Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

London Gatwick has now appeared on the Mahan route map although it's not bookable yet.
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

The Chinese bilaterals are set to increase, not that I'm expecting anything at BHX but it's still handy to know.

The previous agreement, last updated in 2011, limited the passenger airlines of both countries to a maximum of 31 return services per week in each direction, serving up to six destinations in each country.

The new deal will increase the weekly maximum available to both countries to 40 direct flights in each direction, and allow UK airlines to serve up to three more Chinese cities than previously.

Full article: http://atwonline.com/open-skies/uk-agre ... ly+News%29
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

I guess the outcome of Thursdays vote could change the perception of the x6 UK points?

LHR, LGW, MAN, BHX and GLA and EDI? But if Scotland leaves the UK what then?
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

Anything on the rumour mill/Galley FM lately, its been a bit quiet around here...
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

I've not heard much, well nothing that I'd describe as even slightly credible :dunno:

The last realistic rumours I heard were Air India and Emirates, Air India are now confirmed but Emirates remain stagnant at 2x daily.
 
Thomson S15

Germania is to operate one of the Ibiza flights for Thomson in Summer 15.

At least this is something different to look forward to.
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

What happened to FedEx and the MD11? When was that supposed to happen?
 
Re: Thomson S15

Brum X said:
Germania is to operate one of the Ibiza flights for Thomson in Summer 15.

At least this is something different to look forward to.

The timetable seems to have been updated recently, Onur Air look to be doing an Antalya flight on Tuesday mornings, Air Europa look to be doing Palma on a Wednesday morning, Nouvelair were down for an Enfidha flight on Wednesdays but I've read this may switch to Germania on Thursdays and there seems to be a Thursday evening Dalaman TBA.

I guess things could well change again.

Ash said:
What happened to FedEx and the MD11? When was that supposed to happen?

I heard it was due to be upgraded during the run up to Christmas to either an A300 or MD11, I couldn't get an exact date though but maybe CL44 knows something?
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

Just a quick round up of how the next 12 months are shaping up; nothing out of this world but things are generally looking positive.

Aegean Airlines – returning next summer, still at x2 weekly but now operating from the end of March.

Aer Lingus – up to x5 daily to Dublin on some days; also talk of them opening a route to Belfast.

Air India – reportedly increasing to daily flights from November – watch this space.

Air Transat – still x1 weekly but the A330 does appear to operating for a longer period.

Flybe– new winter 14/15 routes to Berlin, Hamburg and Oslo. Cologne, Toulouse, Bordeaux, Florence, Porto and Reykjavik continue to operate through the winter aswell.

Icelandair – new x2 weekly service to KEF from February.

Monarch– new winter flights to Salzburg and Turin. Summer 15 still very much uncertain, Split looks to have gone and so far it appears we have a decrease in based aircraft but things could easily change for both good and bad.

Ryanair – Derry and Reus appear to have gone next year.

Thomas Cook – new A321s will start to replace the ageing 757s over the winter; by the summer x3 A321s and x1 A320 will be based and new summer routes to Djerba, Kalamata and Lesbos launched. The one thing I will ask about Thomas Cook is if anyone knows if the A321s will have the range for the Banjul flights?

Thomson – Sal resumes from the start of November and Barbados replaces Orlando for the winter season as usual. Summer sees new routes to Agadir, Djerba and Porto Santo. Germania appear to be operating a few Thomson flights as well as Onur Air and Air Europa. Long haul wise and Cancun will have an extra frequency next summer.

Like I say nothing spectacular; could be much worse and we've been quite lucky in that EWR hasn't seen any more cuts. Infact if it wasn't for Monarchs uncertainty it wouldn't be looking to bad at all. Hopefully we'll see the Beijing charters return, PIA will get themselves sorted out, Flybe will add Helsinki and perhaps Turkish would be kind enough to go double daily soon?

Please feel free to add anything I might have missed.
 
Re: Thomson S15

Ash said:
What happened to FedEx and the MD11? When was that supposed to happen?

