

"Apart from that we will be reducing our business elsewhere in Britain for reasons primarily to do with high taxation.

"It is a very regressive tax and we are very much against that so the success we have had in Leeds Bradford has overcome that.

"There has been a massive pent-up demand for low fares and significant demand abroad for people to come and visit this region as well.

"The most important thing is Leeds Bradford can support our operation with efficient operations."

Ryanair are in the process of having to stump up around €50m in costs following the Icelandic volcanic eruption earlier this year which disrupted 9,400 of their flights.

He added: "I think the achievement of being one of the fastest growing airports in the current climate is remarkable."

Tony Hallwood, commercial and aviation development director for the airport, said: "Leeds Bradford Airport is one of the fastest growing airports in the UK at the present time.

"We will continue to be one of the fastest growing airports and look forward to continue to grow the capacity into 2011 and beyond."

The airport's chief operating officer, John Parkin, added: "We want to grow the airport here and want the people to have their air travel demand met here in their own region not somewhere else.

"UK aviation is having a very tough time currently but we are growing pretty aggressively and that is great news for the region."

He said that the airport will be pumping £2.5m in schemes to improve access to the airport as part of the planning permission for the new £28m terminal investment.

Phase one to re-develop the pick-up and drop-off points at the front of the airport is already complete and it is thought work to the new terminal will start early next year.

To celebrate the winter schedule Ryanair are releasing 500,000 £9 seats for travel across its European network in September and October which are available from www.ryanair.com until midnight on Thursday.

Source[/textarea]

 

[Aviador]

I don't know if there is any truth in it but keep hearing ten routes mentioned and an extra based aircraft for the airline. Assuming this comes to fruition for next summer I wonder what destinations they will be looking at serving. (or should I be cheeky and say how many Jet2 routes have they got left to poach?)

 

[backtrack]

Now, just to be straight, is the `new` Barcelona route i.e BCN replacing our existing Gerona services? Or is it a completely addition on top of our GRO services too.

 

[Bigman]

I make it 43 departures per week, certainly mid-January. I think we had about 20 a week last year between Dublin, Girona and Alicante.

 

[guest]

Barcelona is a direct replacement for the Gerona flights.

 

[White Heather]

Is this just from LBA or are Ryanair switching their focus from Gerona to Barcelona as a policy change and doing the same from other airports?

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Looking at the Ryanair drop-down list of 22 destinations that fly to/from BCN only LBA and EDI are UK routes.

It may be that Ryanair is in the process of switching some of its other UK routes from Reus and Girona to Barcelona 'proper' but they are yet to reach the web timetable or booking engine.

 

[Aviador]

[textarea]Ryanair to reach more destinations from Leeds-Bradford

BUDGET airline Ryanair is to expand its winter schedule at Leeds-Bradford Airport, despite last week announcing an overall 16 per cent cut in winter capacity across the country.
The Irish carrier announced this week it would operate two aircraft on 13 routes, including new routes to and from Barcelona, Dusseldorf, Gdansk in Poland and Fuerteventura, in an expansion that should see Ryanair's traffic at Leeds-Bradford grow to one million passengers a year.

Ryanair operated just three routes to and from Leeds-Bradford last winter.

Yesterday the airport's chief executive John Parkin said: "Leeds-Bradford is bucking the trend in the UK with Ryanair growth which will see more Ryanair passengers, flight and routes this winter."

He said the airport was one of the few in the UK growing during the recession. Up to March this year 2.5 million passengers used the airport and the figures are predicted to increase to 3.3 million by March next year.

Mr Parkin said Jet2.com remained the airport's biggest airline but said the airport aims to continue growing and offering more choice. Work is due to begin on a £28m expansion and improvement of its outdated terminal next spring.

Ryanair's 13 winter routes from Leeds-Bradford will connect to Alicante, Knock, Barcelona, Krakow, Carcassonne in France; Fuerteventura, Dusseldorf, Malaga, Dublin, Malta, Faro, Venice and Gdansk.

Mr Parkin says Leeds-Bradford is attractive to airlines because many people do not use the airport, opting to travel to Manchester and airlines are keen to target these passengers.

Ryanair's deputy chief executive Michael Cawley said: "Ryanair will now deliver one million passengers per annum and sustain 1,000 local jobs at Leeds-Bradford Airport.

"Our new Barcelona route will replace our Girona route to provide easier access to great value city breaks this winter."

Last week it was announced that Leeds-Bradford and Edinburgh airport, were the only airports to avoid Ryanair's cut in capacity, which will see the airline shed space for two million passengers over the winter.

At the time the airline said Leeds Bradford avoided the cull by cutting its charges in return for guaranteed passenger numbers.

Last year the airport won planning permission from Leeds City Council to improve and expand its terminal.

The proposals had provoked controversy because of the impact on the surrounding roads from dramatically increasing passenger numbers, but airport bosses agreed to contribute cash to measures including bus services to reduce the impact.

Source[/textarea]

 

[backtrack]

Ryanair flew the Leeds United football team out to Krakow on Saturday from LBA. They then had an onward connection by road to Slovakia for pre-season high altitude training.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Haven't they learned the lesson of England's high altitude pre-World Cup training? :shok: