Ryanair

[White Heather]

STILL OFF TOPIC!

Local Yokel, we are agreed on that. I had the Aer Arann operation in mind, rather than Aer Lingus mainline. (as per my penultimate post above). I cannot see that a single ATR72 daily with have any impact at all on the MAN service. I don't think that Aer Lingus themselves would ever come back to LBA unless Ryanair pulled off the DUB route (and even then it would be uncertain), but with the Aer Arann franchise you never know.

LS27, you are correct, but I hadn't forgotten those types, all of which operated from LBA after Aer Lingus first pulled out of LBA. When they came back it was with the Shorts, then the Saab and finally the F50 before pulling out again. I was just concentrating on the early days when in many ways Aer Lingus were at the forefront of developments at LBA.

Anyway, we had better get back to the Ryanair topic................!!

 

[tleeds]

Yes back on topic White Heather .

I'm surprised that RYR have dropped the Knock route. For instance today's flight is due 50mins early, so people can't be complaining about efficiency.
How have the load figures been recently does anyone know?

 

[eastcoaster]

Ryan Air just announced to new routes starting this winter. Riga in Latvia and Kaunus in Lithuania. Two good routes I think and much needed.

 

[tleeds]

Yes I was just about to post this eastcoaster, although you are 30mins ahead

Ryanair, the world’s favourite airline, today (14th June) announced two new Leeds Bradford routes to/from Kaunas and Riga from November which grows Ryanair’s Leeds Bradford winter schedule to 13 low fares routes, which will see Ryanair deliver over 1m passengers p.a., sustaining up to 1,000 jobs in the Yorkshire region.
Ryanair celebrated its two new Leeds Bradford routes by releasing 1million £9.99 seats for travel across its European network in September which are available for booking on http://www.ryanair.com until midnight (24:00hrs) Thursday (16th June). Ryanair’s new routes will be available for booking on Ryanair.com tomorrow.

Ryanair’s Stephen McNamara said:
“Ryanair is pleased to announce two new Leeds Bradford winter routes to/from Kaunas and Riga to extend our winter 2011/2012 schedule to 13 low fare routes. Ryanair will now deliver over 1million passengers p.a. and sustain up to 1,000 local jobs in the Yorkshire region. To celebrate the launch of our two new low fare routes we are releasing 1million £9.99 seats for travel in September on over 1,000 Ryanair routes throughout Europe.”

LBA’s Tony Hallwood commented;
“Ryanair's announcement is excellent news for both business and leisure travellers who wish to fly from Leeds Bradford to Latvia and Lithuania. The new services to Riga and Kaunas will be warmly welcomed as the Leeds City Region looks to develop its trading links across Eastern Europe. We also look forward to encouraging new inbound tourism visitors on both services, working closely with Welcome to Yorkshire to maximise the economic benefits for the region”.

The Riga Route will be operated by the an LBA based aircraft, although I'm not sure about the Kaunas route as Ryanair have a fairly large base there.
Good News anyhow...

 

[eastcoaster]

I can't find a timetable frequency for these flights or if they are at the detriment of other flights we have lost. Malta, Knock are 2 routes we are down for next winter.

 

[ryan]

Looks like they're after some of the Yorkshire to Lithuania market from Wizz then, given that DSA - Vilnius is already served.

 

[lbaspotter]

Excellent news.

These are 2 good routes that have been chosen by ryanair. 2 new markets have been opened that are not served by anyone else yet out off LBA. They my also take some punters who have been using the Wizz Air flights from DSA.

I can't find a timetable frequency for these flights or if they are at the detriment of other flights we have lost. Malta, Knock are 2 routes we are down for next winter.

I don't know if you have noticed eastcoster. But in the official press release by ryanair it states that all routes from LBA for there winter 2011/12 programme will be on sale via there website http://www.ryanair.com from tomorrow. Wednesday 15/06/11. Hope that helps explain why the timetables aren't showing yet.

So it defintley looks like we have only lost the Malta routes compared to last year as Knock is still listed as one off the 13 winter routes that is going to be operated still.

 

[White Heather]

Great news - I for one work with someone whose relatives live near Riga, so he will be a happy chappy when I tell him tomorrow. I just hope that they re-instate Malta for the summer 2012, and hopefully Knock comes back too.

 

[Bigman]

Top banana!! That's another European capital city to add to the list.

We are getting closer to Scandinavia. Maybe something there next?

Keep on rolling!!

 

[lbaspotter]

Hi

Ryanair have now put on sale there 2 new routes to Riga & Kaunas from LBA which where announced yesterday. Both services will run 2x weekly on Wednesdays & Sundays to the following timetables.

Leeds 15:25 - Kaunas 20:00 = RYR2488
Kaunas 20:25 - Leeds 21:15 = RYR2489

Leeds 07:10 - Riga 11:55 = RYR2482
Riga 12:20 - Leeds 13:00 = RYR2483

 

[tleeds]

Fantastic Lbaspotter. I'm sure that both routes will do very well. Maybe this is just the beginning of the Eastern European market for RYR.
Bigman, I'm hoping that the Oslo route comes soon from RYR, would be pretty good for this winter actually..

 

[White Heather]

I can't find a timetable frequency for these flights or if they are at the detriment of other flights we have lost. Malta, Knock are 2 routes we are down for next winter.

