Bristol-5
Brunel to Concorde
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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...els-flights-company-files-administration.html
This Daily Mail report contains a picture of a notice issued under the Civil Aviation Act by Bristol Airport at 2100 last night saying that E145 G-RJXM has been detained pending settlement of airport charges.
This Daily Mail report contains a picture of a notice issued under the Civil Aviation Act by Bristol Airport at 2100 last night saying that E145 G-RJXM has been detained pending settlement of airport charges.
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https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...els-flights-company-files-administration.html
This Daily Mail report contains a picture of a notice issued under the Civil Aviation Act by Bristol Airport at 2100 last night saying that E145 G-RJXM has been detained pending settlement of airport charges.
This Daily Mail report contains a picture of a notice issued under the Civil Aviation Act by Bristol Airport at 2100 last night saying that E145 G-RJXM has been detained pending settlement of airport charges.
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Brussels resumption
Resumption of BRS-BRU flights, which was originally scheduled for 31MAR by SN, has been pushed back to 01MAY. They didn't give an explanation when I asked, but I assume it's connected to CityJet providing the aircraft to operate it.
I'm a bit concerned that 01MAY (a Wednesday) is just a placeholder date, and that it may change again.
I'm a bit annoyed, as I'm flying to the USA in April, and had planned to fly BRS-BRU-USA. Now I have to trek off to LHR (again) in the middle of the night.
I've also heard nothing about any plans to find an airline to fly to Germany (FRA, MUC, etc.).
I'm a bit concerned that 01MAY (a Wednesday) is just a placeholder date, and that it may change again.
I'm a bit annoyed, as I'm flying to the USA in April, and had planned to fly BRS-BRU-USA. Now I have to trek off to LHR (again) in the middle of the night.
I've also heard nothing about any plans to find an airline to fly to Germany (FRA, MUC, etc.).
Resumption of BRS-BRU flights, which was originally scheduled for 31MAR by SN, has been pushed back to 01MAY. They didn't give an explanation when I asked, but I assume it's connected to CityJet providing the aircraft to operate it.
I'm a bit concerned that 01MAY (a Wednesday) is just a placeholder date, and that it may change again.
I'm a bit annoyed, as I'm flying to the USA in April, and had planned to fly BRS-BRU-USA. Now I have to trek off to LHR (again) in the middle of the night.
I've also heard nothing about any plans to find an airline to fly to Germany (FRA, MUC, etc.).
I'm a bit concerned that 01MAY (a Wednesday) is just a placeholder date, and that it may change again.
I'm a bit annoyed, as I'm flying to the USA in April, and had planned to fly BRS-BRU-USA. Now I have to trek off to LHR (again) in the middle of the night.
I've also heard nothing about any plans to find an airline to fly to Germany (FRA, MUC, etc.).
Brunel to Concorde
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Resumption of BRS-BRU flights, which was originally scheduled for 31MAR by SN, has been pushed back to 01MAY. They didn't give an explanation when I asked, but I assume it's connected to CityJet providing the aircraft to operate it.
I'm a bit concerned that 01MAY (a Wednesday) is just a placeholder date, and that it may change again.
I'm a bit annoyed, as I'm flying to the USA in April, and had planned to fly BRS-BRU-USA. Now I have to trek off to LHR (again) in the middle of the night.
I've also heard nothing about any plans to find an airline to fly to Germany (FRA, MUC, etc.).
I'm a bit concerned that 01MAY (a Wednesday) is just a placeholder date, and that it may change again.
I'm a bit annoyed, as I'm flying to the USA in April, and had planned to fly BRS-BRU-USA. Now I have to trek off to LHR (again) in the middle of the night.
I've also heard nothing about any plans to find an airline to fly to Germany (FRA, MUC, etc.).
In early November last year the Brussels Airlines web booking engine showed they were taking back the BRS-BRU route from the flybmi code share from 31 March this year, with the same frequencies and virtually the same timings. The aircraft type was shown as RJ85, presumably CityJet. Unless they had a crystal ball they could not have known then that flybmi would cease operations in the middle of February.
On 19 February, three days after flybmi's closure, I checked the Brussels Airlines booking engine and found that flights on BRS-BRU were still bookable from 31 March with RJ85s. However, the website also contained a notice saying, Due to the ceased operations of our partner airline flybmi, all flights to and from Bristol are cancelled until further notice. This of course was at odds with the airline's booking engine.
On 26 February I asked Bristol Airport if they had any information about BRS-BRU. All they did was refer me to flybmi's press statement at the time that airline ceased to operate which was less than helpful.
