A year ago, I felt that NCL was a local airport to be proud of from a regular users viewpoint. However, experiences over this winter season have radically changed that. Dpes aren't too bad, unless you are being bussed (you can't seriously call it a coach !). Stand in the bus for ages before it moves off with wind and rain blowing in. On Easyjet, I always now get on the second bus, because it's empty, and 95% of the time gets to the a/c before the first bus.

Arrivals have been a shambles. - sitting on the a/c waiting for buses, being bussed from a pier stand to another entrance, sitting in reclaim for 3/4 hour watching and waiting for somebody to even open up the aircraft hold to empty the bags while the belt rumbles around to no effect, queuing for 15 mins to get out of reclaim through customs because of those ridiculous revolving doors at the end, then standing outside in the wind and rain waiting for the "frequent" airport parking bus. Wow, what a customer experience !

That will be to comply with DFT regulations.

I have dep/arr NCL around 12 times in the last 14 months half the times we were bussed, did I once hear any one complain no... I have been bussed around all charter destinations on these trips and virtually every low cost destination (does the 200 yard walk at CIA count as on pier??). We were even bussed in AMS (like going back to the 90's!) made the connection interesting! Especially for our bags!!
Now I am not saying this is ideal but with an airport the size of NCL you have to balance cost of an extra pier, the area north of the existing terminal I have been told would be very expensive to develop due to the land falling away, against every thing else the airport needs, the new VCR has taken a lot of funds recently but it needed to be done on safety grounds as did all the repair work that went on last winter.
NCL is expanding 5.6M pax's last 12 months so bussing people is not making them go else where! The balance of scheduled full fare, low cost and charter has to be maintained for the choice of destinations for people to travel. This balance has to be made also with the funds available to spend they are not limitless!! So whilst a new pier would be ‘nice’ the time has to be right and the funds available. Ditto any new air bridges etc etc

I think people don't outwardly complain(though in my experience they DO) because they are sadly resigned to it. That's a long way from saying they don't mind.

Our crews hear at least 2/3 complaints every week about the coaching arrangements. At one point last week there were two coach drivers to service the 5/6 remote departures departing within 10 minutes of each other. Our crew now prep the a/c quicker to ensure we get the coaches first!

Whilst the growth is good for the airport, we also need to see changes in the infrastructure to cope with the new demands. Personally, I would love to see a second pier but can't see this happening

you can go ahead and say yes we get compaints about coaching but when you have 8 members of staff maybe less in at any one time, you need 2 of them 8 to man the cabinlift, 1 person to answer the phones, 2 maybe 3 to fetch disabled passengers from info desk to Dep Lounge and from Dep Lounge to gates etc that leaves only 2 members of staff to drive coaches!!

yes this staffing issue is slightly being resolved with loads of seasonals being taken on me included, we are doing the best we can!!

Homer09001

I for one think you and the rest of your colleagues who drive the coaches and cabin-lifts do an excellent job under the circumstances.

Keep up the good work!! :):)

Just checking on the latest on the ex ceo situation, as there are quite a few people interested in this at Brs, and send heart felt best wishes :- yeah right !!!!, how the mighty are fallen :D

Ref Homer09001 thread on J2@NCL, the Gatwick has not been dropped over the weekend, the Saturday flight has been cancelled during July & August I guess to do other things?

Why not???

Personally, I would rather walk and get on with it that wait for/in buses but I suppose this breaks some guideline or other despite the fact it happens abroad with no adverse effects.

they do lots of things abroad that we can't do here! sadly thats rules and regulations which we must follow

Bussing v new pier
 

The dabate about 'on pier' or 'bussing' - please no more 'coaching' - does not seem particulalry valid at NCL as the majoirity of pier stands do not have airbridges and you actually get wetter on a pier stand than a bussing stand if it is raining.

The current pier is a joke and needs to be replaced. It has grown from something that was never designed to handled separation never mind the volumes now being pushed through.
If this pier was replaced with a fully serviced new pier where every stand had an airbridge then the other solution could be to build a dedicated bussing facility, designed to facilitate peak flows of passengers and to ease the traffic flows around the ramp. The fact that the current bussing gates are mixed in with pier stands severely hampers thier effectiveness and is not ideal in flow terms. If you look at some of the European airports where they have accepted bussing as a solution but have planned and executed buildings and routes to make it efficient. Regrettably NCL is still in the 'I suppose it'll have to go off pier' mode.

Notwithstanding the current staffing levels on a multi discipline unit of bussing and PRM handling (and I agree that they do, and have always done a fantastic job in very difficult circumastances), the PRM scenario will only get more intense after July 01 when the new EU regiulations become law.

Lastly, thosee doors in the arrival halls. They were argued against before they were installed but GR and LH knew better, they have been a bottle neck from day one and I hope that while DL has the reins he will send them to the dump.

