Archive Route Development & Rumours

[Chilly Dog]

AI and TG not happening for northern Summer.

RJ unlikely but still TBC.

 

[Land23R]

Well Alia & TG still have slots I believe, but if neither comes to fruition, it would mean none of the 4 new long haul carriers that applied for slots at MAN will operate this summer. It's an understatement to say that would be disappointing. While it's true that the likes of Ryanair, easyjet and Jet2 with their high number of based aircraft can provide the greatest contribution to passenger numbers and potential growth, the longhaul network certainly adds to the airport's profile and prestige. We wait in hope for Virgin to reinstate some of their cancelled routes, not to mention the return of a US carrier or two would be helpful. The India market with direct flights is a frustrating omission while acknowledging that a proportion of pax will still be flying there from MAN via other hubs in the ME or Europe, and hopefully Indian passengers in the opposite direction.

All that said, MAN thankfully has some major airlines like the ME carriers, CX and SQ in its portfolio.

 

[BlueManc]

Maybe S23 is just too early in the recovery. For me, I just despair about the consolidation of US routes to LHR/EDI/DUB. Monday: 8 departures LHR-BOS, 5 LHR-ORD, 24 (Twenty Four) LHR-JFK/EWR.

FRA-MUC is 250miles and yet MUC supports a healthy long-haul operation. Yeah I know, we can't compare London Airways to Lufthansa.

Levelling up.

 

[EGCC_MAN]

US carriers have concentrated on destinations where American tourists most want to vacation, taking advantage of their historically strong US Dollars. Ireland, Scotland and London very much tick that box. The US is currently a very expensive destination for those who get paid in GBP, albeit less acutely than afew months ago. Manchester is very much an outbound market where US travel is concerned. Another factor which influenced route choices in resumption of services was that the UK and EU dropped covid-testing requirements for inbound travellers from the US long before Biden and co returned the compliment for us.

MAN actually does support a very healthy long-haul operation. Eastbound is strong and recovering quickly. Even westbound - which as we note is at a low ebb - can see upto eight scheduled departures in a day (US / Canada / Mexico / Caribbean) with operations by Virgin Atlantic, Aer Lingus UK, TUI Airways, Singapore Airlines and Air Transat. Several of these are not daily, of course, and January / February are the quietest months. Air Canada will rejoin the fray in the Summer. We will reminisce for years to come about the heyday of the Thomas Cook transatlantic scheduled programme from MAN. We punched above our weight with that and may never return to that level of Transatlantic scheduled volume.

Going East, the absence of schedules to India rightly draws comment. But it is easy to forget that Pakistan - a much larger market from the NW - is currently unserved as well. It's a big positive that MAN does have Bangladesh Biman schedules to Dacca and Sylhet though.

 

[IanFarquharson]

US carriers have concentrated on destinations where American tourists most want to vacation, taking advantage of their historically strong US Dollars. Ireland, Scotland and London very much tick that box. The US is currently a very expensive destination for those who get paid in GBP, albeit less acutely than afew months ago. Manchester is very much an outbound market where US travel is concerned. Another factor which influenced route choices in resumption of services was that the UK and EU dropped covid-testing requirements for inbound travellers from the US long before Biden and co returned the compliment for us.

MAN actually does support a very healthy long-haul operation. Eastbound is strong and recovering quickly. Even westbound - which as we note is at a low ebb - can see upto eight scheduled departures in a day (US / Canada / Mexico / Caribbean) with operations by Virgin Atlantic, Aer Lingus UK, TUI Airways, Singapore Airlines and Air Transat. Several of these are not daily, of course, and January / February are the quietest months. Air Canada will rejoin the fray in the Summer. We will reminisce for years to come about the heyday of the Thomas Cook transatlantic scheduled programme from MAN. We punched above our weight with that and may never return to that level of Transatlantic scheduled volume.

Going East, the absence of schedules to India rightly draws comment. But it is easy to forget that Pakistan - a much larger market from the NW - is currently unserved as well. It's a big positive that MAN does have Bangladesh Biman schedules to Dacca and Sylhet though.

Agreed US visitors will always flock to London & Edinburgh.
Manchester has a good range of destinations offered by Virgin & Aer Lingus something BHX would love to have bearing in mind we have no scheduled US flights these days.
I dont think to US big 3 will ever come back to the UK regional airports (inc MAN & BHX), the only hope is JetBlue or a similar model.

