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I missed the fact about the lower number of weekends this August compared to 2003 and that will have had a big effect. July and September should receive a boost for the same reason, probably more so for July as I assume the schools went back last week.
I should point out the more positive angle that August was LBA’s second busiest month of all time. For the year, including August, there have been 1,554,228 passengers compared to 1,327,023 in 2003 and we still have the busy months of September and October to come.
If anything it’s been Murcia that’s been a surprise to me, though I know relatively little about the area. The proximity to ALC might look like a problem but in July more people went to MJV with Jet2 than to ALC (or BCN). A scan of the Low Fare finder suggests MJV is priced a little lower than ALC but it’s clearly doing far better than BGO last year.
KAT TOO
Do you have any solid data on where passengers at LBA come from? Without this I don’t see how you can support your statements. Some ought to exist as it’s a fundamental thing for the airport to know in order to target advertising…. OK maybe there isn’t any, but there should.
Just from looking at a map I would say the following. We know that passengers go to MAN from the entire north of England. Closest to DSA are Doncaster, Rotherham and Sheffield. Most people from here would go to MAN or EMA anyway not LBA. Folks from Leeds, Bradford, Harrogate and York are most likely to use LBA and MAN, but we know many travelers for LCC’s will travel a couple of hours to EMA or LPL given the right price. At least LBA is grabbing this market sector back via Jet2.
So, how many people from the middle ground cities of Huddersfield and Wakefield will choose DSA as opposed to LBA that wouldn’t take MAN over both of them anyway? I know there will always be exceptions if you live in Leeds next to Junction x of the M62 and you say it’s easier to get to MAN (or DSA) than LBA but I think that’s dependent on the time of day you need to travel.
I think it’s far too early to say that DSA will take large numbers of passengers from LBA. The IT range on offer at DSA is (potentially) better than LBA but will be duplicated fully at MAN so surely that’s where the effect will be felt most.
The presence of Jet2 on the AMS route had no effect on KLC figures, in fact many months KLC recorded year on year rises, so joining bmi to CDG is probably going to be similar.
There is only one reliable method to find out what IT programme LBA has for any given summer – wait until the 1st May and look at teletext! The fact that BAL keep filling a B767 for out of season IT flights says that people do want to fly from LBA. I think it’s down to the LBA management to drag in the operators and overly relying on My Travel and TUI to the run of the mill Spanish destinations just hasn’t done the job. Time to be more creative, just like NCL and EMA.
PTH