Longhaul from Bristol

[TheLocalYokel]

The impetus for a middle east route will inevitably come when the demographic of the west reaches a stage where the recent arrivals (asylum cases from Sudan, Eritrea, Somalia, etc) have lived in the UK for a sufficient time to attain British passports. The surge was in mid 2000 and i guess the disapora will be sufficiently settled in Uk by now to afford the flights back to their homelands.

Not intending an immigration debate, but i guess they will be the ones who will fuel the demand for middle east flights. Qatar and Emirates will soon take notice as that demographic of passengers will be supplemented by the Dubai shopping travellers.

I don't know the proportion of travellers to/from the UK who use the MEB3 and increasingly Turkish to fly on to more distant parts of the world, notably Asia and Australasia. From personal experience using Emirates via Dubai to Australia regularly in recent years it appears high.

UK business people are looking hungrily at China and anything to ease the connectivity between the South West and China is obviously to be welcomed. The Bristol area has strong links with China, with Guangzhou (which we used to know as Canton of course), China's third largest city, being one of Bristol's twin cities.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Now EDI is firmly online, to me the next logical UK destination for TK is BRS. Emirates, Etihad and Qatar would be hard pushed to get a decent payload out of BRS and may opt for CWL.

(in another non-BRS thread)

I wondered what your thinking was on this user001. I believe that you are in the airline business.

 

[User0001]

It was more of a general musing really.

While Etihad and Qatar could use the B787 which has better take off performance on long distances, cargo would likely be the sacrifice for that take off performance even on a run of just 7 hours, and cargo is usually what helps subsidise those cheap seats that the MEB3 like to offer. (Emirates once said at a local TAS meeting a few years ago that that the EK19 DXB-MAN could take off with no passengers what so ever and still make a profit!)

Emirates is a different beast. The smallest aircraft in the fleet is the A330-200 which is slowly being phased out. After that it will then be a small subfleet of B777-200's which also may not have long left in the EK fleet, and there is no way a fully loaded (cargo and pax minus full fuel) will get off the runway at BRS.

Therefore, my best bet for a middle eastern connection with onward connections is Turkish Airlines. They seem to relish the chance of getting into the airports that the MEB3 cannot.

If the call of Dubai is just too much to ignore for BRS, the main chance of getting Dubai without a runway extension is flydubai, but they have not yet ventured into western Europe. Im not sure if a B737 could do a BRS-DXB mission, im not too hot on B737 economics, but of they are being deployed on tatl missions then surely BRS-XXX-DXB is not beyond the realms of possibility.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Thank you for that, user001 - an appraisal that is generally in line with what I've read and been told locally by those who have more knowledge than me about the subject.

Severnside represents something of a dichotomy in that BRS has the greater commercial case and CWL the greater operational one for such services with its extra 381 metres of runway and lower elevation.

It's physically possible to extend the BRS runway to the east (even to the west but it would be a Funchal-type runway extension at that end) but it would mean taking possession of a common on the east side (and tunnelling the A38 road) and the outcry that would raise can be imagined. The airport's line is that it has no intention of trying to build a runway extension which was discussed in great detail in its master plan.

Now if Bristol's airport had been moved from Whitchurch to Filton instead of to Lulsgate all those years ago.....................

The BRS management still believes that the likes of the B787 and A350 will come to the long haul route rescue although it's realistic enough to believe that there will probably never be a case for more than four long haul scheduled routes from BRS in the future with DXB being one (vide the BRS master plan). It sees the new generation of smaller wide bodied aircraft more likely to extend its long haul charter market than scheduled.

With LHR just up the road with its myriad of long haul routes and frequencies it will always be difficult to challenge this as was found out by Continental when, even though underlying passenger numbers on its BRS-EWR service met its expectations - certainly in the early years before the recession, the yield was disappointing and when the chance came to effectively move the flight to LHR to join the others that CO had started from there (it had no access to LHR when it began its BRS route) the decision was obvious.

