BRISTOL - 4
Join Date: Apr 2009
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Further to my last post, Viking Airlines will now base an aircraft at Bristol all week from next summer! The schedule is as follows:
Monday - Corfu
Tuesday - Heraklion (w leg to East Midlands)
Wednesday - Kos (w leg to East Midlands)
Thursday - Arrecife
Friday - Skiathos, Tenerife
Saturday - Kefalonia (w leg to East Midlands)
Sunday - Zante (w leg to East Midlands)
They have room to add extra flights after the Monday Corfu flight and the Thursday Arrecife flight...
Monday - Corfu
Tuesday - Heraklion (w leg to East Midlands)
Wednesday - Kos (w leg to East Midlands)
Thursday - Arrecife
Friday - Skiathos, Tenerife
Saturday - Kefalonia (w leg to East Midlands)
Sunday - Zante (w leg to East Midlands)
They have room to add extra flights after the Monday Corfu flight and the Thursday Arrecife flight...
Join Date: May 2005
Location: Bristol
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Bristol in Lufthansa Magazine
I've just had the shock of my life after flipping open the LH inflight magazine today (my first flight this month on LH metal).
The first article in the magazine (and 10 pages long) is about Bristol, and what a great city it is. (But we know that - we live here). 10 Bristolians are featured showing cool things about the city (docks, suspension bridge, floating harbour, clubs, music etc.).
So that's weird, isn't it, given that they pulled the plug on flights 4 months ago? I suspect that the editorial lead time may have caught them out.
The most interesting bit is the inevitable "Lufthansa Tip" with details on how to fly to Bristol. And I quote.
So either they're being highly economical with the truth (the truth being that they're rather badly scheduled connecting flights through Brussels) or something is about to happen that nobody here knew about. Sadly, I favour the first explanation....
(Link to the content listing - Lufthansa - Lufthansa Magazin - but it's not the actual magazine).
The first article in the magazine (and 10 pages long) is about Bristol, and what a great city it is. (But we know that - we live here). 10 Bristolians are featured showing cool things about the city (docks, suspension bridge, floating harbour, clubs, music etc.).
So that's weird, isn't it, given that they pulled the plug on flights 4 months ago? I suspect that the editorial lead time may have caught them out.
The most interesting bit is the inevitable "Lufthansa Tip" with details on how to fly to Bristol. And I quote.
Lufthansa and future Star Alliance member Brussels Airlines operate a Monday-to-Friday code-share service to Bristol (BRS) from the German cities of Berlin, Frankfurt and, starting August 31st, Munich.
(Link to the content listing - Lufthansa - Lufthansa Magazin - but it's not the actual magazine).
StandupfortheUlstermen
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SBAE - Silly Bloody Arsebrained Eejits
Ah SBAE and their mad campaign, isn't it sweet?
These people have completely taken leave of their senses. I suppose they do a good line in nuclear physics and heart surgery in their spare time. One of the videos on their website shows an interview with some bloke in a garden, allegedly in Felton. It must have escaped their notice that while they were talking to him their was what sounded like a cracking party going on nearby (at the local pub?), it was so flipping loud I could hardly hear the planes in the background!
It's nice to see their latest press release doesn't let the truth get in the way of a good campaign, still, I don't suppose they'd believe anyone who actually knows the truth about how flights are handled in and out of Bristol. Wonder if it's worth infiltrating their ranks?
These people have completely taken leave of their senses. I suppose they do a good line in nuclear physics and heart surgery in their spare time. One of the videos on their website shows an interview with some bloke in a garden, allegedly in Felton. It must have escaped their notice that while they were talking to him their was what sounded like a cracking party going on nearby (at the local pub?), it was so flipping loud I could hardly hear the planes in the background!
It's nice to see their latest press release doesn't let the truth get in the way of a good campaign, still, I don't suppose they'd believe anyone who actually knows the truth about how flights are handled in and out of Bristol. Wonder if it's worth infiltrating their ranks?
Join Date: Jul 2007
Location: Bristol, UK
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You can certainly use SBAE's very handy direct web link to comment upon the planning application. I chose not to use the suggested template and sent my own more positive comments!!
Join Date: May 2005
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I took the time to write a decent-length letter in respect of the planning application, making the point that SBAE (and others) appear to be using the airport as a proxy in some wider campaign on environmental issues. Whilst we all hear/see their rage/frustration/concern about the environment, levelling all the blame at Bristol Airport seems somewhat fruitless. It's probably because actually tackling the really big environmental problems is harder than circulating pre-printed forms for people to tick and linking to websites for people to register planning objections.
I did make the point that I hoped that the review process would take into account the difference between a hastily ticked-and-returned form, and a more diligent response that required some research and deeper understanding of the complex issues involved.
I suspect that some of the people involved in SBAE are trapped by their own rhetoric - if they have painted themselves as ardent campaigners, it's awfully difficult for them to appear to be anything but violently opposed to any change, regardless how small, even though we're aware they're also users of the airport. Extremism and hypocrisy often go hand in hand.
Let's hope the first rule of analysis applies; disregard the results at the extremes, and interpret the data (or lack of it) from the mainstream.
