Archive Route Development & Rumours

[Dobbo]

Indeed, although the motivation to start cannot be too great. If it helps to trigger a rush of subcontinental airlines (cough... Air India... cough... Scoot) it should be a good thing.

 

[User001]

I'm betting we may see a DAC-LHR-MAN-DAC flight again.......

 

[Dobbo]

Who operates to LHR? Biman?

Would work okay I suppose, I suspect the target market is a similar but distinct demographic like PIA.

 

[ethanegcc]

Biman operates to LHR via Sylhet I think. Whatever gets us a link to Bangladesh is great!

 

[Aceshigh]

http://m.aviationweek.com/blog/hainan-airlines-manchester-service-bedding-down-nicely

New destinations ?

 

[Borneobob]

Can anyone explain why airlines such as Wizz and Blue Air continue not serve Manchester? Wizz are the largest low cost airline in Central/Eastern Europe, and many of the destinations they fly to from other airports are not currently served from MAN. With the huge growth in services and passenger numbers flying from Manchester, are they not "missing the trick" by not flying there?

 

[Dobbo]

Presumably the airline and airport cannot agree commercial terms. I cant believe they are unaware of MAN.

 

[Aceshigh]

http://centreforaviation.com/analys...s-europes-largest-airport-gets-new-ceo-320199

Potentially a bad move for their Manchester Hub. It demonstrates how fortunes and strategy can change in an instant. It was only Nov that FlyBe indicated that Heathrow economics didn't work!

One really does wonder what's changed in 6 weeks.
( ...cough ! )

As the only Dash operator have they been offered "preferential rates"? HAL will be delighted to see extra connectivity to the regions although immediately BA slashed it's fares on same day Flybe are due to start. Plus if Virgin failed it's difficult to see how the FlyBe model can complete.

Two major markets for Manchester which previously fed Manchester will NOW feed Heathrow as well.

If I was MAG I would be sending the new CEO a Christmas Card pronto !

 

[Dobbo]

I don't believe BE will survive long. BA will see to that.

I'm not entirely sure of the codeshare arrangements. Take SQ for example, I think BE can offer the codeshare to SIN via MAN but not LHR. I'm not sure why they wouldn't offer it, but you never know.

 

[Dobbo]

http://m.aviationweek.com/blog/hainan-airlines-manchester-service-bedding-down-nicely

New destinations ?

Presumably DUB.

In the context of China, I can see Air China to Shanghai in 2017 but no other new routes.

 

[Aceshigh]

"I don't believe BE will survive long. BA will see to that."

Well I'm not here to cheer on the failure of a route especially by an operator so prominent at MAN, however we are deluded if we don't believe that this will eat into the margins at Manchester for as long as the service endures.

Personally I would be really interested to know what the landing fee charges are.

As a Dash 8 operator is it possible they have been offered a substantial deal that will ensure the routes success "at any cost".

Competition is to be welcomed but only at rates which don't distort the market.

Given what was said previously this appears to be a monumental handbrake turn in terms of strategy, such decisons are primarily influenced by cost!

 

[Land23R]

China.
Thanks for the link Aceshigh. Interesting and fairly positive article for Hainan at MAN. Note the last 2 sentences though re time frames to start new routes and caution re immediate developments.

As Dobbo says, I think Air China to Shanghai is all we can hope for in 2017 in terms of a new route, and I still remain cautious about that. There is the prospect of HU going daily with the DUB tag on 4 days, which with a 50/50 pax split is equivalent to 5 x weekly for a MAN only but with the benefit of daily flights.

 

[Coathanger16]

I've seen it said (can't remember if it was here or another forum), that when Virgin was operating "Little Red" they were leasing the aircraft and pilots from Aer Lingus. From the start this would have been a cost Virgin would have to recoup whilst flyBe won't be disadvantaged as such.

Further, flyBe will be flying smaller aircraft (c. 80 pax vs c. 170 pax) which will be easier to fill.

As has been pointed out before, flyBe will likely be the only Dash 8 operator and its not hard to imagine that Heathrow Management have set the costs for handling such an aircraft much lower.

Finally, flyBe has a lot of experience flying short haul and domestic flights, whereas Virgin Atlantic had very little if any.

The airlines and scenarios under which they will be flying are very different, so to say that flyBe will fail just because Virgin did, whilst not completely unjustified, isn't entirely true.

 

[Dobbo]

I think you make good points Coathanger, and I agree that BE are better placed to deal with short haul flying than VS. However, the nature of BA's shuttle operation makes it very hard for anyone to compete on these routes. I can see why LHR might look to support BE as much as possible, but it is clearly in BAs interest for BE to fail.

 

[Coathanger16]

Any idea how they're doing on their London City routes? They're up against BA there and are operating at half the frequencies that BA is.

I think the other aspect that will play an important role in flyBe's success at Heathrow is codeshares. Correct me if I'm wrong but Virgin's Little Red was used solely to feed passengers onto Virgin Atlantic's long haul network. Elsewhere flyBe has codeshares with Aer Lingus, Air India, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, Emirates, Etihad, Finnair, Virgin Atlantic & Singapore Airlines (according to Wikipedia). With the exception of BA/EI, there's no reason why those other airlines would be against flyBe acting as a feeder airlines to their Heathrow flights.

 

[Scottie Dog]

As a former employee of the Corporate travel industry I would disagree with you with regards to Little Red only feeding Virgin's longhaul network.

Little Red offered some very attractive point to point fare on their domestic routes, including Manchester to Heathrow and was quite popular with a proportion of the business travellers.

 

[Coathanger16]

As a former employee of the Corporate travel industry I would disagree with you with regards to Little Red only feeding Virgin's longhaul network.

Little Red offered some very attractive point to point fare on their domestic routes, including Manchester to Heathrow and was quite popular with a proportion of the business travellers.

Fair enough. My point was more that you wouldn't get passengers flying Edinburgh to Heathrow with Little Red and then connect onto a non-Virgin Atlantic flight i.e. EDI-LHR (Little Red) LHR-HKG (Cathay Pacific).

 

[User001]

Air Malta ending scheduled ops from May, but will still run 2 weekly on behalf of Thomson.

Shame, but with Jet2, Ryanair and Easyjet fighting for scheduled seats as well as Air Malta, someone was going to loose out.

 

[Aceshigh]

I'm not sure on the economics of this but wasn't too many JVs the killer blow for BMI. In the end they seemed to only carry pax on behalf of other airlines hardly making any profit themselves.

I have no knowledge on this other than hearsay.

Clarification and explanation welcome.

 

[User001]

Both the Enter Air B738 and ASL Airlines B737-700 bases have now been confirmed. Small planet still running a base next summer so it's a good increase and a new airline for MAN.

2 more based airlines to be confirmed soon.