If APD is devolved to Wales and reduced - even to a nil rate as has been hinted at by the Wales First Minister - then if BRS was still subject to the UK government's APD rates that would make CWL much more attractive and overcome to a considerable extent its small and relatively low yielding core catchment in terms of one of the MEB3 setting up shop.

 

[forest1979]

Hi – I really enjoy reading this forum on Bristol airport as a general enthusiast, so I have decided to join so I can get involved in the chat! I am no expert in the field of aviation but I do follow with great enthusiasm the goings on of the airline and airport world and particularly Bristol and its ongoing development.

The reason I have posted on to this particular thread today is that I was looking at the Qatar website and noticed that they use A320/21’s on some routes in and out of Europe. I was wondering whether or not this might be an option for Bristol, given the restrictions of larger aircraft due to runway length. This seems to be a sticking point for them given runway extension appears to be off the table as part of the overall development.

I’m not an expert so not sure what the range of the 320 family would be and if this would be viable option but thought it was interesting.

As a general observer of the airport development and their plans it seems to me that some long haul routes, particularly to the ME & re-establishing a direct NYC route is the one thing BRS need to establish if they are not to lose out to other airports. Hopefully the suggestion of Turkish starting up in Bristol will come to fruition for next year.

I would be interested in anyone’s thoughts.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

A very warm welcome to Forums4Airports,forest1979. We hope that you will become a regular poster.

BRS is my local airport and I've been using it regularly since the 1970s when it handled the sort of passenger numbers in a year that is sees in about a week these days. I lived just down the road from it when I was growing up in the 1950s at the time it was a glider club field after the wartime RAF use had ceased.

Even 20 years ago no-one could have predicted what it's become now. But you are quite right; although it has an extremely healthy European and holiday network and frequencies it does lack scheduled long haul. But that's largely true of most English and Welsh airports outside the main London ones and Manchester and Birmingham. Apart from these only Newcastle has a regular long haul scheduled route - a daily Emirates to Dubai.

BRS does suffer somewhat because of its short (and undulating) runway, its challenging surface connectivity and the fact that it's situated within a green belt that makes associated industries seen at other airports next to impossible. The fact that it's done so well given these disadvantages and others such as indifferent weather at times and the need to remain within what is a relatively small site shows that there is a large and active market. What might Bristol's airport be like now if it had moved to Filton in 1957 instead of to Lulsgate? We shall never know.

BRS's other difficulty especially with long haul scheduled services is its proximity to one of the largest airports in the world. Continental as it was then took what was undoubtedly a sensible business decision when it effectively moved the BRS-EWR flight 100 miles to the east to become the airline's fifth daily service to Newark. CO didn't have access to LHR when it began its BRS route and went in for some European secondary (some say tertiary) routes to try to overcome this. The BRS route apparently did all right for a while but then the recession came along and with the rights to LHR gained there was only ever going to be one outcome.

I'm not sure that BRS will lose out to other airports in the sense that they will get a long haul scheduled route or two instead of it. The airports that it could potentially lose out to are Cardiff, Exeter, Bournemouth and Southampton. SOU is the most successful of these and well used by business people living in the outer hinterland of London, but its runway and site are even smaller than BRS's. CWL, EXT and BOH all have longer runways although not excessively so and EXT's is actually only a bit longer than BRS's although at a lower elevation.

Purely on a commercial case with everything else being equal BRS would win hands down if either a US or Middle East long haul carrier wanted to set up in the south west corner of Britain. It might not be that simple though. If, for example, APD was devolved to the Wales Government it could make a long haul route more attractive. Furthermore, no-one knows to what extent the Regional Air Connectivity Fund whose extension was announced this week by the chancellor will assist airports in setting up new routes. BRS it appears will be excluded from this fund because it handles more than 3 mppa which has been suggested is the cut-off limit. The other airports I mentioned will all qualify as they are well under the 3 mppa bar.

Turkish Airlines might be the best chance because its B737-800s should have no problem reaching Istanbul from the BRS runway fully loaded.

