LEEDS - 4
Thread Starter
Join Date: Aug 2000
Location: Leeds
Posts: 443
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Nice big pull out in the evening paper this evening regarding Bridgepoint, John Parkin and "the future". Interesting to see someone in an offical capacity at the airport acknowledging the leakage to MAN and saying they are going to do something about it. Something in the past that was always know about, but seldom said.
682
Bridgepoint – which had previously been a shareholder at Birmingham airport – is planning to invest £70m into the airport to provide additional terminal capacity and, in Mr Parkin's words, to 'move the airport up a league'.
It is an ambition that both supports and reflects the wider ambitions of Leeds itself. A fact which is not lost on the new boss – who has not wasted any time in making his presence felt.
Not surprisingly, the 'new broom' instigated an all-encompassing review of the business which took about four weeks to complete. "It has helped to inform what it is that we will do and the order in which we will do it as we move forward in bringing our strategy to life," he says.
There have been a number of changes already. The airport now has full 24-hour operations on the apron throughout the whole year. Normally, operations on such a scale are stepped down in the winter but Mr Parkin says he is convinced LBIA is now of sufficient size to have fully operational 24-hour service 'partly because of our expansion plans and partly because we are already of a size where that is appropriate'.
Added to that, the skips have been in, 'things have been moved around' and a lot of existing signs have been taken down to be replaced by 'less signage but more clarity' as part of a modernisation process ahead of the major redevelopment plans.
"What we will get now will be a period of investment that I think is unprecedented in the history of LBIA.
"We are at about 2.9 million passengers per annum today – within five years we want to be at around 5 million passengers per annum. We want to invest in the business by revamping the terminal and making it a much more pleasant place to go through – upgraded and more modern. We want to create, in every sense, the gateway to the region that the region wants.
"I've talked to an awful lot of people and I'm struck by the loyalty of customers in our region who want to use LBIA and the desire to see the airport raise its game. He doesn't believe the airport's development will be hindered by frequently raised concerns about transport links and, while he admits he would be happier if it lay at the end of a dual-carriageway, he cites his experience at Bristol. Everybody described Bristol as having poor access. It too is on a hill and, at that time, it was a very tired terminal with around 1.4m passengers per annum. Today it is 6.4m passengers, has a brand new terminal and is recognised as being one of the top performing regional airports in the country – and its access issues are much the same as they were. Transport issues are not the disabler of growth that people might think. Regional airports provide a local means of accessing international and domestic destinations and that convenience element is very high in the travelling requirements of the passenger – our customer. It's up there with price and choice."
Looking ahead – without betraying any commercial confidences – he says there are aspirations to introduce longer range services from Leeds. From an infrastructure point of view we can certainly operate New York and we can operate Dubai (don't expect to see Jumbo jets, though) and a number of other long-range places but that is just part of a route development strategy – it is not THE route development strategy. We have very tightly-defined catchment area – 98 per cent of our customers come from Yorkshire and Humberside and we estimate that something in excess of two million people from this region use Manchester for flights that we already have here – and there's a challenge for us.
"I think we need, as an airport, to become more visible as well as investing, and upgrading, and introducing more choice of routes and services. He adds: "I'm pressed to think of a better catchment area for an airport to sit in outside of the major UK global gateway airports than this one. The potential here is exciting. We have a lot to go at and some key things in our favour but the airport needs to move up a league and that's what we plan to do.
And he is also acutely aware of the airport's importance as a business facilitator. One of the other critical things that a successful regional airport does for its region is that it provides direct access to and from markets. Our region is becoming more and more visible internationally, and successfully regarded internationally, due to a concerted strategy to deliver that based on real deliverable things that have happened..and you can see the evidence of that in the region, all over the place.
He explains that it is in the nature of the air travel business that airports chase airlines for routes rather than the other way round. There are key routes that we would like to see. And its up to us to compete and to make sure we get flying coming into this airport because there is a good case for doing so." Of Bridgepoint, he says: "I could hardly have a more committed investor and shareholder than I do now." Over the next 12 months there will be some physical changes in advance of the major upgrade works 'when people will notice the really big changes' and the plan is for that to happen in 2009 – with careful planning ensuring that it will not affect the running of the business.
"It gives us the chance to re-engineer the way this place works – make it simpler and easier to use, with more space for the passengers and a better environment; to design in a better experience – the best experience – with half an eye on the changing regulatory and security related environment that we have to deal with and that people understand.
682
Bridgepoint – which had previously been a shareholder at Birmingham airport – is planning to invest £70m into the airport to provide additional terminal capacity and, in Mr Parkin's words, to 'move the airport up a league'.
