Any time I go through LDY there seem to be an awful lot of people from Donegal and Sligo using it, but he's right, it's a lot of cash, especially with the state the Republic's public finances are in.

As an aside, it's mentioned on the Ryanair thread that the BRS-LDY route is being re-instated. Any truth in this? I can't find any mention of it on their site.

If you go to online check-in it is there, might be a mistake

New works at LDY
 

Does anyone know what the new works going on at the airport are?

Astonishingly they seem to be ripping up the concrete that was just laid months ago as part of the £15 million runway and apron extension. And it is not a small area: hundreds if not thousands of square metres. The apron is nearly as small again as it was before the extension.

Is it the new terminal extension? Either way, it has got "screw up" written all over it!

Maybe they are just trying to save money on the rates bill?

If either of your suggestions were correct then yes it would have. But neither are. The old Apron brick surface is being upgraded to the same standard as the new concrete portion which was laid at the start of 2009. Last time I looked they were ahead of schedule on that project and the Runway resurfacing was due to start shortly. So sorry to be the bearer of unexciting news but no "screw up" going on. Derry Journal readers may look elsewhere........... AE

As a local rate payer I am glad to hear that!

However I thought the bricks were lovely and was disappointed to see mere concrete being used on the extension. The two surfaces didn't quite look right together.

I take it the concrete has better load bearing than the bricks and that it is the current standard or else now that 737s operate as opposed to Shorts 360s that the new surface is required for the future.

Anyway I had thought the extension was already finished by the way they had announced the cost of the project. Is the airport going to have to close for the runway resurfacing?

I see Ryanair have said they are talking to three UK airports about becoming their next base ....... I wonder . . . . . .

Amelia, yeah a similar thought had crossed my mind re new RYR base. They say they want to base 2-3 planes. This suggests to me that their intention is for a relatively small base, which would suit Derry. The based planes could service the existing routes, and maybe allow for a few new ones. Perhaps even providing a return to a proper LON service.

I really don't see why a twice daily STN and once daily LTN wouldn't work. If Knock can support 2xStansted, 1xGatwick, and 1xLuton a day, why can't Derry?

I think this next 12-18 months may make or break LDY. The losses it's currently making are unsustainable, and the Council's long mooted plans to sell it to a private company will remain unrealistic whilst the place only has 12-16 flights a day.

Perhaps if local media, particularly The Derry Journal, were more supportive of their local facility, combined with better advertising, then people in the NW might start using LDY, rather than resenting it.

LDY will not be a new base not this time anyway, I would put money on it. The main reason being that If MOL said that the UK would get a new base, MOL would never refer to LDY as UK, that's a whole different arguement. He has made a point of saying Derry and Belfast City are in Ireland and not UK, so I would suggest it is most unlikely that LDY is next base.

Furthermore, I dont believe that LDY would get any more than 1 738 based, as if Ryanair cut their busiest route ie STN back as far as they have, does the demand exist? And if a base with more than 1 a/c it most likely would need to be doing W patters beyond UK destinations?

While I do take your point about LDY and UK versus Ireland and did indeed think as much as I typed my original message (though I was just quoting a newspaper article), Ryanair are sometimes a little schizophrenic about this: their website shows Derry and Belfast as destinations in Ireland but at the same time the destinations map shows the border and, furthermore, clicking on "Click here for more departing airports" while having selected "Ireland (English)" on the language selection drop down only shows Dublin, Shannon, Kerry, Cork, Knock as the available airports.

The newspaper article didn't attribute the quote to Mr O'Leary, just Ryanair, so I'm not sure how much you can read into all that.

Nevertheless, the airport must be in constant contact with Ryanair and must talk about basing aircraft there. After all wasn't that the main point in extending the apron . . . . . .

This afternoons LDY - BHX flight (RYR1109) had a bird strike on no1 engine on departure.