Qatar will fly to Edinburgh using B 787s (it may have already started), with Turkish Airlines already operating to Istanbul from there with B 737-800s. I'm certainly not an expert on aircraft but a little research suggests that the Qatar A 320s/321s have the range to fly BRS-Doha fully loaded and the neos currently on order certainly have. What I don't know is whether they could do so off the BRS runway. They might need more asphalt.

Qatar uses the 800 series of the B 787 on its EDI route. This is the aircraft type (with the A350) that the BRS management put its hopes on for long haul in the future. Whether it would be too large commercially for the BRS market, to begin with anyway, I'm not sure.

If BRS did gain a Turkish Airlines service it might push one of the MEB3 (Emirates, Etihad and Qatar) towards CWL in the future as competition with Turkish at BRS might be considered stretching the market too far.

I'm not confident that a New York route will reappear in the forseeable future whether from BRS or any other regional airport currently without one. Aer Lingus provides a reasonable alternative to the USA if people don't like the idea of flying east first to Amsterdam before flying west.

I don't bet but if I did I'm not sure how much money I'd put on BRS getting a long haul scheduled route in the next two to three years. Istanbul isn't really long haul but it does open up many of the emerging markets further east.

Back to you forest1979 and/or anyone else who wants to give their views. They would be very welcome.

 

[Aviador]

Hi – I really enjoy reading this forum on Bristol airport as a general enthusiast, so I have decided to join so I can get involved in the chat! I am no expert in the field of aviation but I do follow with great enthusiasm the goings on of the airline and airport world and particularly Bristol and its ongoing development.

The reason I have posted on to this particular thread today is that I was looking at the Qatar website and noticed that they use A320/21’s on some routes in and out of Europe. I was wondering whether or not this might be an option for Bristol, given the restrictions of larger aircraft due to runway length. This seems to be a sticking point for them given runway extension appears to be off the table as part of the overall development.

I’m not an expert so not sure what the range of the 320 family would be and if this would be viable option but thought it was interesting.

As a general observer of the airport development and their plans it seems to me that some long haul routes, particularly to the ME & re-establishing a direct NYC route is the one thing BRS need to establish if they are not to lose out to other airports. Hopefully the suggestion of Turkish starting up in Bristol will come to fruition for next year.

I would be interested in anyone’s thoughts.

Welcome to Forums4airports forest1979 and thank you for joining and taking part it's much appreciated.

As for your question, there's no reason why Qatar couldn't operate to the Middle East using A320 or A321 equipment but they would need to make a tech stop to re-fuel somewhere like Istanbul. Whether this would be something they would want to do is another matter.

 

[forest1979]

Hello and thanks for the responses, it was a very interesting read.

Purely from a selfish enthusiasts point of view, I would like to think BRS will at some point expand into certain long haul routes in the future, be that leisure, business or both. Living and working from Cornwall, I know numerous people who used NYC and Cancun routes in the past and preferred this as appose to flights from NQY - LGW or traveling to LHR by road/rail

As mentioned before by others, the one thing Bristol does have going for it, which I’m sure airlines will be aware of, is the thriving and expanding economy of the city and surrounding areas. There is also good demand from both business and leisure passengers. Although access in comparison to some airports isn’t great, it is still well positioned in terms of its catchment area.

Certainly from a Cornish perspective, the subsidiaries received from the EU to set up business here are great, along with superfast broad band across the county, it makes it an attractive place to come and do business.. Maybe one for the BRS marketing team to look at when thinking of future routes and markets to attract?

Thanks also for the comments on Qatar... I note Etihad use the 320 family as part of their fleet, although not on as many routes into Europe from what I can see.

I look forward to the story of “long haul from Bristol” evolving!!

One other question from me, does anyone know if Thomson are bringing the Dreamliner to Bristol next year? I note previous discussions but wondered if there had been anymore conversations muted on this subject?

 

[ljm104]

The A320/A320neo certainly have the range to make it to Doha/Abu Dhabi, although to achieve this they would need to be pretty much at MTOW. I'm not an expert in this area, but I think the A320 actually needs quite a long runway for this scenario, maybe 7000ft+.

