Route Development & Rumours

[flymetothemoon]

JJ, Its a bus service between Dubai & Abu Dhabi,approx 1 hour if i remember properly

 

[JENNYJET]

JJ, Its a bus service between Dubai & Abu Dhabi,approx 1 hour if i remember properly

Thank you as that leads me to the question....Would Etihad be of any benefit to BHX or vice versa? Emirates have the UAE, Qatar have their spot leaving Gulf to fill the Bahrain route since BA hold Birmingham in some kind of contempt.

Gulf could use a smallish aircraft and build up accordingly thus placing little extra strain on the current facilities at BHX, however, should Etihad wish to serve Birmingham England and relieve slot pressures elsewhere within our Kingdom, using BHX as a stopover enroute to Vancouver or Seattle for example to satisfy congressional angst, then perhaps the ANZ option, if it becomes apparent, would be unnecessary as perhaps a market for New Zealand is rather smaller than that of the UAE.

Am I making any kind of logical sense?

 

[Ray Finkle]

Would we also wish to see Gulf Air if one wished to go to Bahrain nonstop?

Gulf Air announced flights to Birmingham back in 2004. It was to be a 4x weekly 763 to Abu Dhabi from April 2005 rising to daily in the June.

Obviously they never happened. Emirates announced their second daily service not too long after so it could have put them off.

 

[JENNYJET]

Thank you Sir Raymond but Dubai and Bahrain are not exactly next door to each other are they, and even if in the same region is it not possible for Gulf to serve the route on a small scale at least? Again, considering the potential logjam at Heathrow?

 

[Ray Finkle]

I guess anything is possible.

It's only my opinion but I'd take Etihad over Gulf Air any day. For connections Gulf Air's 42 destinations do not compare with Etihad's 116 and I'd bet that Abu Dhabi would be much preferred to Bahrain when it comes to transiting.

I'm not sure of the point to point numbers between Birmingham and Bahrain but I've never seen it in any list of top connections.

 

[User001]

And don't forget, Gulf Air were only going to serve Abu Dhabi as they couldn't get the rights to serve Bahrain at the time, the same happened at MAN in the 90's, which set the route up to fail as there wasn't really any sizeable network to work with.

Etihad would be preferable over Gulf Air for many reasons:

As said, the network sizes are like David and Goliath. There isn't really a comparison.

Bahrain is currently not one of the best places to visit. It's still recovering from what was essentially a civil war just a few years ago (I know civil war sounds rather dramatic but it wasn't pretty)

Gulf Air themselves are not exactly in the best shape. Most of the widebody fleet is gone, a lot of routes cut and using A320's used on routes as far as LHR. They have essentially turned into a regional airline.

The main airlines for the Middle East that have the best potential to serve UK points are Emirates, Etihad, Qatar, Oman Air, Saudia and Kuwait Airways.

 

[Brum X]

So with Summer 2017 well and truly launched with Monarch, Vueling starting to upload flights for S17 and our fantastic 4 aircraft Jet2 base (Really chuffed with) what do people think is the future for Norweigan Air Shuttle at BHX.
I notice they still havent launched BCN/MAD for winter so at the moment we have routes to AGP/TFS/LPA.

So will Norweigan stay around with some flights here and there like they do at the moment, will they fight back and base aircraft at BHX or increase flights with away based aircraft or make a quick escape from BHX after the winter 16/17 season ??? I hope its not the latter but things are becoming interesting.

 

[Ray Finkle]

The only UK airport to currently have BCN on sale for winter is Gatwick. BHX, MAN and EDI have nothing as yet and their BCN timetable is far from finished.

As for the future it seems as if they could possibly be the one squeezed the most. Monarch, Ryanair and Jet2 are all solid names and Vueling have IAG and the BA code shares to help them out.

That said AGP and TFS are bookable well into 2017 (June) and LPA is due some updating (the Sun flight starts in Oct then stops again at the end of the same month), so there is definitely commitment there.

The issues with the US authorities must also be causing them a big headache. From the noises they were making regional UK was to be an important part of their US expansion, if that's now off the table might they just walk away back to Europe?

I guess the next few months will tell us whether they're up for the fight or not but I don't think that we've heard the last of them yet. They're known for leaving things late

 

[User001]

Norwegian are due a timetable update soon, and there are new UK routes due to be announced.

I'm not sure the exact date of this update though.

 

[Ray Finkle]

BHX have said that they are expecting new routes from Norwegian, at least one was supposed to be for this winter.

Although it seems that Norwegian like to leave things late I don't know why they don't jump in on Palma and Rome. Both routes are heavily rumoured for Vueling so if Norwegian played it right they could get in there first.

Jet2's daily Palma will bring the numbers back up but there should still be room for more and Rome definitely needs some competition.

 

[David_itl]

Also of note is that the CEO of Gulf Traveller back in the day when they initially said Manchester but then went for Birmingham is a certain James Hogan. He who is CEO of Etihad. Perhaps he's living the dream of getting "his" airline into BHX from the Middle East!

 

[hishaq96]

Saudi Airlines should start Birmingham flights and they should get big loads.

 

[ronnoc1k8]

That should be one of BHX's targets, there is a huge Muslim community in Birmingham that want direct flights for Hajj or Umrah.

 

[Ray Finkle]

Do we know QR loads ?

From when they started in March until mid May the loads were very healthy indeed. Towards the end of May it started to tail off and June has been very quiet, as expected. Things are starting to pick up again and recent loads have been excellent. Forward booking are also healthy from what I hear.

The good news is it doesn't seem to have made much of a difference to Emirates. Their recent outbounds have been near enough full with inbounds not too far off.

Air India and PIA are also looking healthy.

I think that the only one showing concern at the moment is Turkmenistan, although we've seen a couple of 738's recently which will hopefully help matters.

 

[IanFarquharson]

Qatar had

423 pax on Sunday
847 pax on Saturday's two flights

 

[Kevin Farnell]

Qatar had

423 pax on Sunday
847 pax on Saturday's two flights

Thanks Ian.

I make that an 83.4% average load factor for Saturday and 83.3% for Sunday.

Regards

Kevin

 

[Brum X]

Great to see Qatar and EK loads picking up again and it appears they are not effecting each other which is the most positive news about this. Anybody know how good old Air India are doing too ??

 

[IanFarquharson]

Air India
Sat = 355
Sun = 349

 

[rutamkrd]

Thank you Sir Raymond but Dubai and Bahrain are not exactly next door to each other are they, and even if in the same region is it not possible for Gulf to serve the route on a small scale at least? Again, considering the potential logjam at Heathrow?

Just a pointer re Gulfair once great - now very diminished they actually struggle to fill their two daily Heathrow services that are scheduled with A332s and frequently mid week flights are downgraded to an A320 !
Similarly they only serve Frankfurt and Paris with the A320.
So if they struggle in the golden triangle what hope to BHX or MAN any time soon?

Beyond Bahrain the connecting options are meagre these days and going East well the do serve quite a few Indian points mainly for local migrant workers but further East its just the nanny shuttles to Manila and Bangkok.

They are a busted flush these days and probably not worth chasing.

 

[Brum X]

Air India
Sat = 355
Sun = 349

Thanks for the info, good to see Air India still picking up the pax