It is an ambition that both supports and reflects the wider ambitions of Leeds itself. A fact which is not lost on the new boss – who has not wasted any time in making his presence felt.
Not surprisingly, the 'new broom' instigated an all-encompassing review of the business which took about four weeks to complete. "It has helped to inform what it is that we will do and the order in which we will do it as we move forward in bringing our strategy to life," he says.
There have been a number of changes already. The airport now has full 24-hour operations on the apron throughout the whole year. Normally, operations on such a scale are stepped down in the winter but Mr Parkin says he is convinced LBIA is now of sufficient size to have fully operational 24-hour service 'partly because of our expansion plans and partly because we are already of a size where that is appropriate'.
Added to that, the skips have been in, 'things have been moved around' and a lot of existing signs have been taken down to be replaced by 'less signage but more clarity' as part of a modernisation process ahead of the major redevelopment plans.
"What we will get now will be a period of investment that I think is unprecedented in the history of LBIA.
"We are at about 2.9 million passengers per annum today – within five years we want to be at around 5 million passengers per annum. We want to invest in the business by revamping the terminal and making it a much more pleasant place to go through – upgraded and more modern. We want to create, in every sense, the gateway to the region that the region wants.
"I've talked to an awful lot of people and I'm struck by the loyalty of customers in our region who want to use LBIA and the desire to see the airport raise its game. He doesn't believe the airport's development will be hindered by frequently raised concerns about transport links and, while he admits he would be happier if it lay at the end of a dual-carriageway, he cites his experience at Bristol. Everybody described Bristol as having poor access. It too is on a hill and, at that time, it was a very tired terminal with around 1.4m passengers per annum. Today it is 6.4m passengers, has a brand new terminal and is recognised as being one of the top performing regional airports in the country – and its access issues are much the same as they were. Transport issues are not the disabler of growth that people might think. Regional airports provide a local means of accessing international and domestic destinations and that convenience element is very high in the travelling requirements of the passenger – our customer. It's up there with price and choice."
Looking ahead – without betraying any commercial confidences – he says there are aspirations to introduce longer range services from Leeds. From an infrastructure point of view we can certainly operate New York and we can operate Dubai (don't expect to see Jumbo jets, though) and a number of other long-range places but that is just part of a route development strategy – it is not THE route development strategy. We have very tightly-defined catchment area – 98 per cent of our customers come from Yorkshire and Humberside and we estimate that something in excess of two million people from this region use Manchester for flights that we already have here – and there's a challenge for us.
"I think we need, as an airport, to become more visible as well as investing, and upgrading, and introducing more choice of routes and services. He adds: "I'm pressed to think of a better catchment area for an airport to sit in outside of the major UK global gateway airports than this one. The potential here is exciting. We have a lot to go at and some key things in our favour but the airport needs to move up a league and that's what we plan to do.
And he is also acutely aware of the airport's importance as a business facilitator. One of the other critical things that a successful regional airport does for its region is that it provides direct access to and from markets. Our region is becoming more and more visible internationally, and successfully regarded internationally, due to a concerted strategy to deliver that based on real deliverable things that have happened..and you can see the evidence of that in the region, all over the place.
He explains that it is in the nature of the air travel business that airports chase airlines for routes rather than the other way round. There are key routes that we would like to see. And its up to us to compete and to make sure we get flying coming into this airport because there is a good case for doing so." Of Bridgepoint, he says: "I could hardly have a more committed investor and shareholder than I do now." Over the next 12 months there will be some physical changes in advance of the major upgrade works 'when people will notice the really big changes' and the plan is for that to happen in 2009 – with careful planning ensuring that it will not affect the running of the business.
"It gives us the chance to re-engineer the way this place works – make it simpler and easier to use, with more space for the passengers and a better environment; to design in a better experience – the best experience – with half an eye on the changing regulatory and security related environment that we have to deal with and that people understand.
Upto The Buffers
Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: Leeds/Bradford
Age: 48
Posts: 1,112
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I notice he dismissed the transport links to the airport as being an issue. As we all know, the roads are absolute torture (total gridlock at rush hour), and any kind of rail fork from the Harrogate line is a pipe-dream.
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Leeds
Posts: 284
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Even in Winter the latest scheduled arrival is around midnight (depending on the day of the week) and the earliest around 0600hrs. Given the chance of delays and diversions, with the likelihood of overtime if ops are not scheduled, then it would make sense to schedule staff in anyway. That's how I would read it anyway.
Join Date: Oct 2000
Location: UK
Posts: 530
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I was up at LBA yesterday for the first time in many moons, and was utterly puzzled by the vehicle security measures. I was just dropping off a friend, but to do so I was redirected into the car park and straight out of the other side as the lanes outside the terminal have been blocked off. Obviously this is in reaction to the GLA airport incident, but the way it's been done at LBA makes no sense, it wouldn't in any way prevent a repeat of what happened at GLA, and all it achieves is to disrupt everyone else.
