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Old 29th Mar 2012, 08:53
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Not so Simples!

Compton3bravo, whilst it may be the case that these airlines cannot get slots at LHR they do however still have the access to London and the UK through LGW which is what is fundamentally necessary according to our esteemed leaders as well as the aviation industry themselves to keep the UK connected and competitive. It is not all about LHR, BAA and BA. We should all get behind LGW and besides, if this is about connecting the UK, then LGW has far more domestic connections than LHR allowing for the UK to interline to the outside world.
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Old 29th Mar 2012, 09:03
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Agree with you BCNBoy about getting behind LGW but the truth is that everybody wants to fly into Heathrow. Look at the number of US airlines who have moved their schedules as soon as slots have become available. Regarding domestic flights it is quite obvious BAA do not want many domestic flights at Heathrow they want the European and long haul so they can charge expensive landing fees and also get more out of passengers who will spend more on shopping!
PS Always liked LGW but unfortunately it is some distance from where I want to go to when I have to return to the UK so I use the airports north of London. Cheers
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Old 29th Mar 2012, 09:06
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Must take you to task Racedo about some of the Middle East and Gulf countries. If you have ever been to Oman, UAE, Muscat etc you will see they look after themselves - free education, health and no income tax. If successive UK governments had kept North Sea oil and gas for domestic consumption and not sold it to all and sundry you wouldn´t have to rely on the likes of Iran etc. and our good friend Mr Putin for gas!
Just look what is going on in the UK today - people in charge could not run a booze up in a brewery - pasties (hot or cold) and Jerry cans come to mind.
And before you mention it there is a general strike in Spain today but at least the people on strike are trying to improve their lot and not sitting on their hands also keeping the most important things in life i.e. family, food, enjoying life - not running round at 200 mph and don´t have time for anyone - coffee on the go - ridiculous! Oh dear what has happened to my old country.
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Old 29th Mar 2012, 10:45
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If you have ever been to Oman, UAE, Muscat etc you will see they look after themselves - free education, health and no income tax. If successive UK governments had kept North Sea oil and gas for domestic consumption and not sold it to all and sundry you wouldn´t have to rely on the likes of Iran etc. and our good friend Mr Putin for gas!
Just look what is going on in the UK today - people in charge could not run a booze up in a brewery - pasties (hot or cold) and Jerry cans come to mind.
Remind me who tasked personnel over there to ensure they kept their leaders in place and lost lives over the years............oh wait its HMG.

Population of both combined is less than London but least there is opportunity to change leaders every few years, rather than relying on another family member.

Mid east countries rich soley because of oil and price now manipulated to allow them get even richer.
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Old 29th Mar 2012, 10:55
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I also must take you to task compton3bravo, I regularly see you taking a pop at the U.K. in your posts, I am a regular worldwide traveller and for all its travails there is nowehere else I would rather live than here in the U.K.

I am sure you are happy in Spain, and good for you in that case, but your observations are from a distance and we are certainly no worse off and in many cases much better position than others.
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Old 29th Mar 2012, 13:00
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Everybody entitled to their own opinion phalwx. The concern I have is that when I return to the UK now it seems to have gone down hill so much compared to when I lived and worked there a few years ago. It saddens me greatly to see what has happened to it and I take no pleasure in the comments that I have made. It is just my personal observations. Anyway back to aviation matters - third runway at Heathrow needed but unfortunately not going to be built. Cheers
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Old 29th Mar 2012, 20:47
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We should all get behind LGW and besides, if this is about connecting the UK, then LGW has far more domestic connections than LHR allowing for the UK to interline to the outside world.
There is the minor detail that on a route for route basis, Gatwick massively underperforms Heathrow on long haul yield which is why Continental spent several MILLION dollars buying slots to escape from Gatters. Funny thing, for 50 years they've been trying to fix that. Share your solution?
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Old 30th Mar 2012, 09:47
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Skipness One Echo - LHR has the critical saturation that allows for such high yields. Not many other airports have that, not even AMS or MAD come close. CDG and FRA can compete but to a much lesser extent. However, you seem to be speaking from an airlines profitability perspective rather than the arguement about what is good for the economic competitiveness of the economy, which is what the 3rd runway arguement is about. London is one of the largest business hubs in the world, airlines will continue to fly here, no other city of its size and stature can claim to have so many airports serving it. LGW can quite easily become a business airport for London playing the niche card as it already has done as the UK's new gateway to Asia.
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Old 30th Mar 2012, 11:01
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Oh come off it! "Quite easily?" As for Asia, Gatwick just gained and lost Kuala Lumpur and Korean would be double daily at LHR slots permitting. The new Hong Kong service is already dying on it's feet, mainly because it's competing with LHR.
Gatwick is and remains a leisure airport for the most part. Even Delta are leaving in April.
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Old 30th Mar 2012, 19:07
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LGW

