Norwich-2

[Mike Flynn]

Originally Posted by MDS

It'd be nice if they got rid of the £10 departure tax. It's a bad faith 'gotcha' charge which annoys a lot of customers and prevents any real expansion from LCC's.

Soon it'll be the only airport in the UK with such a ridiculous scheme (as MME airport is soon to abolish it) -- infact, I can't think of any other in the whole of Europe which does this nonsense.

After Flybe abandon the sun routes at the end of summer the airport will have the same soggy set of routes they had over 15 years ago; ABZ, AMS, MAN, and EDI (although with even less frequency) - (https://web.archive.org/web/20040807.../timetable.pdf). Less holiday destinations in summertime too. Despite collecting at least £50m since the inception of the passenger fee, there have been no improvements to justify even a fraction of that cost.

Summer 2004 allowed you to fly to LPA, MAH, SPU, ALC, PMI, MLA, TFS, PFO, ACE, AGP, DLM, JER, IBZ, FAO, DBV, CFU. Even winter was able to maintain a solid set of routes.

They've pushed out all the GA flyers with extortionate charges, and all the flying schools (besides Premier Flight) have abandoned it (Anglia Air Centre, Norwich School of Flying, etc.)

I'm not a hater of the airport by any means -- it's one of the main influences as to why I became interested in aviation many years ago and pursued it as a career, hence I'm quite passionate about what happens at NWI; but what positives are there to speak about nowadays? Any?

That is an excellent assessment of Norwich MDS.

Many years ago we had the GA centre with a wonderful club and bar overlooking the airport.

In my early days flying up from the Channel Islands I was allowed to park outside the terminal building for a few hours. This was 1992 when the airport was run by the local council as a facility not a money making machine.

Saxonair provide a good handling service.In the case of the recent royals they would have handled them to the aircraft so like GA aircraft no departure fee or miserable staff in what I can best describe as a shed.

The management of Norwich know the airport is dependent on the oil and gas offshore trade. KLM Engineering has just signed a deal with Rigby to put up a new shed but with Brexit one has to ask what future Norwich has.

I have a few critics such as Nick Barnes but when you descend to the basement of Pprune you find the anoraks and spotters.

The reason private GA and helicopter movements have left Norwich is down to the management who treat their customers in a truly abysmal way.

The airport building is little more than a sad looking industrial building with a lot of bored low paid staff.

Be nice to see what flying qualifications Nick has to post on what is a pilots rumour network?