easy follow Ryan to the Baltics- and cuts routes it competes directly with other LCC

[lowfaresbuster]

EasyJet to begin flights from Tallinn, Riga; cease London-Milan Linate route

LONDON (AFX) - EasyJet PLC (LSE: EZJ.L - news) said it is due to start services from the Baltic states of Estonia and Latvia in October and November and added it is to cease flight from London Stansted to Milan Linate.
In a statement, the low-cost airline said it will fly from Tallinn to Berlin Schoenefeld and London Stansted, starting on Oct 27 and Nov 1, respectively and from Riga to Berlin Schoenefeld from Nov 18.
The new routes will bring the easyJet network to 181 routes, it added.
EasyJet also announces that it will cease flying to Milan Linate from London Stansted from the end of Oct 2004.
'Despite the high-profile problems at Alitalia (Milan: AZPIa.MI - news) , services to Milan Linate continue to be highly constrained with no prospect of greater access to slots,' easyjet said.
Slots used by easyJet to fly to Stansted, London Gatwick and Paris Orly are all within an identical time period, which prevents easyJet from building a sufficiently competitive schedule, it said.
'The lack of attractive slots at Milan leaves easyJet with no choice but to rationalise its twin services to Stansted and Gatwick. This means that the Gatwick and Paris Orly to Milan Linate services remain unchanged,' it added.



But it cuts the above Route- which it shared with FR- also cust AMS-BCN and AMS-NCE which it shared with Basiqair. ALSO custs CPH-NCL & CPH-BRS

[The_Bean_Counter]

They also cut the London Stansted to Venice and to Rome Ciampino services which were in competition with FR and moved both to LGW

[averytdeaconharry]

Fascinating stuff. They look like good moves by EZY to me. It makes no sense for EZY and RYR to tangle in each other's hair. LGW also needs more flights to ROM than BA are offering. That route will do well. The late flight back from CIA should do very well. BA operates LGW-VCE and will come under a lot of pressure in amarket which has little growth prospects. My guess is that they will reduce frequency and use the slots to develop a new route.

[RAT 5]

It would seem, then, that ej have abandoned services FROM AMS, and only serve INTO AMS. The NCE & BCN routes were never developed, but lingered on. Their heart was never in it. All flights on the AMS routes are essentially for UK originating pax, and the schedules aligned for them. Any idea that ej might have strengthened their AMS presence with the long rumoured base must now have died. It will be interesting to watch how the prices from AMS on Basiq Air & other LCA's evolve.

Ej operate out of most of their UK bases into AMS. At one time they were the 2nd largest user after KLM. Any ideas why EMA has not joined the AMS network?

[Flightmapping]

Rat 5,

I would suggest the very competition you mention above. Baby operate this route from NEMA, so they must have decided there wasn't room for two competitors on this route, even if NEMA is one of the few places where you see two locos trashing it out on several identical route pairs.

[thegoaf]

What EZY have not announced is that they are withdrawing three routes from Gatwick. Thay are BIO, IBZ and NAP. They also seem not to be going ahead with the expansion of MAD whcih they announced some time ago. The net effect of the changes seems to be a reduction in the number of aircrfat based at LGW. Thay need only 12 for the winter operations against the current 13.

[The_Bean_Counter]

Is the plan to cut multiple airports out of London to 1, avoid the Ryans where they compete and cut from Gatwick where the Ryans are not on the route ?

[colegate]

Something I find very interesting is that EZY are withdrawing from LGW-BIO and LGW-NAP after a year. BA operate both these routes and a look at their website indicates that they plan to continue their present frequencies. The implication from this is that EZY have failed to make sufficient competitive headway against BA in both of these markets. If EZY have come up against the competitive buffers already at LGW on these two routes we have reached a very interesting watershed in the battle between Low fare airlines and network carriers. It looks as if BA are forcing a small retrenchment by EZY at LGW.

I think we should all watch this space as it looks as if future developments will be very interesting. I think this is because the low fare airlines are starting to scrape the bottom of the barrel for expansion opportunities. They are now fighting each other and the network carriers. You cannot fight successfully on several fronts at the same time. It is certainly going to be fun for watchers!!!

[Wee Weasley Welshman]

Hmmm, I would wait and see what new routes get announced for Summer 2005 out of Gatwick before deciding BA have seen off some of the easyJet challenge there.

A tweaking of <8% of routes after only 2 years of operation hardly qualifies as a retrenchment.

Cheers

WWW

[LTNman]

The planners at easy must be scratching their heads with what to do with all those aircraft on order. Luton has been a traditionally good place to base aircraft for easyjet but with their recent announcement to base another 3 aircraft at Luton and the announcement the following day that Ryanair are going to base 4 x 737-800 at LTN the full signs are going up for based aircraft until a new apron is built.

[Mark Lewis]

BA at LGW seems to be a much slicker operation at the moment. 6 or so 737s have gone in the last few months, and instead of cutting routes, new ones (run by mainline not GB) have been springing up. The whole operation over there is much better prepared to fight EZY than it has been in recent years, and especially compared to that at LHR.
Also BAs LGW advertising seems to be more prevalent than the advertising EZY put in from the same airport.

[Buster the Bear]

Well once Hangar 89 is re-claimed and the original terminal mostly mothballed by next summer due to the advancement of the upper floor Tinimal opening ahead of schedule, the removal of the hangar will create extra aircraft parking, or covered car parking at a premium price!

[LTNman]

I don’t think hangar 89 is going anywhere fast. It was only a year or so ago that Britannia signed a new long-term contract to keep the hangar. Also my information is that the first floor departure lounge in the new terminal will serve the north and eastern aprons while the old terminal will carry on serving the main apron. With the airport looking to add more shops and not closing existing ones the new lounge will have a row of retail outlets the full length of the lounge. Both lounges will be linked by the continuation of the walkway from stand 9

[orangetree]

LGW - ATH is also for the chop. LGW - TLS is moving to STN..I wonder why that could be
LGW - IBZ is only a summer route anyway. Any supposed reduction in capacity from LGW will not be noticed by the crews as the bus takes over the PRG route from November (currently crewed from BFS) and with STN all being retrained on the bus there'll be a lot of taxing going on between LGW and STN for the winter. 5 more buses heading for SXF and another base announcement before the year end would indicate that LGW is getting a breather...I'm sure the 2005 summer schedule will crank the pace up again.

[The_Bean_Counter]

Easyjet are also pulling their Stansted Barcelona and Stansted Bologna services on top of their Milan, Rome and Venice flights. Is that 5-0 to the Ryans ?

[Tudor]

When is LGW losing the ATH and TLS routes? I ask because they are available to book on the winter schedule (unlike NAP, IBZ and BIO).

[Navy_Adversary]

I had an e-mail from Easy outlining the new TLL route. It is a very early start from Stansted (0645) and the route starts October 31st, not the best time to start a flight to the Baltic states.

IMHO it would have been better to have launched TLL in the spring, maybe even as a summer only route , not quite sure if they get much fog or snow in Estonia in the winter.