840 points
 

I totally agree with you 840. Many of our problems are self inflicted.

That's closer to the truth. He did it to Easyjet, Aer Arann and Go, amongst others.

By keeping the competition rules as they are, just allows O'Leary to ride roughshot over all airports, not just Cork. That's why I'd like to see, for NEW routes, a competition free 3 year phase. Remember as well that but for Government intervention, in giving the Stansted route to Ryanair, they may well have gone out of business.

@ Vkid : If that airline charges high prices, people have the choice of not flying with them - remember, that route didn't exist before, so it is in that airline's interests to build it progressively. I know Cork Airport is its own worst enemy at times but this is an added problem that needs to be sorted. As it stands, what airline like Easyjet would risk coming into Cork again ?

Ryanair
 

On the other hand Aerlingus have a substantial Cork operation and Wizzair operate 4 Polish routes from there. Ryanair probably don't want the hassle of going head to head with them on Cork routes although it's always possible.

Ryanair and Aer Lingus are the two biggies but how many airlines have come in only to be battered out in a short time ? The protection would work for all though, i.e. new routes created by Ryanair or AL would be covered under the same umbrella, so it wouldn't be anti-competitive in that way.

The focus should be to encourage new routes while protecting those who do create them in return, so that they are not going to be subject to a larger airline dumping thousands of free seats on the route to force the opposition off.

New German route
 

Cork is set to get a new service to a German destination if my sources are correct.

Just give us the first 9 letters, I'll start you off

F....R....A....N.... you can finish the rest hopefully!

Great news if Cork does get a new German route. However, if it is to be Aer Lingus I fear that the A320 may be too large to be sustainable on the route.

I wonder would Aer Arann look to doing say a daily ATR on routes like FRA or DUS or is that too far?

You might just get to Frankfurt or Duesseldorf if you're happy landing on empty tanks - and that's coming from Cork with the wind behind you!

I assume this is the new Aer Lingus service that was rumoured a few weeks ago. Which route is going or losing frequency to make the aircraft available?

The range of the ATR72 is about 890nm, Frankfurt is about 750ish nm, and Dusseldorf a bit less so its do-able, just would take a while!

Frankfurt would by great for me to get home from Zurich, Dusseldorf even better.....I can get there with Air Berlin - flights for buttons.



I remember going Cork to Frankfurt many years ago (via Dublin) on an EI 737-200. The front half of the aircraft was cargo.

ORK DUB
 

According to the DAA website which in turn quotes the Ryanair annual report - the ORK-DUB route is named as No. 10 of Ryanair's top ten routes in its entire network.

Any figures available on ORK passenger numbers to date. The website has remained quiet on releasing stats for 09.

Is this by yield or load or both?

Traffic figures - 2009
 

Saturday's Examiner has pretty shocking figures for aircraft movements (not passengers) for July 2009

Unfortunately, the CSO are nowhere near as good as the CAA at releasing figures. Most recent figures are for February

