LUTON -8

[ClearLand08]

Monarch having 3 based aircraft was an error, it's clearly 4 as pointed out by compton3bravo.

As for the Ryanair press release, that's curious. The bookable flights on their website clearly show the need for 5.

[LGS6753]

From LLA Website:

Ground Transportation Opportunity at London Luton Airport

Welcome to a fantastic opportunity

London Luton Airport is the UK’s 5th largest airport and is experiencing rapid growth in the number of passengers. We are seeking an organisation to operate a concession to provide personal ground transportation services for our passengers, business partners and staff.

Operating from a pick up and drop off facility close to the passenger terminal, we expect the winning bidder to provide a "best in class" product that enhances customer service and contributes to improving London Luton Airport’s reputation and brand values.

Click the link below to submit your expression of interest and to receive additional information.

Last date for expression of interest is 15th January 2016.

...but this doesn't make it clear where these passengers are being transported to; it is the aircraft, station, car parks, or somewhere else?

[LTNman]

Personal ground transportation services sounds like some sort of minicab operation except minicabs have to be ordered and not hailed.

[Itchin McCrevis]

So reading ClearLand analysis there is still some slots allocated but not taken up in the early morning?

Yes there is certain to be some degree of mis-match between slots held and flights hoped for/intended/on sale at this point in the process, this may include an element of "slot hedging" i.e. over booking to create scheduling options, and there will no doubt be flights on a "wait list" for a move to their prefered slot times - some of which may not be announced or on sale yet.

In theory this should all be sorted by late January according to the IATA scheduling timetable. After January things get more difficult as the schedule is then "opened up" to ad hoc and short-series flights (including GA bookings).

Excellent bit of analysis by Clearland by the way - big respect.

[pabely]

Iberia Express

The reason I thought that they would be a good fit for Madrid, other than incentives by the airport operator, EZY only do evenings, mornings are up for grabs!

[Itchin McCrevis]

Yes Madrid needs a morning flight starting from the Spanish end.

I believe Vueling and easyJet services to Barcelona will actualy compliment each other and grow the market share for Luton to the benefit of both, same would be true for Madrid with a Madrid based carrier.

[Buster the Bear]

Both Madrid and Barcelona once had multiple rotations until the easy love-in with Gatwick.

The new Luton Town stadium sponsored by easyJet, Vueling (Bwelin), Wizz? I wonder which it might be?

[pabely]

Now buster, you are naughty, you are implying Berlin by Vueling now?

[LTNman]

Master plan growth predictions for 2012

The following is the revised growth predictions for the airport and which the redevelopment phasing is based on. I would say by the end of 2016 the airport will be running 4 years ahead of prediction so the last phase will be brought forward. The same document states the reason the new taxiways won't go to the end of the runway is that if they did the runway would then have more capacity than the rest of the infrastructure implying it was pointless.

Upper end passenger and associated ATM unconstrained demand forecasts for LLA.
Source: LLAOL (2012)

Year mppa ATMs-000s
2013 10.3 112
2014 10.8 116
2015 11.2 118
2016 11.7 121
2017 12.1 124
2018 12.6 128
2019 12.9 130
2020 13.4 132
2021 14.3 137
2022 14.8 141
2023 15.4 144
2024 15.8 146
2025 16.6 150
2026 17.3 154
2027 17.7 156
2028 17.8 157
2029 17.8 157
2030 17.8 157
2031 17.8 157

[cj241101]

"Ground Transportation Opportunity at London Luton Airport"

Sounds to me like the contract for the car park bus service, which includes the staff bus from the car hire centre. Anyone who uses this service, especially at the peak times first thing in the morning (i.e. 0400-0500) will hope the successful bidder provides a more reliable service than the current operator.

[TBSC]

Wizz will start Kaunas-Luton 5x weekly from March.

[robbie1973]

Originally Posted by TBSC

Wizz will start Kaunas-Luton 5x weekly from March.

Taking over from Ryanair's twice weekly service ! I personally believe that Ryanair could do much better at Luton, their Dublin service was once operated up to six daily, Knock was twice daily and these service were always busy. I would like to see other airlines try and compete with them on these and a few other services and maybe then they might just buck their idea's up a bit.

[alm1]

The irony is that Ryanair didn't just end Luton-Kaunas - they moved it to Vilnius to compete better with Wizz Air.

[Boeing737-8]

With Wizz adding more flights I though I would add to my list:
August 16-Wizz Air
Belgrade 3 weekly
Bourgas 10 weekly
Brno 3 weekly
Bucharest 26 weekly
Budapest 35 weekly
Chisinau 3 weekly
Cluj-Napoca 20 weekly
Constanta 2 weekly
Craiova 5 weekly
Debrecen 10 weekly
Gdansk 20 weekly
Iasi 5 weekly
Katowice 21 weekly
Kaunas 5 weekly
Kosice 7 weekly
Kyiv 2 weekly
Ljubljana 4 weekly
Lublin 7 weekly
Ohrid 2 weekly
Palanga 2 weekly
Poprad 4 weekly
Poznan 12 weekly
Prague 8 weekly
Riga 12 weekly
Sibiu 5 weekly
Skopje 5 weekly
Sofia 21 weekly
Split 7 weekly
Szczecin 3 weekly
Timisoara 7 weekly
Targu Mures 5 weekly
Varna 7 weekly
Vilnius 21 weekly
Warsaw 26 weekly
Wroclaw 7 weekly
The tally of flights a week go to 342 with some being operated by the A321. Wizz will be offering so many more seats next year than any other year at LTN.

[robbie1973]

That certainly is an impressive route network and long may it continue.

[musicmike]

Originally Posted by pabely

Now buster, you are naughty, you are implying Berlin by Vueling now?

Don't think was implying anything of the sort. Bwelin is the correct pronunciation of Vueling!!

[LTNman]

The new bus station opened today at 12 noon precisely. Never mind the wheelchair access issue as the Greenline coach uses one of the curved bays with the extra gap.. As can be seen the builders were still removing the barriers as the coach pulled in.



Two minutes later the first National Express coach arrived whose arrival was recorded by the airports official photographer. Ironically the coach had a picture of an ex-servicemen in a wheelchair who would have struggled to use the bay the coach parked in.

[boeing_eng]

There has reportedly already been some sort of collision between the airport buses reversing out of the new bays!! When I used the long term/staff bus a couple of weeks back the driver had to stand by the gate and open it for passengers. Because of the delay between doing this and getting back in the bus to reverse it out, another group of passengers would arrive at the gate and start opening it and delay the bus leaving even more!

[davidjohnson6]

BoeingEng - I haven't been to LTN for a few weeks so have no personal knowledge of the new coach bays. However are the problems this week simply teething issues which will be resolved in a few weeks or are they more fundamental ?

[LTNman]

I was told they are going to put a key pad on each gate to stop passengers opening them.

I watched the first few coaches arrive and depart. Lets just say it was interesting. The car park coach drivers were told to give way to their right (or was it left). While those drivers might be obeying that rule nobody else was with multiple coaches all reversing at the same time and going in all directions. Here we have 2 National Express coaches with the one on the left just completed its reverse while the coach on the right is still backing out. The GreenLine can be seen rightly giving away. The right angle bays and curve mean most coaches are heading for the same spot. Given time things will settle down one hopes as the drivers get used to the layout,