I heard it was due to be upgraded during the run up to Christmas to either an A300 or MD11, I couldn't get an exact date though but maybe CL44 knows something?

Sorry Folks.

I have not heard anything about the possibility of a Fedex A300 / MD11 (but I would not object to either of them). My dealings tend to be with the other Airlines and not Fedex/UPS/TNT etc. It would seem feasible to me for an aircraft change prior to Christmas but we will have to wait and see.
 
Re: Thomson S15

CL44 said:
Ash said:
What happened to FedEx and the MD11? When was that supposed to happen?

I heard it was due to be upgraded during the run up to Christmas to either an A300 or MD11, I couldn't get an exact date though but maybe CL44 knows something?

Sorry Folks.

I have not heard anything about the possibility of a Fedex A300 / MD11 (but I would not object to either of them). My dealings tend to be with the other Airlines and not Fedex/UPS/TNT etc. It would seem feasible to me for an aircraft change prior to Christmas but we will have to wait and see.

Thanks anyway :hatsoff:
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

thunderchild said:
Just a quick round up of how the next 12 months are shaping up; nothing out of this world but things are generally looking positive.

Great round up thanks for that :hatsoff: It seems a lot rests on what happens with Monarch and the release of the Flybe summer timetable.

Also a good point re the Thomas Cook A321 making it to Banjul. According to the Greater Circle Mapper BHX-SSH is 2506 miles and BHX-HRG 2528 miles with both being done by Monarch A321's, although I hear it's not out of the question for a tech stop on the way home. BHX-BJL is 2820 so a good 300 miles further :s_dunno

Ryanair – Derry and Reus appear to have gone next year.

I believe the discussions are still ongoing with Reus and as yet no flights are on sale. Also nothing from Ryanair is bookable from Derry for next summer so hopefully if an agreement is reached we may see it return, if not there is always an outside chance of EIR starting the route. Looking at the timetable it appears there are 4 based some days of the week with 3 the rest of the time, there are however more away based flights. I think overall we're about six flights per week down.
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

The BHX stand at World Routes 2014 in Chicago. It appears the renowned 'curry buffet' is back :)

ByEeYOYCEAAwK5G.jpg
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

Birmingham and Leeds have both reappeared on the Vueling website under both the 'airports' and the 'timetables' sections but as before nothing is bookable and no destinations are listed.
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

Ray Finkle said:
The BHX stand at World Routes 2014 in Chicago. It appears the renowned 'curry buffet' is back :)

ByEeYOYCEAAwK5G.jpg

The guy standing to the left isnt bad either ( Sorry, i couldnt help that, LOL)

:hatsoff: :hatsoff:
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

Ray Finkle said:
Birmingham and Leeds have both reappeared on the Vueling website under both the 'airports' and the 'timetables' sections but as before nothing is bookable and no destinations are listed.

In my opinion Vueling would be a great addition to BHX, following the success of Aegean Airlines and hopefully Icelandair next year. Also we need new airlines like this if BHX hopes to get year on year increase in passenger numbers and to hit that magic 10 million.
 
Re: China Southern Airlines

I agree it's great to see people passionate about the success of BHX :)

The China Southern flights were a success here and a lot of people here want to see that extended to a full service. I have put our views forwardˈto the Chamber of Commerce & China Southern passionately and directly and will continue to so.

Direct flights to China are the ultimate goal and will eventually happen but I think we may still need to wait another couple of years yet. Although our region makes a compelling case with plenty of Chinese interest I'm not sure the London-China market is fully established yet and the airlines BHX are after, China Southern and China Eastern, are still growing. We're not just competing with other UK airports but some pretty major European cities too. This was a quote from Mr Kehoe in an email reply, However, we had to demonstrate a market test which we did this summer and which was very successful. We hope to repeat the programme next year for a longer period. Ultimately, we aim to develop this into a scheduled service.

I don't think it's a no, more of a not yet.

