American Airlines

[JENNYJET]

If O'Leary's aspirations to open flights to the US ever come to fruition BHX will be a perfect candidate airport. O'Leary understands the public desire for regional departures and the willingness to use them. The US carriers and airlines such as BA aren't interested in venturing away from London and it will take an airline like Ryanair to offer something different before the others wake up and realise the importance of the UK regions.

Just wondering what Ryanair might use as the vessel to traverse the North Atlantic? Dip into the desert to find a spare B767 or A330/A340/B777 perhaps?

It would be an explosive entry into the Transatlantic market but only if Mr. O'Leary had the courage to replicate Sir Freddie Laker!!!

 

[JENNYJET]

If O'Leary's aspirations to open flights to the US ever come to fruition BHX will be a perfect candidate airport. O'Leary understands the public desire for regional departures and the willingness to use them. The US carriers and airlines such as BA aren't interested in venturing away from London and it will take an airline like Ryanair to offer something different before the others wake up and realise the importance of the UK regions.

Just wondering what Ryanair might use as the vessel to traverse the North Atlantic? Dip into the desert to find a spare B767 or A330/A340/B777 perhaps?

It would be an explosive entry into the Transatlantic market but only if Mr. O'Leary had the courage to replicate Sir Freddie Laker!!!

 

[Jerry]

Maybe BHX and it's catchment area can only sustain 1 daily flight to a New York airport area? Maybe for the airport this could mean United getting extra pax and upgrading to a 767? And as a regular transatlantic flyer to the west coast stopping and connecting on the east coast is not that appealing to me. I prefer a short hop say to a hub like AMS or DUB then a direct flight from there as in many cases it's a shorter overall journey time.

 

[Jerry]

Just wondering what Ryanair might use as the vessel to traverse the North Atlantic? Dip into the desert to find a spare B767 or A330/A340/B777 perhaps?

757 and then maybe eventually 737 Max 8/9 as that would have the range to get to the east coast and could also be used on it's other routes.
But i honestly believe he could be beaten to it by JetBlue.

 

[Brum X]

It may be that BHX can only sustain 1 daily flight at the moment to New York but the fact remains that until we can get a different product compared to our existing United flight, i still feel optimistic that BHX can have another successful USA route. Members of another airport keep telling us that they can be successful with AA with no tv's on the back of the seats, well for one AA have been around at MAN for years unlike at BHX and secondly as far as i am aware they use 767's on this route for most of the year and that could be the game changer. Do i go on a 757 with a poor product or a bigger plane with a poor product. People who live in North Birmingham/South Staffs would probably be slightly more enthusiastic for the latter and travel upto MAN.
Also to keep comparing BHX and MAN is a bit annoying as MAN covers the whole of the north of England with multiple large cities close together, also covers North Birmingham/Staffs and some of scotland. Its an airport of 23 million pax so i would expect this airport to have multiple routes to New York. Maybe just maybe there is too much capacity on this route and may be further casualties in the future at MAN. TCX having massive USA expansion at MAN will not help BHX as this is a well known brand who only appear to be interested in MAN. Now what i would love to see and to confirm if BHX can sustain a quality product to New York is for us to have a carrier like Norweigan open up at BHX, not MAN, just BHX in complete competition with the likes of TCX at MAN and then see what happens.
Now if that was a failure then BHX has failed in a big way, but we are not being given the chance at the moment to compare. Lets hope the airport development team are still talking to these airlines to put it into reality.

 

[TM3]

Personally I don't think that AA wanted to take any traffic away from LHR, it's not in their interest to do that with their JV with BA.

I think this is more to do with them seeing United charge a premium price for their service to EWR and cream off some passengers who only wanted to fly from their local airport, that's why they offered something so similar to UA.

As United's loads were seemingly unaffected when AA was running this service I think it has proved additional demand, just not another aircraft running at the same time. Most likely this would be just an upgauge to a 767 (by United) but they could add a couple of additional flights on peak days at a different time on another 757 if they wanted.

I think if AA tried the same on a smaller newer aircraft like an A321LR or a 737 MAX they'd probably get away with it.

I don't think BHX's problem is lack of demand to the US I think it's the lack of another airline who isn't already heavily invested in maintaining services to LHR especially now that BA/AA and Virgin/Delta have pinned their hopes of transatlantic expansion on DUB and MAN respectively. From the legacy players that only really leaves United unless another Star Alliance airline wants to come in.

Maybe a disrupter like Jet Blue is our best hope.

 

[David_itl]

Personally I don't think that AA wanted to take any traffic away from LHR, it's not in their interest to do that with their JV with BA.

Having the JV with BA lessens the risk for them flying out of the regions. If they didn't want to take traffic away from LHR, why do they persist in maintaining JFK, ORD and PHL ex-MAN, and PHL ex-GLA and JFK ex-EDI. There's no shortage of shuttle flights for them to take prospective passengers down to Heathrow.

 

[TM3]

Having the JV with BA lessens the risk for them flying out of the regions. If they didn't want to take traffic away from LHR, why do they persist in maintaining JFK, ORD and PHL ex-MAN, and PHL ex-GLA and JFK ex-EDI. There's no shortage of shuttle flights for them to take prospective passengers down to Heathrow.

I assume these routes make money. Closing a profit making route is riskier than sitting out new route to see if it makes money.

I think one of the differences between BHX and the other airports in the UK is the fact that you can drive to LHR and no-one can work out exactly the effect of that.

In terms of convenience it sits somewhere between getting non-stop and one stopping. Plus routes like JFK where there is a lot of choice and high frequency are often cheaper at LHR which is another factor.