 

[gulftraveller]

It is easy to forget that even now, at a low water mark, Manchester has twice as many US passengers than Edinburgh. In 2017 it was more like four or five times the number.

I think that at MAN at least, US airlines will return. AA ceded to EI whilst DL is represented by VS. I expect Jet Blue will come, as well as a Star Alliance operator (One World and Sky Team being already covered), in all likelihood UA.

If the dollar continues to weaken, the US will once more become more attractive as a destination for British tourists, though UK would be less attractive for US tourists. The question at MAN is who would take on routes from the past such as LAS, LAX, SEA, ORD, BOS, MIA. In their day they performed well.

 

[Land23R]

US carriers have concentrated on destinations where American tourists most want to vacation, taking advantage of their historically strong US Dollars. Ireland, Scotland and London very much tick that box. The US is currently a very expensive destination for those who get paid in GBP, albeit less acutely than afew months ago. Manchester is very much an outbound market where US travel is concerned. Another factor which influenced route choices in resumption of services was that the UK and EU dropped covid-testing requirements for inbound travellers from the US long before Biden and co returned the compliment for us.

MAN actually does support a very healthy long-haul operation. Eastbound is strong and recovering quickly. Even westbound - which as we note is at a low ebb - can see upto eight scheduled departures in a day (US / Canada / Mexico / Caribbean) with operations by Virgin Atlantic, Aer Lingus UK, TUI Airways, Singapore Airlines and Air Transat. Several of these are not daily, of course, and January / February are the quietest months. Air Canada will rejoin the fray in the Summer. We will reminisce for years to come about the heyday of the Thomas Cook transatlantic scheduled programme from MAN. We punched above our weight with that and may never return to that level of Transatlantic scheduled volume.

Going East, the absence of schedules to India rightly draws comment. But it is easy to forget that Pakistan - a much larger market from the NW - is currently unserved as well. It's a big positive that MAN does have Bangladesh Biman schedules to Dacca and Sylhet though.

I accept that with the dollar at 1.23/1.24 against sterling, the US is likely to be too expensive for many British tourists on which MAN has relied, coupled with inflation in the US as well. As has been said, the exchange rate is attractive for Americans to come to the UK and Europe. But because London and Edinburgh have become the focal points for arrivals into the UK, should MAN just accept that as an immovable fact? The NW and North Wales has plenty of attractions. Would it be flogging a dead horse as the saying goes trying to woo back the US carriers, and efforts be more rewarding concentrating on other markets - India, Pakistan, perhaps Africa? We've not had much luck with India so far. Or should MAN be striving hard with innovative ideas for attracting those US tourists if it's not already doing so?

Is there more potential for the Caribbean? I'm not sure to what extent the local dollar currencies follow the US dollar, but MAN's current offering is mainly Barbados. Canada is restricted to Toronto nowadays. Direct flights to Vancouver and Calgary are gone. The Canadian dollar is about 1.65 to the pound but I'm not up to-date with costs over there. Air fares for direct flights look expensive. Again, I recognise the Friends and Relatives market - in both directions - has diminished over the years but western Canada has tremendous attractions with some wonderful scenery for those who have experienced it.

MAN punching above its weight in the Thomas Cook / Virgin heyday nevertheless did demonstrate what the potential market and demand was for the US, albeit at an exchange rate that was more favourable but not all that high by historical levels. The average rate in 2018 was $1.335 =£1. Of course, we don't know how profitable or otherwise those high frequency routes were but the loads by and large were excellent.

It would be interesting to know how MAN sees its medium term future on longhaul. What will be worth looking for in 2023 is to what extent MAN recovers against 2017-2019 total passenger numbers compared to other UK airports in what is a competitive environment. Yes, STN for example relies more than MAN on its lo-co airlines and may well perform better, but LGW with some longhaul and BHX with a few longhaul and some legacy carriers could make for reasonable comparisons.

 

[jfy1999]

Sean M reports on Twitter that Tunisair are planning to launch Monastir in May 2024.