Thread Starter
Join Date: Aug 2000
Location: Leeds
Posts: 443
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Well, I guess when JP is talking about the “challenge” of clawing back from MAN, this article in the Yorkshire Post yesterday is a indication of what he is up against.
**********************************************************
AIRLINE Lufthansa has no plans in the short-term to launch flights from any of Yorkshire's airports, one of its senior executives has revealed. Marianne Sammann, general manager for Lufthansa in the UK and Ireland, said the group did not want to "spread itself too thinly" by starting services in Yorkshire. But, speaking to the Yorkshire Post during a visit to the region, Mrs Sammann said Lufthansa had not ruled out the move completely and would keep an open mind when considering airports in Yorkshire, including Leeds Bradford and Robin Hood Doncaster Sheffield, for new destinations in the future. Mrs Sammann said Lufthansa had 55,000 frequent flyers from Yorkshire which regularly used its services, including business owners. Lufthansa flies from Manchester and Newcastle airports. It recently doubled the number of flights between Newcastle and Dusseldorf in Germany. The revised Newcastle service is part of Lufthansa's on-going investment and route network development through Dusseldorf. Mrs Sammann says Lufthansa is also aware of the importance of flights to India, to which passengers from Yorkshire begin their journey with Lufthansa from Manchester. "Thirty-six per cent of the total UK passengers going to India are coming through Manchester," she said.
******
One wonders how much traffic is lost to MAN that is actually only travelling out of there on connecting flights via UK, European or international transit points. The LBA offering in terms of connections into hub airports has got worse rather than better over the last few years, when it has been a growth area in general elsewhere in the UK regions. Presumably correcting this has to be a key part of the route development strategy alluded to in the press article earlier this week. Given the proposed increases in charges at LHR and the imminent arrival of open skies are two further nails in the coffin of LBA-LHR, it might be a case that the first step on the journey is a backward one!
**********************************************************
AIRLINE Lufthansa has no plans in the short-term to launch flights from any of Yorkshire's airports, one of its senior executives has revealed. Marianne Sammann, general manager for Lufthansa in the UK and Ireland, said the group did not want to "spread itself too thinly" by starting services in Yorkshire. But, speaking to the Yorkshire Post during a visit to the region, Mrs Sammann said Lufthansa had not ruled out the move completely and would keep an open mind when considering airports in Yorkshire, including Leeds Bradford and Robin Hood Doncaster Sheffield, for new destinations in the future. Mrs Sammann said Lufthansa had 55,000 frequent flyers from Yorkshire which regularly used its services, including business owners. Lufthansa flies from Manchester and Newcastle airports. It recently doubled the number of flights between Newcastle and Dusseldorf in Germany. The revised Newcastle service is part of Lufthansa's on-going investment and route network development through Dusseldorf. Mrs Sammann says Lufthansa is also aware of the importance of flights to India, to which passengers from Yorkshire begin their journey with Lufthansa from Manchester. "Thirty-six per cent of the total UK passengers going to India are coming through Manchester," she said.
******
One wonders how much traffic is lost to MAN that is actually only travelling out of there on connecting flights via UK, European or international transit points. The LBA offering in terms of connections into hub airports has got worse rather than better over the last few years, when it has been a growth area in general elsewhere in the UK regions. Presumably correcting this has to be a key part of the route development strategy alluded to in the press article earlier this week. Given the proposed increases in charges at LHR and the imminent arrival of open skies are two further nails in the coffin of LBA-LHR, it might be a case that the first step on the journey is a backward one!
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Leeds
Posts: 284
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
"Obviously this is in reaction to the GLA airport incident, but the way it's been done at LBA makes no sense, it wouldn't in any way prevent a repeat of what happened at GLA, and all it achieves is to disrupt everyone else."
In fact it may well prevent a repeat of the GLA attack, but for security reasons it is not really appropriate to say how. Just be glad that something is being done with consideration for your safety and security, RAFAT.
In fact it may well prevent a repeat of the GLA attack, but for security reasons it is not really appropriate to say how. Just be glad that something is being done with consideration for your safety and security, RAFAT.
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: Leeds
Posts: 6
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Just read on the MAN thread that Jet2 are running trials with a premium layout 757 (120 pax??) to NYC from Manchester. Apparently they are going to obtain ETOPS rating then announce the route.
Why are they doing this from MAN? MAN already has numerous legacy carriers to NYC surely something like this should be done from LBA as we are crying out for a service to NYC, even following a lo-co model.