BHX has a great mix of traffic but 3 or 4 flights more long-haul flights making use of the runway extension would transform BHX and benefit business and leisure pax here. That is the bigger picture.

Totally agree but who are going to operate these flights? North America has massive over capacity from London and the airport have more or less confirmed there is nothing going to happen, there is even some doubt about the long term future of United. Virgin Atlantic aren't interested in starting even the leisure routes.

Out of the main Middle Eastern airlines Qatar joining Oneworld pretty much writes them off, BHX is way down the list of priorities for Etihad, which leaves Emirates, a massive brand in the UK and established for 14 years at BHX but showing no signs of expansion. Many thought 3x daily would happen this year yet despite load factors well into the 90%'s and prices not exactly cheap we're still rooted at 2x daily. If there is such a huge untapped market at BHX then this is an airline perfectly positioned to exploit it, the fact that they haven't is concerning. There is also the small matter of an airport just over an hour away having 5x daily A380's.

As for the Far East, China is a work in progress but wheels turn frustratingly slowly with these things, we may see some summer charters from Japan but I can't see it ever leading to a scheduled flight and I reckon it'd be a step too far to get the likes of SQ, TG, NH etc, even as a tag on with another European city.

The only other option I can think of is going for one or two low cost airlines such as Air Canada Rouge or Flynas but to start BHX I reckon they'd require a very good deal and that doesn't appear to be BHX's style.
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

Canada is a tricky one and I think many people like to use the lack of flights to YYZ etc as a means of blasting BHX; to be fair BHX will never see the amount of flights it saw in the 80s due to the fact that the VFR market is drying up. However, this is true for the entire UK market and not just specific to BHX which is why Exeter, Leeds and Newcastle have all lost their links to Canada over the years – the market has changed and Air Transat has had to consolidate their operations accordingly.

The UK regions to Canada is now based on tourism and as Canada is low yielding at the best of times it’s actually quite a hard market to crack. Air Canada Rouge has been set up because the likes of MAN (and BHX) cannot support mainline service; the yields simply don’t work despite the demand. Given that their UK coverage pales to Air Transats I’d be genuinely surprised to see Air Canada Rouge set up shop at BHX – LGW would be the next logical step, in fact I’m quite surprised they didn’t go their first.

As for Flynas; given the fiasco that was their MAN operation I’d be genuinely surprised to see them open another UK point – do they still serve LGW?

IMHO at this point BHX should really focus on continuing to build up its European short haul network aswell as investigating the possibility of any new long haul teaming up with Flybe as a means of feeding pax from this end.

As for China I think all options need to be explored; one of the many rumours that has been discussed was Air China looking at PEK-MAN-DUB. Whether this was fact or someone making it all up I don't know but given that MAN has now reportedly secured Hainan theoretically could a PEK-BHX-DUB flight work? Paul Kehoe will have his direct China link but sharing only half the load with Dublin which I feel is something that could be plausible.
 
Re: Route Development & Airport Rumours

I'm not sure where BHX go from here with regard to the European network. Flybe have been fantastic and hopefully we'll see a bit more from them next year but they can't do it all by themselves and I can't help but feel that to fill some of the gaping holes we've had for many years BHX will either need to get Ryanair back on side or somehow get Easyjet interested. TAP and Flybe Nordic should be absolute priorities.

Paul Kehoe will have his direct China link but sharing only half the load with Dublin which I feel is something that could be plausible.

If they can't get a standalone service then an arrangement such as this could be worth exploring although possibly not with Air China as they have just gone double daily at Heathrow so I can't see them turning up at BHX. I think the best we can hope for at the moment is news of an expanded charter programme for next year, whether that be a couple of flights per week or just weekly for a longer period.

Long haul wise my main concern is the failure of BHX to get a third flight out of Emirates. I've lost count of how many consultative committee meetings minutes have stated 'discussions are ongoing with Emirates over adding more capacity' yet still nothing. If BHX want this years record growth to continue into 2015 then surely Emirates expansion has to be a must?
 

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