By then the Brussels Airlines website had put back the start date for their RJ85 service to 1 May which is still the situation.
Just to complicate it further, a member of another forum which which I am associated contacted Brussels Airlines around 26 February and was informed, We are still looking for the best option on the long term. We'll communicate about Bristol and other routes soon. Sorry for any inconvenience. Yet then as now they were still showing flights from 1 May on their own website.
My enquiry was not just academic. I was looking to use the route in the late spring but I shan't take the risk that it will be put back further and have made other arrangements. As for FRA and MUC, it's a job to see which airline could operate these routes.
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BRU, FRA and MUC
I think BRU, FRA and MUC only work as destinations if they're carrying connecting passengers (MUC maybe less so), including passengers connecting to long-haul. That tends to rule out Ryanair and Easyjet as operators, as I don't think they'd have the point-to-point volume to justify putting on a 737/319. I guess if that point to point traffic was there, they'd be operating them now - as Easyjet operate AMS alongside KLM.
It may be that the volumes on those three routes fall awkwardly outside the aircraft that LH Group has available to it, despite being potentially commercially sustainable with the right aircraft. Maybe bmi's 37/49 seat ERJs were too small (pushing up fares). KLM operates AMS with a 98 seat aircraft, Aer Lingus (admittedly competing head to head with Ryanair) uses 72 seat prop-aircraft on DUB. The 80-ish seat RJ 85's that SN were scheduling to operate BRS-BRU from May 2019 were withdrawn in 2016 because (as a 4 engine aircraft) they're really not economical to operate. SN operated BRS for many years (on a 3 x daily basis) using the RJ 85 - the move to bmi coincided with withdrawing the RJ's. LH did briefly operate BRS-FRA directly (using a wetleased RJ-100), but then pulled out.
I've emailed LH to ask them to look at options to get BRS back on their route map, but SN's apparent dithering over resuming BRS-BRU (which should be a reliable route, but maybe Brexit affected) suggests they don't have the right size aircraft to operate it, and LH may face the same problem.
It may be that the volumes on those three routes fall awkwardly outside the aircraft that LH Group has available to it, despite being potentially commercially sustainable with the right aircraft. Maybe bmi's 37/49 seat ERJs were too small (pushing up fares). KLM operates AMS with a 98 seat aircraft, Aer Lingus (admittedly competing head to head with Ryanair) uses 72 seat prop-aircraft on DUB. The 80-ish seat RJ 85's that SN were scheduling to operate BRS-BRU from May 2019 were withdrawn in 2016 because (as a 4 engine aircraft) they're really not economical to operate. SN operated BRS for many years (on a 3 x daily basis) using the RJ 85 - the move to bmi coincided with withdrawing the RJ's. LH did briefly operate BRS-FRA directly (using a wetleased RJ-100), but then pulled out.
I've emailed LH to ask them to look at options to get BRS back on their route map, but SN's apparent dithering over resuming BRS-BRU (which should be a reliable route, but maybe Brexit affected) suggests they don't have the right size aircraft to operate it, and LH may face the same problem.
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I think BRU, FRA and MUC only work as destinations if they're carrying connecting passengers (MUC maybe less so), including passengers connecting to long-haul. That tends to rule out Ryanair and Easyjet as operators, as I don't think they'd have the point-to-point volume to justify putting on a 737/319. I guess if that point to point traffic was there, they'd be operating them now - as Easyjet operate AMS alongside KLM.
It may be that the volumes on those three routes fall awkwardly outside the aircraft that LH Group has available to it, despite being potentially commercially sustainable with the right aircraft. Maybe bmi's 37/49 seat ERJs were too small (pushing up fares). KLM operates AMS with a 98 seat aircraft, Aer Lingus (admittedly competing head to head with Ryanair) uses 72 seat prop-aircraft on DUB. The 80-ish seat RJ 85's that SN were scheduling to operate BRS-BRU from May 2019 were withdrawn in 2016 because (as a 4 engine aircraft) they're really not economical to operate. SN operated BRS for many years (on a 3 x daily basis) using the RJ 85 - the move to bmi coincided with withdrawing the RJ's. LH did briefly operate BRS-FRA directly (using a wetleased RJ-100), but then pulled out.
I've emailed LH to ask them to look at options to get BRS back on their route map, but SN's apparent dithering over resuming BRS-BRU (which should be a reliable route, but maybe Brexit affected) suggests they don't have the right size aircraft to operate it, and LH may face the same problem.
