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That schedule has LHR 'slot-sitter' written all over it!"
Not neccesarily, it operates to/from LHR5, so ideal for connections
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Domestically, the service cannot compete point to point with the train. The route is aimed purley at the connecting market similar to that that exist on the MAN-LHR shuttles whose breakdown of passengers consist of about 80-90% transferring."
This is true for city centre to city centre, except on sundays when there are no fast trains and weekends when there is engineering work.
Not all pax are doing city centre to city centre journeys. This extends choice and offers alternatives so beneficial all round.
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How contstrained is T5 on domestic? Is it just stands 501, 502, 503, 505, 506 which have access to UK arrivals? Given they were flying GLA, EDI, ABZ, NCL and MAN, no one really expected any more domestic destinations to be added when T5 was built."
AFAIK, 507,508 and 509 also have access to UK arrivals, 510 (gate A10) is the "back to the 1960s gate", for those unfortunates taking a bus to a remote stand.
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I mean had you suggested BA would be flying LBA-LHR four daily on the A319 most would have scoffed at the thought."
Excellent, good to see that route revived! Hope it's not the only one.
Quote: Just some thoughts I'd like to put down about the 'positive spin' being put out by some people about the LHR route, before the first flight has ever taken off.
BA have had this order in for new long haul aircraft for some time. I guess they must have had a credible plan for using them within the then existing slot availabilty. Somehow I don't believe they ordered them on the off chance that a load of spare slots would suddenly fall into their lap.
Of course, they may well want to use some of the windfall of bmi slots for long haul expansion, but as they have said, they need quality feeder traffic to go with them. This is what the LBA flights are designed to do, forget the old concept of day returns to the capital, it is dead. BD couldn't make it work from Leeds nor could BE. The train is far superior at doing this, I would suggest from all English regions, apart from possibly the far south west. Scotland may have a stronger claim to this sort of traffic, but their airports also have significant numbers of flights to LGW, LCY etc. to cater for this.
Now, if in due course BA do decide to convert some domestic slots at LHR into long haul, here are some statistics to consider:
North east- pop. 2.6m; pop. growth (2001-10) 2.6%;
flights to LHR 6
North west- pop. 6.9m; pop. growth (") 2.4%;
flights to LHR 17
Scotland- pop. 5.2m; pop. growth (") 3.1%;
flights to LHR 38
Yks/Hbr- pop. 5.3m; pop. growth (") 6.8%;
flights to LHR 4
Flights are from all airports in region, so for Scotland means ABZ, EDI and GLA, and are for a typical weekday in December, as taken from BA timetable. I have ignored other London airports. Other data is from ONS.
Now, where would you reduce capacity to make extra long haul slots available?"
BA have stated that the split of the new slots will be about one third longhaul and two thirds shorthaul, which makes sense.
Without decent feeds, many longhaul routes are unsustainable, at least in the short term.
Some of the ABZ, EDI, and GLA slots have to be divested eventually, so the Scotland figures will be reduced. It's unlikely that there will be 17 MAN-LHR flights/day forever, 3-4 shifted to LPL would be good, probably unlikely though.