Leeds Bradford - General Thread

[dmrodgers]

Just seen an article saying that of all UK airports, LBA had the 2nd biggest drop in passengers in 2020, down 82%. Only London City ( surprisingly) fared worse. Another AMP airport, Luton, had the smallest reduction, but still 65%.

I guess that is a result of being generally a 'bucket and spade' airport with very few business and city flights like other airports in the UK. Hopefully once the new terminal is up and open we will be able to attract some new airlines offering city destinations and business flights.

 

[White Heather]

I guess that is a result of being generally a 'bucket and spade' airport with very few business and city flights like other airports in the UK. Hopefully once the new terminal is up and open we will be able to attract some new airlines offering city destinations and business flights.

I agree, but surely London City is the exact opposite, with mainly business routes, and it's had the biggest drop, by over 90%. I think it proves a good mix of leisure and business is essential when times are tough.

 

[Len Fish]

Maybe those normally using London City, especially those in the nearby financial sector, have been working from home, holding meetings via Zoom and the like so not travelling. Plus it was closed completely for three months in 2020 due to the slump in passengers.

 

[jason1-11]

BA (LCY's biggest customer) consolidated flights to LHR as most routes are duplicated so the limited demand was met by purely cancelling and re-routing. This obviously had cost benefits for IAG.

 

[airforced]

Is anyone else sick and tired of interviews and meetings (LCC for example) on zoom? I do feel that when we get back to normal, whatever that ends up being, that zoom will quickly be forgotton as it is a poor alternative to the real thing and it won't take the place of face to face meetings and so on. If that is the case then we can expect that normal travel, which includes airlines, will really take off again (excuse the pun). Business routes from our new terminal will therefore become more important than ever when added to the mix of our bucket and spade business which most certainly will be resurgent.

 

[Aviador]

No amount of technology will replace face to face. Not now, not ever.

 

[Len Fish]

These Zoom and the like meetings always seem to be strained. I’ve watched my daughter on them, you don’t get any of the eye contact, body language to get the mood of the meeting or to judge when to speak or stay quiet. Plus it makes chairing the meeting and keeping order almost impossible as everyone piles in at once. The planning meeting was a prime example, although I suspect that would have been a shambles even if held in person, given some of the personnel present!

 

[gcoabc1]

These Zoom and the like meetings always seem to be strained. I’ve watched my daughter on them, you don’t get any of the eye contact, body language to get the mood of the meeting or to judge when to speak or stay quiet. Plus it makes chairing the meeting and keeping order almost impossible as everyone piles in at once. The planning meeting was a prime example, although I suspect that would have been a shambles even if held in person, given some of the personnel present!

Well put. I fully agree with you. My daughter regularly has Zoom meetings and she says the same things. I believe that something like 80% of effective communications is around the physical recognition on your face of the intent and emphasis you apply to whatever facts you are trying to get across and similarly the reactions of your audience to that. Comedians are masters of this.
It always staggers me that General Studies is not compulsory at schools because it provides a breadth of communications, fact based research and presentation skills so desperately needed these days. After all face to face is how we all prefer to conduct our social lives which has been particularly missing and stressful during the pandemic.

 

[White Heather]

The last airport ACC was on Teams. It was well controlled by LBA as they muted everyone except the person speaking. No interrupting. Speakers had to put their hand up (visible to the temporary chair) if they wanted to speak, and it worked ok. However, despite the fact my coffee is better than the airport's, it's no substitute for face to face and I hate it as much now as I hated telekits at work. Many people are very reluctant to speak out when at face to face meetings, they are regular contributors.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Just seen an article saying that of all UK airports, LBA had the 2nd biggest drop in passengers in 2020, down 82%. Only London City ( surprisingly) fared worse. Another AMP airport, Luton, had the smallest reduction, but still 65%.

I don't know which stats that report was quoting. The CAA table for the year to December 2020 (and thus for the calendar year) which they remove each month after all airports have reported showed the following:

Cardiff down 86.8%
Exeter down 85.5%
Newquay down 85.3%
Southampton down 83.4%
London City down 82.3%
Leeds-Bradford down 81.2%
East Midlands down 80.7%

Not all airports had reported but of those that had (the majority) the fall for the other airports was between 79.6% and 72.7%, albeit some of the tiny Scottish airports had smaller percentage drops. Luton, said to have the least reduction, had not yet reported; neither had Doncaster-Sheffield, LBA's 'neighbour'.

Other airports in the North were Newcastle down 79.6%; Manchester down 76.1%; Teesside down 74.9%; Liverpool down 73.5%.

 

[White Heather]

It was just a news item that popped up. Can't remember what the publication was.

 

[mdobuk21]

Manchester is closing during the night from Monday 15th March 21:00-07:00 this is for all traffic, scheduled, biz, football related and freight. I wonder if we will see anything on the days we are open?

 

[White Heather]

Manchester is closing during the night from Monday 15th March 21:00-07:00 this is for all traffic, scheduled, biz, football related and freight. I wonder if we will see anything on the days we are open?

Not unless we open specifically to take their traffic as we are closed too.

 

[dmrodgers]

I agree, but surely London City is the exact opposite, with mainly business routes, and it's had the biggest drop, by over 90%. I think it proves a good mix of leisure and business is essential when times are tough.

You are right the WH, a good mixture of leisure and business flights is needed once the terminal is completed to make the airport profitable for years to come.

 

[LBA4EVER]

Its mainly thanks to wizz air that luton has seen one of the least drops in pax.

 

[Sherburnflyer92]

No amount of technology will replace face to face. Not now, not ever.

Don't let the anti carbon emissions lot hear that. They will get so angry.

 

[Sherburnflyer92]

Its mainly thanks to wizz air that luton has seen one of the least drops in pax.

Agreed. Wizz Air provided a good service for LTN. Meanwhile our airlines had to deal with Grant Shapps and his most useless of game of "where can I throw a dart board at today" game. Which meant airlines had to chase capacity as it headed East.

 

[Jetchaser]

Can someone please tell me how Teesside Airport is opening new routes all the time and seem to be now serving UK locations that I don't think even LBA are not serving?

How come they are building their route network at a pace LBA could only dream of?

 

[Aviador]

Supportive politician!

 

[Finger66]

Whilst it’s great to see any new routes springing up at the moment, as soon as any subsidy/support is removed the airlines will be off as quickly as they arrived. Some of these new MME routes will survive but some won’t. It’s good business sense for airlines at the moment but once normality returns they will be off to more lucrative pastures. Not saying that will be LBA, just don’t see most of MME surviving