It may be that the volumes on those three routes fall awkwardly outside the aircraft that LH Group has available to it, despite being potentially commercially sustainable with the right aircraft. Maybe bmi's 37/49 seat ERJs were too small (pushing up fares). KLM operates AMS with a 98 seat aircraft, Aer Lingus (admittedly competing head to head with Ryanair) uses 72 seat prop-aircraft on DUB. The 80-ish seat RJ 85's that SN were scheduling to operate BRS-BRU from May 2019 were withdrawn in 2016 because (as a 4 engine aircraft) they're really not economical to operate. SN operated BRS for many years (on a 3 x daily basis) using the RJ 85 - the move to bmi coincided with withdrawing the RJ's. LH did briefly operate BRS-FRA directly (using a wetleased RJ-100), but then pulled out.
I've emailed LH to ask them to look at options to get BRS back on their route map, but SN's apparent dithering over resuming BRS-BRU (which should be a reliable route, but maybe Brexit affected) suggests they don't have the right size aircraft to operate it, and LH may face the same problem.
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I acknowledged that MUC *may* work P2P, but it needs the right aircraft size to make it economical (49 seat ERJ-145 versus 92 seat ERJ-175). Flybe only fly CWL-MUC direct twice a week (M,F) and that route is ending on 06SEP19.
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I think you have made an important and valid point about availability of appropriately-sized aircraft for FRA and MUC, B_T.
You alluded to LH operating BRS-FRA themselves which they did for 13 months from the end of March 2008. They used Eurowings Bae 146-300 aircraft at 3 x daily (21 x weekly), including a night stopper. In that time they carried just under 100,000 passengers before ending the route citing the recession that was at its height. 2009 is the only year this century that has seen a drop in BRS's overall annual passenger numbers.
3 x daily was very good for connectivity at FRA but at that frequency even the Bae 146-300 was probably too large. Whether it would have succeeded in more promising economic times is hard to gauge.
In 2013 bmi regional (as flybmi then was) set up a Bristol base and began a number of routes, with Germany seeing Frankfurt, Munich, Hamburg and Hanover - the latter lasted only a year but Dusseldorf began in 2015.
With Frankfurt rising to 3 x daily on weekdays and Munich double-daily, annual passenger figures rose between 2013 and 2018 from 16,000 to 53,000 and from 10,000 to 48,000 respectively. The LH code shares undoubtedly played a significant part.
Prior to Eurowings, BA operated both FRA and MUC from the beginning of this century with small E-Jets, first as Citiexpress then as Connect. It was a single daily service on both although FRA increased to 2 x daily at one point. So far as I know both were P2P. In 2007 Flybe bought BAConnect and promptly closed the five-aircraft Bristol base and with that went FRA and MUC, plus DUS that had commenced the previous year, along with several non-German routes. With flybmi's situation it's almost like history repeating itself, except that the reasons are different.
So from having six German routes until the middle of February BRS now has only two, both year round - easyJet to Berlin SXF mainly daily in summer, slightly less in winter, and Ryanair to Cologne at mainly 4 x weekly.
Although in terms of BRS's overall numbers the loss of the flybmi passengers won't create a huge dent, the German routes were more important than the passenger numbers lost. BRS needs more hub connectivity, especially with BRU's immediate future still seemingly unclear albeit the route continues to remain available for booking from 1 May on the Brussels Airlines website, and of course Germany is a major European country with which most regional airports would want as much connectivity as possible.
You alluded to LH operating BRS-FRA themselves which they did for 13 months from the end of March 2008. They used Eurowings Bae 146-300 aircraft at 3 x daily (21 x weekly), including a night stopper. In that time they carried just under 100,000 passengers before ending the route citing the recession that was at its height. 2009 is the only year this century that has seen a drop in BRS's overall annual passenger numbers.
3 x daily was very good for connectivity at FRA but at that frequency even the Bae 146-300 was probably too large. Whether it would have succeeded in more promising economic times is hard to gauge.
In 2013 bmi regional (as flybmi then was) set up a Bristol base and began a number of routes, with Germany seeing Frankfurt, Munich, Hamburg and Hanover - the latter lasted only a year but Dusseldorf began in 2015.
With Frankfurt rising to 3 x daily on weekdays and Munich double-daily, annual passenger figures rose between 2013 and 2018 from 16,000 to 53,000 and from 10,000 to 48,000 respectively. The LH code shares undoubtedly played a significant part.