SKIPNESS You must really hate and I mean really hate or is it dislike whatever it is you seem to have a major grudge about Gatwick, many times on here and on other forums on other sites you continously run down Gatwick and especially BA at LGW, you seem to think you have all the answers but as much as alot of what you say is very near the truth can you just hold back sometimes as it is getting very tedious.
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Old 30th Mar 2012, 20:27
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Skipness
No matter where Air Asia x were flying into in Europe-it would have stopped-nothing to do with LGW, and which the new management have completely turned around and done so well after BAA.
Air China are starting here soon-DY and LH are examples of business flights-so LGW is not entirely a leisure airport-yes there are plenty of leisure flights ,we all know that!
Give LGW some credit,the management have really tried hard here

Last edited by Charley B; 31st Mar 2012 at 07:15.
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Old 30th Mar 2012, 23:33
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many times on here and on other forums on other sites you continously run down Gatwick
No sir I do not and have never done so, you are clearly not reading what I am saying.

I love flying from Gatwick. Just flown BE LGW-NCL, DL LGW-ATL and doing LGW-AMS and LGW-INV in the next month so whatever I may be, I am not anti Gatters. I love the airport and am pleased at what GIP have done.
However talk of "getting behind" Gatwick as if it were some League One football team is naive nonsense. There are real and understandable reasons why long haul at LGW struggles. All the way from BUA, BCAL and Virgin's fight to get out of LGW into LHR. You must have noticed that all they left behind was leisure?

Anyone who wants to see BA short haul expand from LGW is in cloud cuckoo land. I have been flying with BA through LGW for 18 years and watched them closely but I cannot see how they are going to turn LGW short haul into a profitable operation, and as a stand alone business unit that's a death sentence, clearly signposted by the continued postponment of the B734 fleet replacement. In business the death of a thousand cuts can be a better scenario than the axe falling as it's done organically and over the last seven years BA short haul LGW has contracted fleet size year on year.

The same goes for anyone who thinks Air China or Korean are starting at Gatwick by choice and those who cheers Hong Kong Air as the next big thing. Gatwick is what it is, the primary leisure gateway for London. It has never managed to beat LHR on a single long haul route and today there are only three long haul routes from both LHR and LGW. ( God I hope that's right, Friday and post pub!), Seoul, Beijing and Hong Kong, with Seoul and Beijing a LHR move when slots become free. Given the focus on alliances and connectivity and the added expense of a split operation over two London airports with only two daily flights, I just think some fanboys need to get real. As for LH, well they're downsizing already, and given they alrerady operate LHR and LCY-FRA I give LGW-FRA another year. It was a spoiler to keep EZY out of FRA and I don't see it lasting, indeed the aircraft has already been downsized.

That's not anti Gatwick, it's a balanced assesment of commercial reality and of what the market will support, it does not mean I hate Gatwick for goodness sake, it just means it's never been able to, and still shows no sign of, competing with LHR in certain markets.

Last edited by Skipness One Echo; 31st Mar 2012 at 09:40.
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Old 31st Mar 2012, 05:29
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Well said Skipness, my thoughts entirely. Also just goes to show how Dave C is not in the real world when he said he wanted to make Gatwick a business airport. It will always be primarly a leisure airport but nothing wrong in that.
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Old 31st Mar 2012, 07:04
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We still seem to be no further on with the issue of "airspace restrictions", chaps.

As mentioned in an earlier post LHR, LGW, STN , LTN, LCY, are all competing for a slice of the traffic, business or Leisure, as they all have their own unique vested interests.