Fair Points made here Amelia Earhart;

I just wish that Ryanair would expand Derry and look at a base, it frustrates me at the decline in the operation and to be fair to the airport management for all their negatives they have complied fully with Ryanair to meet their demands and now flights are not growing in number!

BHD take note......

Does a base matter?
 

Yeah it looks like it was Michael O'Leary and not just a Ryanair spokesman who made those comments about a UK base. Indeed, I think he actually said "base in Britain" which definitely rules LDY out although I take your point (EI-Bud) that MOL wouldn't have described LDY as in the UK whether or not a different Ryanair spokesperson might have.

Anyway, all this begs the question does a base really matter? I presumed all the airport works were to this end but apart from a red dot on the website what advantages does being a base provide? I mean BHD is a base but has less destinations than LDY (4 as opposed to 6). Paris Beauvais has 19 flights and is not a base, nor is Oslo nor Malaga, so being a base should not necessarily be confused with route development.

What concerns me more is lack of routes to obvious destinations like Manchester and Edinburgh, and that the loss of routes from LDY to Bristol and EMA seems to have been followed by these routes being announced at or being increased in frequency by Ryanair at BHD.

And with the existing routes, we went from 14 flights per week and 2 operators to Glasgow to 1 operator with just 4 flights per week. And as for loss of the twice daily Stansted route and subsequent timetabling of the London flights to two airports, don't get me started!

How much of the 33% fall in passenger numbers using LDY was due to a reduction of passenger demand and how much was due to a reduction of supply of seats?

All this while Ryanair parked 14 aircraft over the winter . . . .

For top dog of a successful international airline, his knowledge of his own island is poor.

gate22 this is a very debatable comment that you made and I think that we should avoid it on here!!!

Obviously it suggests that he has nationalism in his blood, or else doesnt care one bit and wants the publicity generated by his controverial comments.


EI-BUD

Does that not show that FR can destroy niche business links just as quick as MOL alleges they provide them??

Besides the price sensitive VFR traffic, or the opportunistic shopping trips to the mainland, I feel Ryanair on these thinner routes just end up butchering the service rather than improving. Removing the useful business links that could provide a day return, either in Derry or Great Britain, to the benefit of soccer fans / stag do's etc, who are basically looking a cheap weekend away, and may not even be that fussy on destination.

I'm sure that when the runway is lengthened in Derry, Ryanair will launch services to such cities on the mainland as Paris and Malaga. After all, Derry is Ireland's 4th largest city with a significant population.

I thought that the runway up there was lengthened. If not what have they spent ££££££££millions on in the last year, all from the public purse's of two states (is this legal under EU law - won't surprise me if it is not). Seems a bit unfair with private airports only 50 miles away or so, from a competition point of view.
Surely if you can get a flight to Alicante (maybe with restrictions), surely Paris etc should not be a problem. How can FR get away with coming into an airport getting the 'government' to pump ££££££millions in and then just pull routes. Surely the fact that no other airline operates there means that there just is not the capacity (is this not bad planning from the authorities being a complete waste of public money?). Lets put it this way, if LDY was a private airport it would have closed 6 years ago. The 4th largest city on the island of Ireland so what!!!!. Carisle has a population of 100,000 is probably 100 miles or more to the nearest airport, and it has no flights. Londonderry 83,000 is only 50 miles away from a gateway airport. So why should Londonderry have routes to New York, Paris and Milan etc?

The runway has been extended at Derry Airport, it is now sufficiently long enough to handle a 738 with a full complement of passenger and baggage and fuel for whatever distance the aircraft can do. Ie without restriction.

As regards Derry being the 4th largest city on the Island I think that it is more like 5th largest.. Dublin, Cork, Belfast (hard to get specifics of exact populations as if you take City it is 276,000 but double if you include sub urban areas) Limerick and Derry.

Interestly however (completely unrelated) if we look at Cities with the largest Irish Populations you would find that Liverpool and London have more than all except Dublin!!! I may stand to be corrected on that one!!!

I quoted that from CCR.

Don't understand what you mean-please do explain?