Prior to Eurowings, BA operated both FRA and MUC from the beginning of this century with small E-Jets, first as Citiexpress then as Connect. It was a single daily service on both although FRA increased to 2 x daily at one point. So far as I know both were P2P. In 2007 Flybe bought BAConnect and promptly closed the five-aircraft Bristol base and with that went FRA and MUC, plus DUS that had commenced the previous year, along with several non-German routes. With flybmi's situation it's almost like history repeating itself, except that the reasons are different.
So from having six German routes until the middle of February BRS now has only two, both year round - easyJet to Berlin SXF mainly daily in summer, slightly less in winter, and Ryanair to Cologne at mainly 4 x weekly.
Although in terms of BRS's overall numbers the loss of the flybmi passengers won't create a huge dent, the German routes were more important than the passenger numbers lost. BRS needs more hub connectivity, especially with BRU's immediate future still seemingly unclear albeit the route continues to remain available for booking from 1 May on the Brussels Airlines website, and of course Germany is a major European country with which most regional airports would want as much connectivity as possible.
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Which more or less answers the question about Bristol's connectivity issues with the rest of Star Alliance hubs, mainly ZRH and VIE..And i am thinking that if it didnt happen when OS had the F70 and LX the AR8, is it ever gonna happen now that all companies moved to bigger regional aircraft? Could Cityjet/Nordica provide an interim solution for LH as they have done for SK,LO,OS etc..? It's still mind-blowing that an airport like BRS which has many direct routes all over Europe and serves such a big catchment area, with such a vibrant city of the SW, of an important economic role, has such trouble attracting LH,esp.when you see them flying to places like WRO,TSR,SBZ,POZ etc...(a little unfair for BRS)
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Despite 8.5mppa, I think Bristol has a relatively small, and fragile, demand for business flying, mainly due to the relative proximity of BHX and LHR.
bmi had an awkward size fleet, of awkward sized expensive to operate aircraft. I believe most of their routes ex-BRS were commercially viable, and I tend to think it was their other endeavours (particularly operating routes ex-FRA and ex-MUC as LH *codeshares*, not wet leases) which dragged on them.
An example to illustrate the problem of aircraft size. Ex-LHR (ex-MAN, ex-BHX), LH operate 319/320 aircraft, and there's usually a decent availability in the K L T buckets, which are affordable flying. There's usually very good availability in V W S buckets, which is pricier, but still within range. You'd have to be unlucky to find an LH flight ex-UK with only Q H U M, because that's where it gets painful. If you end up with only Y B avails, forget it. You're better off walking.
bmi was almost never able to offer K L T. If you got lucky, you might find some W avails. More often than not, I'd be up in Q U. On a short-haul fare, that's about a £200 difference on a round trip. On a long-haul fare (UK-SFO) that's about £600-£800 difference on a round-trip. If you breathe very deeply, you can justify spending an extra £200 to fly ex-BRS over going to LHR. That is much much harder to do when it's £800. And even harder again when the difference is closer to £1,000 because if you're going to have to go to LHR, you have a wider choice of airlines, some (most) of whom will be cheaper than LH Group.
So if you can't find an aircraft that can offer decent inventory (which I'm guessing is about 90 seats, as KLM do well ex-BRS), your potential passengers will just go to LHR. I suspect that isn't true of some of the other regional destinations that the LH Regional fleet serves - it's their price or no price.
You're quite right to say it is anomalous that our only alliance/hub-carrier is KL (with a little nod to EI). It's possible that until economic ~90 seat aircraft come back in-vogue at LH Group (more CRJ900s? A220-100s?), we may be waiting another 5 years for connections to the world via anywhere other than AMS.
M_V - you've reminded me of the trips I took on BACon's MUC-BRS route, which was a weird MUC-BRS-GLA route. Everyone staying on-board for GLA, had to get off, bus to the terminal, walk through passport control, go back upstairs and through security, and re-board again. An absolute palaver.
bmi had an awkward size fleet, of awkward sized expensive to operate aircraft. I believe most of their routes ex-BRS were commercially viable, and I tend to think it was their other endeavours (particularly operating routes ex-FRA and ex-MUC as LH *codeshares*, not wet leases) which dragged on them.