I did make the point that I hoped that the review process would take into account the difference between a hastily ticked-and-returned form, and a more diligent response that required some research and deeper understanding of the complex issues involved.
I suspect that some of the people involved in SBAE are trapped by their own rhetoric - if they have painted themselves as ardent campaigners, it's awfully difficult for them to appear to be anything but violently opposed to any change, regardless how small, even though we're aware they're also users of the airport. Extremism and hypocrisy often go hand in hand.
Let's hope the first rule of analysis applies; disregard the results at the extremes, and interpret the data (or lack of it) from the mainstream.
Join Date: Jul 2007
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I agree. The airport is an easy target rather than addressing the 40% of emissions from UK homes and the massive increase in China and India which frankly dwarf this country. I attended one of the weekend planning open days in the old terminal and during the 2 hours I was there, there were surprisingly few people present. In my view the vast majority are voting with their feet and using the airport rather than the small minority (some of whom have been seen using the airport!) who feel they have the right impose their will on that majority. In any event I think the Planners and the Council will bottle it and send the whole application off to a Planning Inquiry so that they can absolve themselves of the responsibility of making a decision.
Join Date: Apr 2009
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Welshtraveller,
The flights are bookable on the kiss flights website who are the agents for Viking Airlines. Viking's website doesnt have any flights for summer 2010 loaded yet, but the flights will operate!
The flights are bookable on the kiss flights website who are the agents for Viking Airlines. Viking's website doesnt have any flights for summer 2010 loaded yet, but the flights will operate!
Join Date: May 2005
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In any event I think the Planners and the Council will bottle it and send the whole application off to a Planning Inquiry so that they can absolve themselves of the responsibility of making a decision.
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Can these comments be from the same Bristolians that were so desperate to keep an airport out of Filton, the obvious home for it?
Look closer to home for the NIMBYs next time chaps.
Look closer to home for the NIMBYs next time chaps.
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Can these comments be from the same Bristolians that were so desperate to keep an airport out of Filton, the obvious home for it?
Look closer to home for the NIMBYs next time chaps.
Look closer to home for the NIMBYs next time chaps.
Join Date: May 2005
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It already is a proper accusation.
Have another go.
Brunel to Concorde
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SBAE and all that
SBAE is composed of basically three disparate groups: the 'professional' campaigners such as Friends of the Earth and the Protect Rural England people who will use any weapon that comes to hand to further their causes, including expansion of airports; some local elected representatives who for whatever reason(s) are against expansion; nimbys - some of these may also be found within the other groups of course.
The members sometimes make uneasy bedfellows, with the professionals' planet-saving (in their view) moral high ground not infrequently compromised by some nimbys' unashamed desire to prevent expansion because they don't want a biggish airport as a neighbour, and are content if flights and passengers are displaced to other airports which will still produce the same amount of the planet-savers' dreaded emissions.
SBAE has been issuing window and car stickers and posters since it came into existence but when I strolled round part of Wrington (the largest of the airport's neighbouring villages and the parish in which BRS is situated) a few weeks ago I saw only one anti-expansion poster displayed and I passed about two hundred houses . It wasn't a a scientific count but, nonetheless, may be more indicative of the general local view rather than the noise emanating from the committed anti-expansionists.
Indeed, as one who grew up in and around Wrington in the late 40s and 50s I have seen it turn into a near small town since then where people have moved onto new estates, some built on green field sites. Some of the very people who have been responsible for this significant village expansion who commute daily to and from Bristol emitting their own carbon gasses (but that's all right because it's only other people who have to be kept in check), and by commuting ensure the A 38 is at its busiest at those times, are the most vocal when it comes to opposing airport expansion and an extension of its boundary into adjacent Green Belt land.
The spokesman for SBAE seems to be a character called Jeremy Birch. He was on the local telly this week asserting there is no need for expansion because passenger numbers are falling and will never again reach the previous peak. Why should this concern him? The airport owners are taking the financial risk, not him.
Another one who loves the local media spotlight is local parish councillor Hilary Burn. It was only last year that she complained at an airport consultative committee meeting that the airport's passenger figures had got ahead of its master plan projections. The airport is damned for losing passengers and damned for gaining them so far as SBAE is concerned.
I'm not sure who is the intended target of the remarks concerning Filton.
With hindsight it can easily be argued that Bristol City Council made a hash of moving its airport when the celebrated wartime Whitchurch became too small in the 1950s.
I am one the council's biggest critics (on many things) but it must be said that few people if anyone could then have predicted BRS's rise into a significant mid-ranking UK regional airport. Indeed, as late as the mid 90s I doubt that many would have said BRS would be handling over 6 mppa by 2008. I have the airport's ten-year plan issued in 1993 when its aim was to double its then 1 mppa by 2003, and that looked ambitious in 1993.
I have read that the city council could have had Filton instead of Lulgate when Whitchurch was closed. However, they would have been tenants of the resident aircraft manufacturers instead of owners and who knows how that might have worked out down the ensuing years?
