Since about 1990 Aberdeen has seen about seven different owners of the flying school/club, some good, some bad and one in particular very well documented on here in recent years! But the same problems beset them all, busy airport with long times spent holding at busy periods, high fuel prices, lost flying days because of poor weather or wind direction and runway orientation, lack of local maintenance etc etc.
My friends at Grampian new that something had to change for any sort of club to survive, they tried to reduce costs by not employing full time office staff and instructors. The hourly rate did go up by quite a lot more than in previous years and indeed compared to other schools, so they tried to offset that by at least providing members with what they had been asking for, two fairly nice PA28's. They had been growing bored with old C150's and 152's. It was never going to be as busy a school as it had been in it's hey day in the early 90's, but the aim was to try and hang on in there, keep GA alive in ABZ, at least until they were thrown out by the Airport for good. They were managing this, only just, and I'm sure would have continued to do so for as long as people wanted to rent the aircraft or have the occasional lesson. Sadly as mentioned above, the fuel prices, parking and landing charges became too much for anybody to cope with.
If only somebody could turn the old RAF Edzell site back into a nice little GA airfield. I reckon it would do well. Well away from controlled airspace, close to Aberdeen and Dundee, lovely tarmac runways, no BAA, no commercial ATC and you could even attract smaller biz jet aircraft in.
We can but dream
P.S I should add, that in fairness to Signature, the previous owners of the school shafted them for over 8k in unpaid fuel charges then buggered off leaving a trail of destruction behind them all the way to the central belt! I suspect that a fair bit of damage was caused by that incident and probably tarnished the reputation of light aviation in these parts.
Last edited by youngskywalker; 21st Jul 2008 at 10:20.