I was actually forgetting we also now have Southend in the mix.

Farnborough and Biggin also have a substantial level of business movements ! I have excluded Northolt as this may yet become part of the plan !

All the forecasts I have seen deal with capacity restrictions based purely on runways, the natural arguement therefore is build another runway and hey presto you can put more aircraft in !

What about ATC capacity in the air , is this infinite, it appears to be !

So why not put 2 runways in LHR , add another at LGW, and why not throw in a second at Luton and Stansted .....on that basis everybody is happy, each has bags of capacity and all the delays, restrictions dissolve .... !

BUT hang on capacity cannot be infinite, as a case in point we have the Olympics coming up, all the reports on ATMs relating to the increased traffic levels regarding that event suggest a different story, they suggest a very delicate managed flow to prevent massive slot restrictions, delays etc, so they are in effect saying that the marginal extra movements relating to the Olympics cannot be handled without a trade off somewhere else ....!

..... if you build another runway at LHR will this not simply constrain movements in another location i.e. are we not simply shuffling round the problems that ATC have to then manage ?

A case in point is the Stansted/ Southend equation, EZY have in effect moved 30 daily flights that previously served STN to Southend, instead of all these movements originating at 1 airport, we clearly now have airspace issues around movements in/out of STN plus Southend and even LCY as slots in/out must conflict with each other !

That problem in itself will now grow as the owners of Southend have aspirations to grow their own business by 2m pax a year !

I just cannot see how this the piecemeal approach of an extra runway is actually going to maintain the status of LHR unless the ATMS are reduced elsewhere..

" so hands up everbody who wants to give up their slots ! "

Last edited by Bagso; 31st Mar 2012 at 07:39.
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Old 2nd Apr 2012, 12:36
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The responses re airspace capacity in the South East has been deafening !

Solutions anybody ?
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Old 2nd Apr 2012, 12:48
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The responses re airspace capacity in the South East has been deafening ! Solutions anybody ?
ATC Issues - PPRuNe Forums

If you honestly want to know, only these will really know. You're in the wrong forum.
All I will say is that if we can't have it all, then strategically, we would need to explore closing something else to benefit the major hub at LHR. BAA ran the models before they spent millions buying land and houses for the the third runway.
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Old 2nd Apr 2012, 20:33
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Well I have to be honest Skippy for somebody with your excellent knowledge that is a total kop out but well done for sticking your head above the parapit.

We have had siren voices on here suggesting we must build the 3rd RW at all costs NOBODY but nobody has addressed this issue.

As indicated if building a 3rd runway will reduce holding , taxy delays then surely the same argument applies to LGW, STN.....all we need do is carpet the South East and a solution is at hand !

At least you agree that something has to give elsewhere !
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Old 2nd Apr 2012, 21:10
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surely the same argument applies to LGW, STN.....all we need do is carpet the South East and a solution is at hand !
Bagso,

Ever heard of Castellón Airport? Building an airport where there's space isn't good enough - it's not Field of Dreams. If the SLF don't want to use it, then you can't force them to. Same principle applies to extending an existing one.

3rd rwy @ LHR would solve an existing problem of providing capacity during low viz conditions alongside the growth in use of Code F aircraft and those problems listed earlier. IMHO, the political requirement to spare residents the noise have created more problems than it solves.

True that multiple runways won't work unless flexible departure tracks are made available over West London to optimise sequencing whilst maintaining adequate separation.
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Old 2nd Apr 2012, 21:24
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trash

I refer my learned friend to my previous post where I suggested expanding LHR and closing all the others down.......
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Old 2nd Apr 2012, 21:50
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Bags,

Did and reckon my comments are still valid -
If the SLF don't want to use it, then you can't force them to.
Closing them down to open up airspace seems an odd proposition when there are other options that would free up airspace and (existing) airfield capacity - doing away with alternation at LHR and allowing flex departure tracks would solve the short term capacity constraints.

The political quotient will always get in the way though because the Westminster Crew seek election/re-election but if the UK is to prosper, it needs strong political leadership with the long-term vision to lay out the roadmap to growth.
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