 

[Scottie Dog]

SPD_travels has re-tweeted this post.
Egyptair have applied for 5 weekly Manchester-Cairo on A320neo from 1st June. Later applications for slots usually have a higher chance of happening, so let’s hope this one comes off. Thanks for
@SeanM1997

 

[mullion]

They are doing Dublin on a regular basis and they are still taking delivery of small buses

 

[Scottie Dog]

Courtesy of @SeanM1997 on Twitter

NEW ROUTE
easyJet - Belfast City to Manchester.
Flights start 26 June 2023
EZY736
BHD 0915-1015 MAN (Mon & Wed)
BHD 1625-1725 MAN (Fri)
BHD 1725-1825 MAN (Sun)
EZY735
MAN 1055-1200 BHD (Mon & Wed)
MAN 1805-1910 BHD (Fri)
MAN 1905-2010 BHD (Sun)

 

[Scottie Dog]

ACL Report for Start of Season S23. Comparisons are with S22.

View attachment 28005
View attachment 28006

 

[LS@MAN]

ACL Report for Start of Season S23. Comparisons are with S22.

View attachment 28005
View attachment 28006

Thanks for the info @Scottie Dog

Making a comparison to the slot report file I downloaded in January, for Ryanair I notice TLS is now missing…should I assume the route is now not starting or could potentially start later in the summer?

 

[EGCC_MAN]

A poster on another forum mentioned that Ryanair have been adding routes and capacity at as little as four weeks notice. This is because of delays to deliveries of new aircraft from Boeing on an unpredictable schedule. They don't want to be caught with seats sold and insufficient aircraft in service to operate them.

 

[Land23R]

Looking at Scottie's extract from the ACL report of Significant Route changes, just a few points that come to mind.

On short haul, confirmation that easyjet, ryanair and Jet 2 are all adding an extra based a/c, even if in some cases, it's not clear when the extra a/c will arrive. That's good news. It's interesting though that despite a higher number of based a/c, Jet 2 have far less ATMs and seats available than the other two carriers.

As reported elsewhere, it's encouraging that Ethiopian will operate an extra flight via Geneva despite earlier slot issues, making it 5 x weekly.

However, there's a cautionary note on some of the other long haul airlines.

CX is shown as returning to daily. Some dates late September / early October on their web site indicated no departures on Sunday & Tuesday I think, so still 5 x weekly at present.

Likewise Qatar have slots for 3 x daily, but their schedules late summer show their evening flight on Monday/Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday only, so 18 x weekly at present rather than 21.

Perhaps potentially most disappointing is Gulf Air. Initially they applied for daily slots - perhaps for safety if they weren't certain which days they would operate - and this reduced to 4 x weekly slots. The ACL listing above also states tbc. When last checked for mid/late summer, flights were only showing as bookable on Sundays and Wednesdays, so only 2 x weekly. Scottie's excellent LF reports each month indicated some very good figures for Gulf Air from MAN, so hopefully, the increase to 4 x weekly may still happen.

If anyone has any more up to-date information, or when it becomes available, regarding actual frequencies for CX, QR and GF, I'm sure it would be appreciated.

 

[LS@MAN]

A poster on another forum mentioned that Ryanair have been adding routes and capacity at as little as four weeks notice. This is because of delays to deliveries of new aircraft from Boeing on an unpredictable schedule. They don't want to be caught with seats sold and insufficient aircraft in service to operate them.

Very true...although I notice TLS is the only route that was previously listed as new and is now missing within the ACL report regarding Ryanair.

Excuse my ignorance, because I'm not completely clued up when it comes to slot allocations etc, so the MAN-TLS slot has been removed from the report but the actual slots are still "held" as the route may operate at a later date pending aircraft deliveries...so based on this, Ryanair would have taken the route into account due to the deadline of allocating slots and will therefore have the slots available to them if and when the extra aircraft is delivered...?

 

[EGCC_MAN]

My guess - but it is a guess - is that only slots confirmed in the report are currently held.

Perhaps someone else can clarify?

 

[mullion]

Gul Air doesn`t suprise me as they only have a small fleet so maybe something else will have to give

 

[jfy1999]

SPD Travels Twitter:
Air India CEO Campbell Wilson has stated that ‘future Air India expansion in the U.K. is likely to include Manchester’.

 

[jfy1999]

Air Sial are interested in Pakistan - Manchester flights -

AirSial launches international operations with eight weekly flights to Jeddah

LAHORE - AirSial, Pakistan's airline in the private sector, kicked off international flight operations from Lahore on Wednesday. At a ceremony to launch

en.dailypakistan.com.pk

'As the ban on EU operations is lifted, flights would be started for Manchester and London as well,' Jilani said as he detailed that currently A320 Airbus is being utilized for flights but soon the fleet would see addition of bigger aircraft as well.

Thanks to SPD Travels on Twitter for the link