I know it has been said before Eastcoaster posted this that we have lost the Knock flight next winter, but we haven't actually, or if we have, someone should perhaps tell Ryanair themselves, because the Ryanair press release on their website, announcing Riga and Kaunas, states clearly that there will be 13 routes next winter from LBA and Knock is listed as one of them.

 

[eastcoaster]

I noticed they included Knock in their press release. I too think this is a bit strange to see it, when it has been discussed before and in the Irish Press that the flights will end. I'm not surprised if it does go as the loads have been very poor, but I believe the Irish government subsidises flights into Knock, and I guess maybe these subsidies don't last for ever and it is to come to an end, along with the flights, maybe.
Having said that, i can not book any flights to Knock after 1st Nov, but I can to the rest of the network from LBA.

 

[markietg]

The LBIA departure page is showing 3 FR flights to Faro tomorrow. Is this a mistake?

 

[Sherburnflyer92]

Two daily tommorow.

1045 and 1645!

 

[lbaspotter]

I see it looks like ryanair are going to stick 2 figures up at LBA (Well MOL was lying last month as usual) by announcing a new base at Manchester Airport on Monday morning.

It has been mentioned that they will base 4 Boeing 737-800 aircraft and Lunch 28 routes.

I wonder how this will effect Jet2?

 

[White Heather]

Why is that sticking two fingers up at LBA though? Jet2 manage to fly from both MAN and LBA, and so should Ryanair. LBA has enough catchment area to keep aircraft full without worrying about picking up pax from the MAN area. If any airport is to worry, it is LPL as they share the same catchment area to a large extent. I don't think MOL would open a base at MAN though if he thought that either of their existing LBA or LPL bases were going to be adversely affected. If anything he is trying to ensure that his airline dominates across the entire North of England. Perhaps he is worried about the inroads Jet2 are making in the North West?

What could happen now is that there could be an impact on Jet2's expansion at MAN, which has accelerated since Ryanair pulled their base. Now they will have some real competition! Who knows, once LBA's terminal problems are sorted, it might encourage Jet2 to invest a little more in LBA and a little less in MAN, which is undoubtedly their main centre of operations now, if not their home base.

 

[a300boy]

I dont think it will be too long before Jet 2 migrate their main base to Manchester. I bet the management of Manchester Airport are offering lots of incentives to do so.

 

[rmac]

I cannot see Jet2 moving h/q to Manchester at any time however can see the logic of Ryanair opening a base at Manchester. With passenger numbers much greater than LPL and LBA it makes sense to have a reasonable presence at MAN to keep the likes of Jet2 and easyJet in sight. I think of LPL and LBA as the "Spars" of this world whilst MAN is the supermarket, they all have a part to play. Neither can be complacent and need to be competitive and to grow as market conditions allow. The same is true of airports. The smallest may disappear as have many "corner shops".
For LBA though getting on with the terminal extension is paramount, I think. I passed by yesterday just after the Titan landed and saw the place heaving with arriving passengers. The numbers wanting to get the 757 to Leeds appeared to be greater than the seats available, and the Lourdes arrivals were confused about their bus transfer to wherever! Also saw the cars awaiting their pick ups, parking on the double yellow lines and causing chaos. So LBA has much to do, the potential is there and once the improvements are in place then I see Ryanair, Jet2 and maybe easyJet increasing their presence.

 

[User0001]

What does 'migrate their main base' actually mean though. Do you mean all of the head office type functions? If so, then Manchester would not count as a suitable alternative under employment law and they would be obliged to make the staff redundnant if they did not want to move to Manchester. Why would they want to do this?

If you mean, aircraft and routes, then I would have thought MAN and LBA are pretty similar in terms of based aircraft and route network and have been for a couple of years. MAN has been open since 2004 for Jet2 and in that time there have been periods of growth / consolidation at both LBA and MAN, more often than not a reflection of what has been going on with the competition...

...which is why if Ryanair do announce 28 new routes from Manchester, then the question will be - are there really that many routes that can be operated without overlapping with existing operators? Jet2 have announced Bergamo, Barcelona for example and some routes into regional France - all areas you would imagine that in a basket of 28 routes, Ryanair would look to target. Flybe also operate to 4 regional desinations in France which could be vulnerable.

I have no doubt that the new management at Manchester have ditched the idea of the previous regime that MAN would be able to replicate a Heathrow type network. Instead the new lot are doing what everyone else is doing which is chasing passenger numbers and then look to make the money in the car parks and the shops. Ryanair and Easyjet are by far and away the best bets for getting passenger numbers in and delivering year round passenger numbers, so it seems logical they have targeted these two. They 'year round' aspect is really important and whilst Jet2 are good for LBA and MAN in summer, they are very conservative in winter and it creates huge variations in demand. Airports don't like building car parks and terminal redevelopments which sit idle for half the year as it takes twice as long to get your money back on the investment.

I'm sure any announcement by Ryanair will be full of the usual interesting quotes about other airports, so we wait with interest. I think it will be interesting to see how this will impact LPL considering the catchment overlap and the sheer size of the LPL base. I think LBA has its own discrete catchement area and hopefully growth from Ryanair at MAN alongside a positive committment to LBA will help reinforce the message that LBA and MAN can operate independently of each other - which actually helps the LBA cause in many respects. The biggest concern for LBA may well be the fact that 4 aircraft going into MAN may mean there is not an aircraft available to increase the LBA base to 3 for summer 12. All of which is caveated by the knowledge that Ryanair could announce they are walking away from LBA - ~I very much doubt it, but you can never say never with them.