An example to illustrate the problem of aircraft size. Ex-LHR (ex-MAN, ex-BHX), LH operate 319/320 aircraft, and there's usually a decent availability in the K L T buckets, which are affordable flying. There's usually very good availability in V W S buckets, which is pricier, but still within range. You'd have to be unlucky to find an LH flight ex-UK with only Q H U M, because that's where it gets painful. If you end up with only Y B avails, forget it. You're better off walking.
bmi was almost never able to offer K L T. If you got lucky, you might find some W avails. More often than not, I'd be up in Q U. On a short-haul fare, that's about a £200 difference on a round trip. On a long-haul fare (UK-SFO) that's about £600-£800 difference on a round-trip. If you breathe very deeply, you can justify spending an extra £200 to fly ex-BRS over going to LHR. That is much much harder to do when it's £800. And even harder again when the difference is closer to £1,000 because if you're going to have to go to LHR, you have a wider choice of airlines, some (most) of whom will be cheaper than LH Group.
So if you can't find an aircraft that can offer decent inventory (which I'm guessing is about 90 seats, as KLM do well ex-BRS), your potential passengers will just go to LHR. I suspect that isn't true of some of the other regional destinations that the LH Regional fleet serves - it's their price or no price.
You're quite right to say it is anomalous that our only alliance/hub-carrier is KL (with a little nod to EI). It's possible that until economic ~90 seat aircraft come back in-vogue at LH Group (more CRJ900s? A220-100s?), we may be waiting another 5 years for connections to the world via anywhere other than AMS.
M_V - you've reminded me of the trips I took on BACon's MUC-BRS route, which was a weird MUC-BRS-GLA route. Everyone staying on-board for GLA, had to get off, bus to the terminal, walk through passport control, go back upstairs and through security, and re-board again. An absolute palaver.
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I have been reading the last few posts with great interest as a mainly BHX but occasional BRS user.
BHX has multiple daily connections with LH, SN, LX, SK, AF, KL, EI plus of course TK, EK and QR. However, we have no non stop flights to Lisbon, Seville, Valencia, Gibraltar, Athens, indeed many other European cities that BRS boasts on its departure boards.
BRS meanwhile is entirely the opposite. It has flights to a much wider range of European cities than BHX but now only has KL and maybe SN from May for worldwide connections.
It seems like the airlines over the years have, aside from the operational issues for EK/QR, decided BHX is a 'legacy' airport and BRS a much better and more year round P2P city/leisure break destination airport?
Having said that I am surprises TK haven't started at BRS yet.
My own BRS usage happens when I can't fly non-stop from BHX or when price is so competitive it makes the longer journey to BRS worth my while. I know of a fair few people who do the same who live in Warwickshire and Worcestershire.
Perhaps LM will take up the slack but I read somewhere (I think on the NCL thread) they are not going to (or can't?) codeshare with *A which means these would be solely P2P routes and not therefore as viable? Just my thoughts.
BHX has multiple daily connections with LH, SN, LX, SK, AF, KL, EI plus of course TK, EK and QR. However, we have no non stop flights to Lisbon, Seville, Valencia, Gibraltar, Athens, indeed many other European cities that BRS boasts on its departure boards.
BRS meanwhile is entirely the opposite. It has flights to a much wider range of European cities than BHX but now only has KL and maybe SN from May for worldwide connections.
It seems like the airlines over the years have, aside from the operational issues for EK/QR, decided BHX is a 'legacy' airport and BRS a much better and more year round P2P city/leisure break destination airport?
Having said that I am surprises TK haven't started at BRS yet.
My own BRS usage happens when I can't fly non-stop from BHX or when price is so competitive it makes the longer journey to BRS worth my while. I know of a fair few people who do the same who live in Warwickshire and Worcestershire.
Perhaps LM will take up the slack but I read somewhere (I think on the NCL thread) they are not going to (or can't?) codeshare with *A which means these would be solely P2P routes and not therefore as viable? Just my thoughts.
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i was thinking the same. They clearly can’t be interested. Personally unless Lufthansa is interested the best we can hope for is a daily easyJet to Munich and maybe Ryanair to Hamburg. Frankfurt and dusseldorf I can’t see returning
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I have feeling that the airport will want to shape route development. I'm not sure they'd extend marketing and route support to FR or EZY to operate to BRU, FRA or MUC, knowing that it'd probably be fragile for them too, and almost certainly destroy the business case of operating hub routes to those destinations. I'd support them in that approach. I think I'd be important to reassure to LH Group, and find imaginative ways to find aircraft and support the routes.
On a small point of detail: the BM flights were LH codeshares, and outside of *A. (When BRU was operated by SN, it was inside *A). I think there is a case to say that a new operator needs to be either a wetlease provider to *A airline or a *A airline directly. There is a network benefit from being properly inside *A. (LH had to do all kinds of gymnastics with rule exceptions to allow their own Gold status passengers to get their usual benefits in respect of lounge entry, additional baggage allowance, through checking).