Aside from operational limitations, I would also question the profitability of the route for smaller aircraft. Unless the yields were exceptionally high through premium passengers, which I doubt they would be from Bristol, I suspect the airlines wouldn't see this as worth their while.I could be wrong of course, but my view is that Bristol's best chance of an MEB3 carrier still comes from the 787/A350, which we all hope will be able to operate satisfactorily from the BRS runway, although that remains uncertain.

In some ways it's a shame that Boeing haven't pursued a 757 replacement, as it's performance characteristics lend themselves very well to regional airports with short runways, as we saw with Continental.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Some interesting points raised in your latest post, forest1979. So far as the BRS management and Cornwall are concerned I'm certain that the former are well aware of the potential traffic to and from the county and its importance to the airport. In 2012 Devon and Cornwall provided one million of BRS's near six million passengers that year, so it's a very important part of the airport's market, and the marketing team were in the far South West a few months ago engaged in a concentrated campaign to seek hearts and minds.

When Exeter Airport was put up for sale by the then local authority owners in the past decade the BRS owners became the preferred bidders. However, a substantial body of opinion amongst the politicians and business interests in Devon decided that BRS's intention was to close or marginalise EXT to their own advantage and both the EC and the OFT became involved with allegations of unfair competition issues resulting in the BRS people electing to withdraw from the sale process.

Some believe that far from trying to reduce EXT the intention would have been to use it as a sort of second terminal and second runway and, knowing the quality of the BRS senior team, it's more than likely that EXT would be far busier now than it currently is and that Cornwall would have benefited.

Haven't heard any more about the TOM Dreamliner and BRS. I believe that the Thomson summer 2015 holiday programme may be out next month and that may give a clue.

That's a valid point about the B 757 ljm104. I'm not aware of any occasion when it had to make an en route fuel stop flying west because it could not upload sufficient fuel off the BRS runway. When the route was announced the doom merchants, and some of those put out that their airport didn't get the service, were openly saying that it would have to fuel stop on a regular basis. It even took off once to my first-hand knowledge with a small tailwind component to avoid getting in the way of the work of the calibrator aircraft that was operating that day, the control tower having obtained the CO captain's agreement.

It would be a huge boost if the B787/A350 did become a regular although it might have to be the smaller series of the type.

 

[tpm]

Today in my inbox:

Help us secure a direct route to North America from Bristol Airport

I am writing to ask for your support as we step up our efforts to secure a direct transatlantic route between Bristol and North America. Now that economic conditions are recovering in the UK and worldwide there is a strong business case for the route. We are now reaching out to South West and South Wales businesses like yours to gather information to build a compelling case to the airlines for a daily link to the USA.

Since Continental Airlines ceased its daily transatlantic service from Bristol in 2010, the South West and South Wales have had no direct link to North America. Whilst there are good connections via frequent services to European hub airports, a direct flight would bring many benefits to the region in terms of international profile, inbound tourism and cost and time savings to businesses.

Meetings with airlines will take place over the next couple of months. Please help us present the strongest case we can by taking a few minutes to complete our questionnaire.

PS: The subject of the e-mail said 'direct flights to New York'

 

[Aviador]

Nice to see some proactive work by the airport to regain the New York link. The response from the business community is always good with this kind of PR offensive. In reality getting bums on seats is much harder because it involves people putting their money where their mouth is.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

I wonder whether this initiative coming now has anything to do with a thought that CWL might be the recipients of some start-up aid from either the UK Regional Air Connectivity Fund or from the Wales Government, now that the EC rules on state support appear to have been simplified. It seems that BRS would be barred from receiving such state aid because it's too busy and too successful.

Perhaps the airport is getting in now and is prepared to use its own money as start-up support, something that's always been legal because its ownership is in the private sector. It was an open secret that Continental received very favourable terms when they commenced their EWR route.

