SOUTHEND - 4
This discussion certainly underscores the difficulty of identifying un(der)served destinations that could support a credible ATR operation. In the longer term Stobart Air might find their opportunities somewhat limited for this reason. This particular case is rendered more difficult by the need to fit into an existing schedule. Maastricht appears to be a good fit but the past performance of MST-based routes is not encouraging.
I agree that Jersey in theory is an interesting idea. Easyjet have significantly reduced their SEN-JER schedule this summer to two per week at the very off-peak times of Tuesday and Saturday evenings. So an early morning Stobart schedule would not conflict. The interesting question might be the attitude of Flybe especially in view of their interest in JER-LCY as indicated by their LCY slot allocations.
I agree that Jersey in theory is an interesting idea. Easyjet have significantly reduced their SEN-JER schedule this summer to two per week at the very off-peak times of Tuesday and Saturday evenings. So an early morning Stobart schedule would not conflict. The interesting question might be the attitude of Flybe especially in view of their interest in JER-LCY as indicated by their LCY slot allocations.
Last edited by Tagron; 12th Apr 2014 at 11:26. Reason: typo
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Monchengladbach had at least one LON route previously and the time I utilised the route to position crew (to LGG of all places on I had to book them in business class, economy was full. But having never worked with the ATR I'm not sure how a 72 would get on with Monchengladbach's runway.
This discussion certainly underscores the difficulty of identifying un(der)served destinations that could support a credible ATR operation. In the longer term Stobart Air might find their opportunities somewhat limited for this reason. This particular case is rendered more difficult by the need to fit into an existing schedule. Maastricht appears to be a good fit but the past performance of MST-based routes is not encouraging.
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I think Stobart Air is facing the same dilemma that VLM Airlines faced before it was taken over by Cityjet: The equipment used means that the perimeter in which the airline can look for possible destinations is somewhat restricted - and also has competition from HSR.
New airport (effectively), new airline and new routes, one would think start off small and expand from there, not come straight in with stretched variants of aircraft.
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Wouldn't SA look to replace Cologne with another city route? Cologne is a big city with over a million people, replacing Cologne with Jersey or a small city like Maastricht wouldn't make up for the loss of expected passenger numbers and revenue the Cologne route would bring.
Maybe Stuttgart, Paris Orly, Leipzig, Copenhagen?
Maybe Stuttgart, Paris Orly, Leipzig, Copenhagen?
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All, except Paris, too far away to fit into the schedule. Plus the concept seems to be to go after unserved markets (RNS, GRQ, CFE, MO) or markets with possible corporate clients from SE London (CGN, ANR) and not just adding a sixth London gateway for destinations already served from elsewhere with massive capacity.
As for the ATR42 vs. ATR72 problem - as far as I know, the ATR72 is only marginally more expensive to operate than the ATR42, so unless you operate into airports with very short runways, it does not really make a lot of sense to have an ATR42 (which also explains why its sales are pretty much non-existent whereas the ATR72 is selling like hot bread).
As for the ATR42 vs. ATR72 problem - as far as I know, the ATR72 is only marginally more expensive to operate than the ATR42, so unless you operate into airports with very short runways, it does not really make a lot of sense to have an ATR42 (which also explains why its sales are pretty much non-existent whereas the ATR72 is selling like hot bread).
Last edited by virginblue; 12th Apr 2014 at 12:42.
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Bremen was a City Flyer Express (LGW) route, to hell that Ryanair serve it at stupid o'clock with putrid cabins and seat backs that don't recline, serve it morning and evening for the business traveller as City Flyer did.
But of those destinations only ORY would work in the present situation without rejigging the schedules. Longer term I suspect they will have to find a way of serving the major cities even though this will put them more in competition with the established players.
The choice of the ATR72 as opposed to the ATR42 is noteworthy because the ATR42s remain in the fleet. They were not sold off as many reports predicted but are in use on the EIR routes. Four more ATR72s are on option. What happens next ?
The choice of the ATR72 as opposed to the ATR42 is noteworthy because the ATR42s remain in the fleet. They were not sold off as many reports predicted but are in use on the EIR routes. Four more ATR72s are on option. What happens next ?
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If you have paid for ATR42s or can get dirt cheap leases (the RE ATR42s are all pretty knackered early built -300s IIRC), it makes sense to keep them if you don't need more than 48seats. If you purchase new equipment, it does not really make sense to waste money on an ATR42-600 unless you operate into restricted airfields (like, for example, LIAT in the Caribbean).
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How to develop a successful airline ... start small and expand from there ...
Love him or hate him how did Ryanair start ... with stretched state-of-the-art B737's, with less than state-of-the-art BAC1-11's ...
Nope, in the old days there were literally three functioning airports in the Irish Republic, namely DUB, SNN and ORK.
Ryanair started out with a clapped out fleet of Budgies and carved a niche for themselves serving the other regional airports of the Irish Republic, never mind operating costs per bum on seat etc
Love him or hate him how did Ryanair start ... with stretched state-of-the-art B737's, with less than state-of-the-art BAC1-11's ...