Left figure is Feb 2008, Right figure is Feb 2009

Lanzarote (ACE),Spain 6,773 6,625
Malaga (AGP),Spain 5,051 3,802
Amsterdam (AMS),Netherlands 13,210 12,133
Barcelona (BCN),Spain 2,788 4,023
Birmingham - Uk (BHX),Great Britain 9,978 8,701
Bristol (BRS),Great Britain 1,771 1,900
Bratislava - M.R Stefa (BTS),Slovakia 2,546 -
Paris - Charles De Gaulle (CDG),France 7,782 7,894
Cardiff (CWL),Great Britain 1,655 1,023
Edinburgh (EDI),Great Britain 2,514 2,215
Derby - East Midlands (EMA),Great Britain 3,684 -
Faro (FAO),Portugal 987 -
Roma - Fiumincino (FCO),Italy 4,208 3,610
Fuerteventura (FUE),Spain 1,222 -
Gdansk (GDN),Poland 2,317 2,343
Gerona (GRO),Spain 827 -
Geneva (GVA),Switzerland 16 1,966
Innsbruck (INN),Austria 759 663
Krakow (KRK),Poland 1,889 -
Katowice (KTW),Poland 2,165 4,900
Leeds Bradford (LBA),Great Britain 1,277 -
London - Gatwick (LGW),Great Britain 8,625 8,556
London - Heathrow (LHR),Great Britain 37,406 32,772
Las Palmas (LPA),Spain 3,087 3,279
Liverpool (LPL),Great Britain 6,390 6,069
Manchester (MAN),Great Britain 9,736 7,732
Munich - Franz Josef Strauss (MUC),Germany 4,163 3,840
Newcastle (NCL),Great Britain 2,457 1,256
St. Mawgan (NQY),Great Britain - 258
Plovdiv (PDV),Bulgaria 1,014 714
Prestwick (PIK),Great Britain 6,460 -
Plymouth (PLH),Great Britain - 276
Palma (PMI),Spain 179 -
Poznan Lawica (POZ),Poland - 2,088
Prague (PRG),Czech Republic 3,891 146
London - Stansted (STN),Great Britain 21,949 19,418
Berlin - Schoenefeld (SXF),Germany 2,698 2,636
Salzburg (SZG),Austria 1,902 1,529
Tenerife Sur - Reina Sofia (TFS),Spain 1,485 1,342
Toulouse (TLS),France 16 802
Warsaw - Frederic Chopin (WAW),Poland 1,961 2,385
Wroclaw (WRO),Poland 766 -

Clearly, the biggest factor was the introduction and witdrawal of routes and rotations, while the location of Heineken Cup matches also had an influence.

However, the fact that so many destinations are down, while so few our up tells its own story.

Facts & Figures

This link says it's no 3? Was this the source?

Any idea when this new 'German' route is due to be announced ?!?

Cork East Midlands
 

Looks as if Cork East Midlands is about to start for the 3rd time since 2002. Hope it's third time lucky.

Who with?

Jet 2 perhaps since they're just after announcing a base in East Midlands but they're basing a 757 there which would be too gig for the route, perhaps they could do it with the Newcastle 733 on a W pattern?

Ryanair could also be a possibility. They left in a huff the last time but with Baby after axing Cork - Birmingham, and Ryanair themselves after axing Shannon - East Midlands (and after reducing Shannon - Birmingham to 4 weekly), there could definitely be market there. Cork has escaped any of the cuts that Shannon and Dublin have got in the past few months so the base is obviously still profitable for them, so perhaps they might give East Midlands a go again.

BMI Baby could also be another possibility to resurect the route. They axed it the last time to launch Cork to Birmingham but given the intense competition from Aer Lingus on that route which resulted in them axing the route earlier this year, perhaps they might decide to give Cork to East Midlands another go.

An outside possibility would be easyjet who also have a base in East Midlands. Perhaps they're going to have another attempt at breaking into the Republic market. The last time they tried with Gatwick, Cork was by far the most successful route.

Whichever airline it is, I'd say the Cork Airport Authority are desperate to get any new business given the sharp decline in passenger numbers in the past year.

I flew EMA-ORK on a few occasions, and every time the flight was 80% full on a B738, I think a B733 of bmibaby or Jet2 will easily be able to be filled!

BHX-ORK
 

With the Aer Lingus increase to double daily on bhx re Mo/We/Th/Fr
from the winter schedule, is Cork getting aircraft 5 or is just a gap
filler for one of their aircraft.

Great news for BHX and I trust Cork although a new destination
might have gone down better.

Good to see a day return possible on Mo/We/Fr.

Pete

There seems to be some major changes to the EI winter timetable. BHX seems to be the big winner of this, but MAN does gain daily flights and an evening flight on a thursday.

There are other route reductions, so there might be room for a new route or two, impossible to tell until all the current routes are fully loaded at the right frequencies.

Brian.