Presumably this new domestic route is to compete with the fast and direct train service between the 2 cities(from london Euston)......good thinking but hang on, isnt the train service operated by err, virgin??!!
Did they instigate this route when they thought they had lost their west coast rail franchise to the first group? In the shambles that followed they have held onto the franchise for 2 more years at least.
So is it just me who is wondering why virgin want to compete with themselves??
Virgin Trains is managed separately from Virgin Atlantic (although they are both owned by SRB) for a start; VT serves the O&D market between the 2 cities, VS (is planning to) serve the transit market from Manchester for flights from LHR
I highly doubt this has anything to do with the entire refranchising process, even if Virgin retained the ICWC franchise, the VS flights have still would have happened anyway, because they serve different markets
This has everything to do with the fact BA has bought BMI (who despite strained relations, did provide a lot of transfer traffic for VS), so not rely on their “enemy” for passengers from the regions, they have launched their own flights (trouble is that they face a hard fight with BA over this market and I doubt DL will support them over this, since it has no benefit for them)
I love them too.....
BALHR is doing finals this year some MBA in chemistry
I think BA could fall to FR , but VS will needs to survive noce to have a decent honest price fixer running an airline as opposed to MOL
If they are going to buy any full-service airline (bar EI), it will be LH/LX/OS/SN
http://theairlineblog.********.co.uk...lufthansa.html
If SRB and Virgin are really serious at attempting a feeder for their longhaul, then their best solution would have been to negotiate with MOL to take over the EI routes into LHR (which could also be used to feed DL routes).
Apparently though, they have lost that battle (if not yet the war) as MOL has signed a MOU with BA/IAG.
Having said that, I think there is an awful lot of water to pass under the bridge before any deal for RYR to take over EI is done and dusted, let alone the RYR MOU with BA/IAG to be passed.
We are nowhere near the end game on this ....
There where talks about FR handing EI’s LHR slots to VS, but like the VS/BD talks, we must presume they went nowhere
Whatever the case, I doubt if DL will allow VS to operate LHR-DUB/BHD or even LHR-MAN/EDI/ABZ that VS will soon operate, since those destinations are already linked (for DL) at AMS with the help of their partner KLM
Less water than you think, in fact the stream has run dry. The Irish govt announced today they won't sell their stake to FR. This leaves him unable to get enough shareholder approval, even if the EU passed the deal. It's game over.
Is it not the case that the EU (in return of giving them a bailout), told the Irish Government to sell “state assets” such as their EI stake, also wouldn’t a sale of their stake help reduce the amount of austerity the Irish have to suffer?