Nope, in the old days there were literally three functioning airports in the Irish Republic, namely DUB, SNN and ORK.
Ryanair started out with a clapped out fleet of Budgies and carved a niche for themselves serving the other regional airports of the Irish Republic, never mind operating costs per bum on seat etc
Perhaps a stupid question, but if a simple replacement cannot be found for SEN-CGN, how bad is it for the recently published Stobart Air schedule to undergo a limited bit of rejigging (ensuring nothing changes by more than the EU261 prescribed 2 hour limit) ? Neither SEN nor any of the planned destinations from SEN seem to be particularly constrained by slot availability
Would perhaps give a bit more freedom for a route planner to choose potential routes to fill the CGN vacancy...
Would perhaps give a bit more freedom for a route planner to choose potential routes to fill the CGN vacancy...
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How to develop a successful airline ... start small and expand from there ...
Love him or hate him how did Ryanair start ... with stretched state-of-the-art B737's, with less than state-of-the-art BAC1-11's ...
Nope, in the old days there were literally three functioning airports in the Irish Republic, namely DUB, SNN and ORK.
Ryanair started out with a clapped out fleet of Budgies and carved a niche for themselves serving the other regional airports of the Irish Republic, never mind operating costs per bum on seat etc
Love him or hate him how did Ryanair start ... with stretched state-of-the-art B737's, with less than state-of-the-art BAC1-11's ...
Nope, in the old days there were literally three functioning airports in the Irish Republic, namely DUB, SNN and ORK.
Ryanair started out with a clapped out fleet of Budgies and carved a niche for themselves serving the other regional airports of the Irish Republic, never mind operating costs per bum on seat etc
Mk. I with the Budgies and BACs and its business model and route network was on the brink of insolvency when MOL was brought in and pretty much scrapped Ryanair Mk. I to re-invent Ryanair Mk. II.Other than the name, the 1980s / early 1990s Ryanair has little to do with the airline of today.
PS: I think they started with a Bandeirante.
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its business model and route network was on the brink of insolvency
Wasn't the route network of Ryanair then, that you suggest was on the brink of insolvency, reminiscent of the Aer Arran (Stobart Air or is that "Aer") route network of now?
I'm relieved I'm out of the industry now in the main because the asylum has become run by accountants, never mind what the customer actually wants, "We'll offer them this cr@ppy schedule at this cr@ppy price and to hell with them if they don't like it" whilst staff wander around in brightly coloured tee shirts incapable of thinking on their feet and making a decision that hasn't been pre-programmed in to a computer.
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Maybe there are no new carriers in the pipeline for Southend and Easyjet won't be adding any extra capacity at Southend.
Was this the reason for the creation of Stobart Air? A clever move by the owner of Southend or a sign of desperation not to have all its eggs in one basket?
Quote from the Stansted website
Even with newly signed agreements, as MAG owners of Stansted has just found out, Easyjet can remove capacity at a drop of a hat even if the ink still hasn't dried.
So what of the future? Gatwick seems to be untouchable and is the airport easyjet is most committed to.
Luton would appear to be going through an easyjet renascence at the moment which is a surprise to me seeing that there are still government hurdles to jump before work can start on expanding the airport but as easyjet's home base Luton seems to be safe.
I am not sure what is going on over at Stansted and how committed the airline really is to Stansted but Southend has to be vulnerable in the mid to long term. Easyjet has only been at Southend a short while but has pulled routes and cut capacity on other routes as it tries to find the right destinations for its Essex outpost. It seems to have all but given up on some days in the winter.
Maybe ultimately Easyjet will close either its Stansted or Southend base while expanding the one that it keeps. Both airports use the same London rail terminal so there is no difference there.
For Southend to be the winner the airport would need to stay open past midnight and the rail link would also need to run longer. If that happened and a base was closed I think Southend would be kept as it is far away from Luton and Gatwick while Luton and Stansted are close neighbours. If it doesn't happen I could see a day when easyjet up sticks.
Does anyone here think that there is no chance that easyjet would pull out of Southend? Think it can't happen, well they pulled out of East Midlands after basing three aircraft there for several years.
Was this the reason for the creation of Stobart Air? A clever move by the owner of Southend or a sign of desperation not to have all its eggs in one basket?
Quote from the Stansted website
easyJet and the new owners of London Stansted, M.A.G, have today announced a new long-term growth framework deal to enable the airline to more than double its passenger numbers at Stansted from a current 2.8 million passengers to six million passengers a year over the next five years
So what of the future? Gatwick seems to be untouchable and is the airport easyjet is most committed to.
Luton would appear to be going through an easyjet renascence at the moment which is a surprise to me seeing that there are still government hurdles to jump before work can start on expanding the airport but as easyjet's home base Luton seems to be safe.
I am not sure what is going on over at Stansted and how committed the airline really is to Stansted but Southend has to be vulnerable in the mid to long term. Easyjet has only been at Southend a short while but has pulled routes and cut capacity on other routes as it tries to find the right destinations for its Essex outpost. It seems to have all but given up on some days in the winter.