Coaching Arrivals
 

We dont mind being on remote, my company are not often on terminal, its not that bad.. only when u arrive in bound and have to keep pax on aircraft for a further 30 mins to wait for one bus that will have to do a few trips.
Remote operations is fine, if you have the staffing levels to do it!!!

'Piers at Newcastle' One can tell to an extent how evocative an issue is by the number of postings, particularly by the less regular contributors. Those that have followed this forum over the years may recall that I have 'sounded off' on this very issue on several occasions, usually initiated by 'another' bad experience. However those carriers that I have used over the last 12 months have on the whole not used the remote stands and so the frustration has been at least temporarily appeased. What concerns me is that whilst I recognise that change won't happen overnight, I see no evidence that what have been noted as problems, have been taken on board by the management, and that more importantly that they actually have in place any plans albeit in future to address them. I take on board and have some empathy with the comments of 'Homer..& groundhand', appreciate budgets & cost constraints, but from my side I am in the dark as to the plans for say the next 3-5 years. As for the masterplan 2004, I'm cynical & attach no comfort from this document which was presumably only produced to comply with government legislation. Indeed the airport thinks so much of it that has been removed as a link from their website and as such is no longer accessible! Readdressing the subject of this post the pier at NCL has ironically been its Achilles heel! The 'bolt on' improvements were carried out under cost constraints, and fundamentally it is has one floor level missing! New pier construction has for many years now involved segregation of inbound and outbound passengers on different levels with ground level for mainly ground ops. To put another level on at NCL, it would probably be a lot more economical to rebuild the whole pier & this is not going to happen, at least not until a second pier is built elsewhere which could in addition provide some short term support. This is a gem! and I can not comment on ground structure, but I have to say that it is likely to be complete b:mad:cks! as the land you are talking about already on occasions supports aircraft as large as 747's:8 . It all comes down to effective management, if you are talking of volumes of pax of 6M plus, then you ought to be able to put in plans to accommodate them in the 21st century and not by continually adding patches to the current infrastructure. Finally I am not blinkered and well done for the new control tower which is an excellent development (though again driven by compulsion rather than management as old one 40 years old):ugh:

Skyman771 - I can only but agree wholeheartedly with you!

skyman 771

Sound comment.

My point is that I do not think that the layout of the airside area with the positioning of the current terminal lends itself to mulit-pier operations.
I agree totally that the current pier needs to be replaced.

I believe this could be achieved by closing the stands in the quadrant next to the 'old' ATC facility and putting in place a temporary bussing facility to serve ALL carriers for a re-build period. Other airports have achieved this so it might not be perfect but it can be done.

Demolish and rebuild the pier on 3 levels with the required separations and with airbridges on every pier stand.

On the North side develop a dedicated bussing departure facility with routings out to all the non-pier stands.

The terminal will need to be expanded at some stage - goodbye to the current ATC and management offices. There is no room there for additional stands so bussing is the medium to long term solution.

At airports where the right infrastructure in terms of fixed facilities and the number of busses (and staff) are made available and these are managed effectively the system works and the passengers accept it. There are a lot of airports where I would prefer to be bussed to an arrivals point near controls rather than a 1-2km walk to get to the same point.

NCL development was held back for many years, not because of poor senior management but because Government borrowing policies prevented the business from being able to access monies from normal commercial sources. Development had to be self financed and this stopped a lot of the more 'ambitious' plans coming to fruition. Imagine having a business with double digit percentage growth year on year, profits increasing year on year but not being able to access commercial banking loans?? To say that previous management were frustrated, JB the FD in particular, is a tad of an understatement.
Now that these restrictions have been lifted there is a lot of catch-up to do.

All is not lost, you could live in the catchement area of DTV!

Skyman771 - Please keep your b:mad: ks to your self! To have a second pier close to the terminal you would have to build it north of stands 13-16 with further stands to the north of that, this is the area that falls away sharply! You cannot build taxi/apron with too much slope!
NCL pilot – 2-3 complaints a week! I rest my case
Others
Please try to keep real with comments, things like an airbridge on every stand is not going to happen, who would use them!? NCL is a well run regional airport business . If you were to travel around other airport you would find a lot more to complain about! E.g. the last two flights (transatlantic) from Manch we had to wait 40+min each time on arrival for a stand!!
:ugh: :ugh: :ugh:

10 DME ARC Probably can't, but then you have changed tack, ie thats it's not the construction of a second pier that is the issue, what you are now suggesting is that insofar as future development of NCL is concerned, then as there is a slope to the north of 13-16 then in that area at least expnasion has reached it's limit ?
I note your support of NCL in travelling all the way to MAN, an incidentally irrelevant point in this discussion;)

New stands,buses and well being!
 

Watch that blood pressure 10 DME ARC!!

I think you will find any future development will arrive just in the nick of time next year ? and will be in an area east of stands 20-25.
Unfortunately because of costs..bussing to a small remote terminal may be the only answer?

The current pier will have some small modifications..but not rebuilt.

Runway extension?-forget it..