Originally Posted by
Scottie Dog
Since this is now in the public domain I thought I would post this which is taken from the Minutes of the Annual Meeting of the Manchester Airport Consultative Committee meeting on 12th April 2019
Members had also expressed disappointment that no permanent fix was imminent for the leaking roof over the Skylink and that the walkways were difficult to repair as they were old and it was hard to obtain replacement parts.
Brad Miller explained that both of these issues had also been raised by airlines. The walkways were also of non standard design which meant parts were difficult to source. Both items would be part of a medium – long term review but there would be no immediate fix.
I had separately written to the Chief Operating Officer and the following is part of the response received:
"As you are aware, the majority of the travellators at Manchester Airport, are aging assets which, need maintaining on a more regular basis. We are currently revising the holding for long lead time items with a view to minimising asset downtime. This review extends beyond the Skylink and covers all lifts, escalator and travellator assets with any stock being held on site at Manchester.
The elevators closest to the GTI have been out of action due to exceptional circumstances. Both lifts in this area were out of service due to a local power station being flooded, which affected the power supply. Whilst one of the elevators was reinstated very quickly the other suffered a power board failure during the outage, and I am happy to report that this lift has now subsequently been returned to service."
Hopefully we will see improvements over the coming months - although this will not be a quick fix.
These out of service escalators and travellators require replacement of core drive components which have a long non-UK manufacture lead time.
These assets form part of a remediation plan that is now live and will span from June-October 2019. Our facilities management team are continually addressing the leak issue within the Skylink area however, until all leaks are identified, and the areas repaired, the capturing of water will remain in the interest of passenger and visitor safety. Whilst we appreciate the appearance may not be appealing on the eye it is only a temporary measure and is being constantly reviewed.
You wonder why they buy non standard equipment in the first place. Instead of these costly repairs in customer experience & money- why were they not replaced with modern, efficient standard models years ago?