That wonderful gift on hindsight now tells us that Filton would have been a much better bet than Lulgate with nearby motorway and rail connectivity, a bigger site (though about to be made smaller with housing development), a longer runway, better weather and situated nearer much more of Greater Bristol's industry and commerce than rural Lulsgate.
However, so far as I am aware the only time a serious bid was made to turn Filton into a civil airport was in the mid 1990s when Bae applied to develop it as a city airport. After a public enquiry the then relevant government minister rejected the application.
I don't think the citizens of Bristol (in its wider sense because Filton is not actually in municipal Bristol although it is in the contiguous urban area) opposed the application in huge numbers. The BRS management did so, for obvious commercial reasons, as did the usual crop of objectors whose type we are seeing now in regard to the BRS expansion.
There may have been more nimbys because Filton sits near many thousands of people's homes whereas Lulsgate is neighbour to villages.
I hope the expansion applications will be decided on their merits rather than aligned to the views of those who make the most noise. We know that life is not like that though, especially with politicians (local or national) involved.
The members sometimes make uneasy bedfellows, with the professionals' planet-saving (in their view) moral high ground not infrequently compromised by some nimbys' unashamed desire to prevent expansion because they don't want a biggish airport as a neighbour, and are content if flights and passengers are displaced to other airports which will still produce the same amount of the planet-savers' dreaded emissions.
SBAE has been issuing window and car stickers and posters since it came into existence but when I strolled round part of Wrington (the largest of the airport's neighbouring villages and the parish in which BRS is situated) a few weeks ago I saw only one anti-expansion poster displayed and I passed about two hundred houses . It wasn't a a scientific count but, nonetheless, may be more indicative of the general local view rather than the noise emanating from the committed anti-expansionists.
Indeed, as one who grew up in and around Wrington in the late 40s and 50s I have seen it turn into a near small town since then where people have moved onto new estates, some built on green field sites. Some of the very people who have been responsible for this significant village expansion who commute daily to and from Bristol emitting their own carbon gasses (but that's all right because it's only other people who have to be kept in check), and by commuting ensure the A 38 is at its busiest at those times, are the most vocal when it comes to opposing airport expansion and an extension of its boundary into adjacent Green Belt land.
The spokesman for SBAE seems to be a character called Jeremy Birch. He was on the local telly this week asserting there is no need for expansion because passenger numbers are falling and will never again reach the previous peak. Why should this concern him? The airport owners are taking the financial risk, not him.
Another one who loves the local media spotlight is local parish councillor Hilary Burn. It was only last year that she complained at an airport consultative committee meeting that the airport's passenger figures had got ahead of its master plan projections. The airport is damned for losing passengers and damned for gaining them so far as SBAE is concerned.
I'm not sure who is the intended target of the remarks concerning Filton.
With hindsight it can easily be argued that Bristol City Council made a hash of moving its airport when the celebrated wartime Whitchurch became too small in the 1950s.
I am one the council's biggest critics (on many things) but it must be said that few people if anyone could then have predicted BRS's rise into a significant mid-ranking UK regional airport. Indeed, as late as the mid 90s I doubt that many would have said BRS would be handling over 6 mppa by 2008. I have the airport's ten-year plan issued in 1993 when its aim was to double its then 1 mppa by 2003, and that looked ambitious in 1993.
I have read that the city council could have had Filton instead of Lulgate when Whitchurch was closed. However, they would have been tenants of the resident aircraft manufacturers instead of owners and who knows how that might have worked out down the ensuing years?
That wonderful gift on hindsight now tells us that Filton would have been a much better bet than Lulgate with nearby motorway and rail connectivity, a bigger site (though about to be made smaller with housing development), a longer runway, better weather and situated nearer much more of Greater Bristol's industry and commerce than rural Lulsgate.
However, so far as I am aware the only time a serious bid was made to turn Filton into a civil airport was in the mid 1990s when Bae applied to develop it as a city airport. After a public enquiry the then relevant government minister rejected the application.
I don't think the citizens of Bristol (in its wider sense because Filton is not actually in municipal Bristol although it is in the contiguous urban area) opposed the application in huge numbers. The BRS management did so, for obvious commercial reasons, as did the usual crop of objectors whose type we are seeing now in regard to the BRS expansion.
There may have been more nimbys because Filton sits near many thousands of people's homes whereas Lulsgate is neighbour to villages.
I hope the expansion applications will be decided on their merits rather than aligned to the views of those who make the most noise. We know that life is not like that though, especially with politicians (local or national) involved.
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very well put mv on youre last post. Im in IOWA and read about things going on in bristol. I am amazed that the airport here in quad cities has air bridges and they dont seem to have any planning problems here like in england. Keep up the good posts as always like to read them. yv.
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Sharm
Thomson adds third weekly flight to Egypt
(20/08/09)
From 20th December, Thomson will add a third weekly flight to Sharm El Sheikh direct from Bristol. Operating on a Sunday afternoon until the end of April, the service offers a weekend alternative to existing flights that depart on Mondays and Thursdays
(20/08/09)
From 20th December, Thomson will add a third weekly flight to Sharm El Sheikh direct from Bristol. Operating on a Sunday afternoon until the end of April, the service offers a weekend alternative to existing flights that depart on Mondays and Thursdays