 

[nwoody2001]

i have no real interest in meaningfully engaging with the topic of conversation as it is one that has been done to death, but have read some of the comments here, I feel compelled to put some facts down to inform your discussions going forward.

1. AA pulling out of BHX does not mean there is no market for the route or product, but instead that the market that does exist does not meet the commercial expectations of AAs business model. As a consequence, when commercial expectations are not meet, suitable adjustments need to be made. This has been the case at both BHX, MAN and number of other European routes. In BHXs case it resulted in the route being pulled, in MANs case it resulted in the route going seasonal.
2. The arrival of AA into BHX has proved a market does existing between BHX and NYC above that provided by UA. Over the last 6-9 months, pax levels for UA have returned to what they were before AAs arrival, with both UA and AA operating consistently through the summer at between 70-90% LF. This is tangible evidence that a market does indeed exist, just not one that meets AA requirements, most likely with regard to yield.
3. AA pulling out of BHX does not demonstrate that such a route is not sustainable, its simply demonstrates that AA felt that their finite resource could better be utilised serving other markets.

 

[Kevin Farnell]

And we were not the only airport to be suspended, they were much bigger airports too.

Cancelled Routes:
Chicago O’Hare – Dusseldorf Seasonal service will not be resumed in summer 2017, previously scheduled daily from 11MAY17 with Boeing 767
New York JFK – Birmingham Service to be cancelled from 06JAN17 (JFK departure), currently served by Boeing 757
Philadelphia – Brussels Seasonal service will not be resumed in summer 2017, previously scheduled daily from 05MAY17 with Boeing 757
Philadelphia – Zurich Seasonal service will not be resumed in summer 2017, previously scheduled daily from 04MAY17 with Boeing 767

Looking at this list, BHX is the only year round service to be dropped.

In BHXs case it resulted in the route being pulled, in MANs case it resulted in the route going seasonal.

With regard to the above, I would view MAN's now seasonal route as tending towards 'at risk'.

Kevin

 

[hammerb32]

Having the JV with BA lessens the risk for them flying out of the regions. If they didn't want to take traffic away from LHR, why do they persist in maintaining JFK, ORD and PHL ex-MAN, and PHL ex-GLA and JFK ex-EDI. There's no shortage of shuttle flights for them to take prospective passengers down to Heathrow.

If Mr Smith in Preston wants to fly to New York will he really drive to MAN for an hour, take a couple of hours checking in, take a shuttle to LHR for 90 mins spend a couple of hours transiting at LHR to then take his 7 flight to JFK with AA or will he just drive to MAN and get on the Delta flight saving himself 4 hours? If AA didn't fly from MAN, EDI or GLA they would concede this market to a competitor.

BHX is very different as it's a very short drive to LHR or MAN, from my house it would take 45 minutes to drive to BHX, 90 to drive to LHR or 75 to MAN, that's assuming there's no traffic issues. When AA rock up with a 30 year old plane that hasn't seen an upholsterer or anyone from IT in those 30 years and then charge a premium fare would Mr Smith in Wolverhampton pay the extra £300 to fly to NYC or save the £300 and drive the extra 30 minutes to MAN and take the much better service offered by TCX or DL?

 

[David_itl]

Yes. Mr Smith fron Preston DOES drive down to LHR instead of using MAN. 4 million passengers from the MAN catchment area use LHR despite extensive ops from here. The combined LBA/MAN shuttles only amount to 1 million so that leaves 3 million on surface transport.

 

[flymetothemoon]

Went out on AA131 last Saturday fulload as far as could see,back today could only see 3 or 4 seats empty
Business almost full both ways

 

[hammerb32]

Yes. Mr Smith fron Preston DOES drive down to LHR instead of using MAN. 4 million passengers from the MAN catchment area use LHR despite extensive ops from here. The combined LBA/MAN shuttles only amount to 1 million so that leaves 3 million on surface transport.

No doubt but I'd guess most of the 3 million are getting on direct services not available from MAN rather than routing from LHR into a hub to onward connect again where MAN is connected to the same hub.

 

[Brum X]

Went out on AA131 last Saturday fulload as far as could see,back today could only see 3 or 4 seats empty
Business almost full both ways

United then will be happy boys and id expect them to be scheduling there 767 on the BHX-EWR route for S17.

 

[JENNYJET]

Let United allocate their remaining B747-4 for a promotional period before they retire the aircraft and then see the demand in context, after which deploy B777/B787?

AA have no Balls, just the army of spreadsheet robots following every Cent in live scrutiny at Chicago HQ..

Very unsatisfactory.

 

[IanFarquharson]

Loads have really picked up the AA JFK with 174 pax yesterday

Pity they are going !

 

[Matt995]

The final AA130 from New York JFK is just taxing out at JFK, aircraft N198AA running over an hour late!

Is this the last AA B757 we may see at Birmingham??

 

[DaveBham]

The final AA130 from New York JFK is just taxing out at JFK, aircraft N198AA running over an hour late!

Is this the last AA B757 we may see at Birmingham??

Let's hope so. Old aircraft that keep going tech are hardly a good advert for transatlantic travel from National airports (prefer this term to regional, which sounds so parochial).

 

[BHXsupporter]

I agree with you and with hammerb32's sentiments above wrt old frames. That's not the way to establish loyalty for a service and perhaps therefore they got what they put in (and Newton's 3rd Law of Motion was applied: 'When one body exerts a force on a second body, the second body simultaneously exerts a force equal in magnitude and opposite in direction on the first body').