Does it also mean that their 757's are going to be fitted with winglets? Nice if it did happen.
What are your thoughts??
Why are they doing this from MAN? MAN already has numerous legacy carriers to NYC surely something like this should be done from LBA as we are crying out for a service to NYC, even following a lo-co model.
Does it also mean that their 757's are going to be fitted with winglets? Nice if it did happen.
What are your thoughts??
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: Leeds
Posts: 6
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
I recently travelled with FlyBE to Belfast on a Dash 8 400. Nice flight although sitting behind engines seems rather noisy.
Anyway upon landing we parked at the same gate as we took off from, sorry not sure of number but we boarded through 5A.. whats the point of that by the way?? We had to wait for a bus to take the pax to the door for passport control, or it seemed.
Is this normal?? I did see a sign for Belfast & Dublin passengers to use the first or second floor? Upon arriving I had to show my passport (would not accept driving license, which is a full and upto date photocard one), my understanding is that because i was travelling domestically a passport is not required only photo ID. I always take my passport as a matter of course, good job as I wouldnt have been able to get in.
Just seems another LBA typical event.
Although on a good point, getting through security leaving LBA only took 5 mins. Not the 45 mins it took when travellig to DUB earlier in the year.
Paul
Anyway upon landing we parked at the same gate as we took off from, sorry not sure of number but we boarded through 5A.. whats the point of that by the way?? We had to wait for a bus to take the pax to the door for passport control, or it seemed.
Is this normal?? I did see a sign for Belfast & Dublin passengers to use the first or second floor? Upon arriving I had to show my passport (would not accept driving license, which is a full and upto date photocard one), my understanding is that because i was travelling domestically a passport is not required only photo ID. I always take my passport as a matter of course, good job as I wouldnt have been able to get in.
Just seems another LBA typical event.
Although on a good point, getting through security leaving LBA only took 5 mins. Not the 45 mins it took when travellig to DUB earlier in the year.
Paul
Last edited by ZBB757; 25th Nov 2007 at 17:20.
Join Date: May 2005
Location: leeds
Posts: 222
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Britishjet delay
Anybody any info why todays flight is currently running 11 hours late?.Also I was in Wakefield this afternoon around 3pm,when I saw what looked like a 747 at a fairly low altitude,didn't look like it was on approach to LBA,were my eyes deceiving me or what?.
Join Date: Dec 2005
Location: Leeds
Posts: 284
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
"Anyway upon landing we parked at the same gate as we took off from, sorry not sure of number but we boarded through 5A.. whats the point of that by the way?? We had to wait for a bus to take the pax to the door for passport control, or it seemed."
It's a legacy of the days when Irish terrorism was the main threat.
It's a legacy of the days when Irish terrorism was the main threat.
Join Date: Nov 2007
Location: Leeds
Posts: 6
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
Flights to NYC
So where will Jet2's NYC flights be operating from?
Are they getting new (to them) 757's to cope with extra capacity, Yes i know its winter season and they probably have a few extra planes at moment. But what would happen in summer? and surely now is the chance to carry out much needed maintenance on the tired 737's?
What will be the chances of them looking at bigger planes such as 767, it has commonality with 757 so pilots would need minimal, if any, training. There are tons of 767-200's lying in the dessert doing not much. If i recall UA and DL parked loads after 9/11. Although not ER models so would that hinder using them to US?
Also could LBA cope with regular 767's? I watched the BY 767 take off and from understanding I think it had to re-fuel at MAN because it couldnt take off fully loaded. Although not sure if it was a -200 or -300. I think the SweFly ones we used to get were no-where near full. It would be nice to see a 767 in Jet2 c/s.
Paul
Are they getting new (to them) 757's to cope with extra capacity, Yes i know its winter season and they probably have a few extra planes at moment. But what would happen in summer? and surely now is the chance to carry out much needed maintenance on the tired 737's?
What will be the chances of them looking at bigger planes such as 767, it has commonality with 757 so pilots would need minimal, if any, training. There are tons of 767-200's lying in the dessert doing not much. If i recall UA and DL parked loads after 9/11. Although not ER models so would that hinder using them to US?
Also could LBA cope with regular 767's? I watched the BY 767 take off and from understanding I think it had to re-fuel at MAN because it couldnt take off fully loaded. Although not sure if it was a -200 or -300. I think the SweFly ones we used to get were no-where near full. It would be nice to see a 767 in Jet2 c/s.
Paul
Join Date: Apr 2004
Location: north
Posts: 74
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes
on
0 Posts
NYC flights are not operating from NCL, Why would they trial it in MAN if it was gonna operate from NCL. Infact the NCL base is the only non profitable base for jet2 so i can only see a reduction in services .