Maybe ultimately Easyjet will close either its Stansted or Southend base while expanding the one that it keeps. Both airports use the same London rail terminal so there is no difference there.
For Southend to be the winner the airport would need to stay open past midnight and the rail link would also need to run longer. If that happened and a base was closed I think Southend would be kept as it is far away from Luton and Gatwick while Luton and Stansted are close neighbours. If it doesn't happen I could see a day when easyjet up sticks.
Does anyone here think that there is no chance that easyjet would pull out of Southend? Think it can't happen, well they pulled out of East Midlands after basing three aircraft there for several years.
Last edited by LTNman; 13th Apr 2014 at 05:20.
LTNman
To answer your question "Does anyone here think that there is no chance that easyJet would pull out of Southend?" I would say that no aviation professional would rule that out any more than they would rule out easyJet pulling out of any of their other smaller bases.
There might be two possible reasons why that could happen:
1) The passenger demand at acceptable yields, on a sufficient number of routes, dried up to the extend where a base was no longer tenable.
2) New opportunities arose elsewhere within Europe which were considerably more profitable and which could not be exploited without cannibalising other bases.
I cannot see any sign of 1) arising in the near future as there is little chance of a major competitor moving in to bring that about and with the UK economy improving demand may well increase. As for 2), well easyJet is a business enterprise after all is said and done and maximising profitability will always rule over sentiment. Perhaps a more interesting question is whether easyJet feel that the SEN base is now mature or whether they will increase the size of the based fleet over the next year or two.
I don't think there is any possibility of SEN ever staying "open past midnight" for scheduled passenger flights for environmental reasons, although it is open H24 of course and does have quota capacity for night charter flights. I do expect the current train situation to be resolved but whether that has to wait until 2016 when the current franchise expires or not remains to be seen.
The Aer Arann plans to establish a network of routes from SEN goes back three years so it has nothing to do with easyJet's SEN activities and the name change to Stobart Air seems to just reflect Stobart Group's recent change of business focus.
To answer your question "Does anyone here think that there is no chance that easyJet would pull out of Southend?" I would say that no aviation professional would rule that out any more than they would rule out easyJet pulling out of any of their other smaller bases.
There might be two possible reasons why that could happen:
1) The passenger demand at acceptable yields, on a sufficient number of routes, dried up to the extend where a base was no longer tenable.
2) New opportunities arose elsewhere within Europe which were considerably more profitable and which could not be exploited without cannibalising other bases.
I cannot see any sign of 1) arising in the near future as there is little chance of a major competitor moving in to bring that about and with the UK economy improving demand may well increase. As for 2), well easyJet is a business enterprise after all is said and done and maximising profitability will always rule over sentiment. Perhaps a more interesting question is whether easyJet feel that the SEN base is now mature or whether they will increase the size of the based fleet over the next year or two.
I don't think there is any possibility of SEN ever staying "open past midnight" for scheduled passenger flights for environmental reasons, although it is open H24 of course and does have quota capacity for night charter flights. I do expect the current train situation to be resolved but whether that has to wait until 2016 when the current franchise expires or not remains to be seen.
The Aer Arann plans to establish a network of routes from SEN goes back three years so it has nothing to do with easyJet's SEN activities and the name change to Stobart Air seems to just reflect Stobart Group's recent change of business focus.
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I do expect the current train situation to be resolved but whether that has to wait until 2016 when the current franchise expires or not remains to be seen.
Last edited by LTNman; 13th Apr 2014 at 14:20.
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Rail franchising has always been, and continues to be, a dark art. What applies for one franchise contractual obligation does not necessarily apply elsewhere. Abellio Greater Anglia (Dutch Railways by any other name) has focused on revenue increasing franchise obligations such as gating and enhanced revenue protection at the same time as "re-modelling" services and returning trains to the leasing companies and decreasing customer service staffing levels. I would very much doubt that the traffic to be generated by a late night/early morning service to SEN would offset the costs involved, not to mention the increased track charges levied at these times by Network Rail who jealously guard their engineering hours, not so much to do lots of lovely engineering but as a revenue source when they have to give them up to allow train operators to run those pesky passenger trains. This won't change, whoever the incumbent franchise operator. Until such time that the revenue offset is balanced by the traffic on offer (as it is at LTN) I can't see enhanced train services to SEN. So, in the meantime, where is the EasyBus (or whoever) replacement? That IS within Stobart's power to deliver. If they can sort out planes, routes and an airport, a couple of little Mercedes buses to/from central London and Stratford can't be beyond them?
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In addition to pondering the late-night / early-morning travel situation perhaps Stobarts could also consider asking WH Smith (or a similar operator) if they would be prepared to open a landside shop to complement the existing airside one. I am sure that such a shopping facility would be appreciated by arriving passengers and meeters and greeters.
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GREATER Anglia bosses are investing more than £20million into train services across Essex after agreeing a two year extension to their franchise. never know might adding service to southend Airport early start morning