 

[ljm104]

Interesting stuff tpm

The implication of this is that there must be a genuine prospect of the route restarting, otherwise management would be focusing efforts elsewhere. It wasn't long ago that noises from the airport suggested hope for a transatlantic route in the near term had all but disappeared.

United is showing no signs of retiring it's international fleet of 757s (inherited from CO) anytime soon, and I suspect that these would still be the aircraft of choice should a BRS-EWR service resume, with newly delivered 787s being deployed on higher profile routes.

 

[alphagolf]

Interesting stuff tpm

The implication of this is that there must be a genuine prospect of the route restarting, otherwise management would be focusing efforts elsewhere.

In a local newspaper today, Robert Sinclair is quoted as saying in reference to increasing passengers;

"He is predicting the return of trans-Atlantic flights from Bristol after a gap of 4 years.", he believes direct flights to North America could return in the very near future"

Positive news, wonder if we could see a launch before the end of the year.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Positive news, wonder if we could see a launch before the end of the year.

The airport management said they will be talking to airlines within the next couple of months. The plural may suggest it's something of a fishing expedition at the moment unless an airline or airlines have expressed some interest behind the scenes.

What must worry the BRS owners and management is the possibility of APD being devolved to Wales. There have been suggestions in the national press in recent weeks that all the main political parties will make promises to Scotland about taxation matters, including more to be devolved with APD being one, to try to counter the Yes vote in the Independence referendum. If Scotland is given APD powers it would seem highly unlikely that Wales wouldn't be given the same.

That would have a serious effect on long haul ambitions at BRS, including charter flights. Assuming no operational problems intruded BRS would have a far stronger business case to be the Severnside airport for a NYC route. If APD is reduced at CWL - almost certainly to zero - and the recently clarified EC regulations over state assistance for start-up routes are brought into play then the game changes dramatically.

Public money would then make CWL a far more attractive airport for long haul compared to a privately-owned neighbour that enjoys no such help.

It might surprise some that a Tory chancellor would introduce a measure (the extension of the Regional Air Connectivity Fund for airports under 3 mppa) that penalises successful airports in the private sector against those that need public money to compete, although it appears that his Lib Dem number two may have had a strong influence on this.

But that's how life is sometimes and there may be very little that the BRS owners can do about the situation if a government is set upon a political course, other than sell their shareholdings.

I remember that in 2005 Continental announced the BRS-EWR route in September that year, to commence the following May.

 

[superking]

If my memory is working as it should, i seem to remember brs management talking about a ny route again.
Reading on the dried plum forum it will more likely it wont be ua, as reading they are suspending flts from belfast,rome,manchester and dublin for 9 weeks.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

If my memory is working as it should, i seem to remember brs management talking about a ny route again.
Reading on the dried plum forum it will more likely it wont be ua, as reading they are suspending flts from belfast,rome,Manchester and dublin for 9 weeks.

Your memory is sound - some earlier posts in this thread discussed it.

Obviously the airport management knows far more about these things than I do but I've been a bit sceptical about the possibility of a transatlantic scheduled route ever since the Continental route was stopped.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Well, things can change quickly in the airline business.

Today United has announced a Newcastle-Newark route operating from late May until early September next year for a trial period. It will run 5 x weekly with B757 equipment.

This was a surprise to me and I suspect to many with an interest in aviation.

Back in April the BRS management said they would be talking to airlines to re-establish a NYC link with Robert Sinclair, BRS CEO, then quoted predicting a return of transatlantic flights in the 'very near future'.

There have been some rumours flying around in recent weeks about such a service, not necessarily with United, but we shall have to wait and see if the rumours have legs.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

With NCL's new United service to JFK next summer and BHX's new American Airlines service to JFK it looks as though there won't be a return of a BRS NYC route next year despite some rumours that have been circulating.

With no sign of TUI re-establishing the Florida and Mexico weekly summer charters it's beginning to look as if BRS will have to settle for its fairly comprehensive (in summer anyway) short haul network for the forseeable future, unless anyone knows something to the contrary.