The long haul will operate next year 2020 the flights cease.

Yes i know that but why?

They're moving the long haul ops to DSA instead. It's role reversal from the TOM/FCA merger days where they decided to remove the ex-Thomsonfly long haul routes from DSA and focus instead on the ex-FCA routes at EMA. I wouldn't say there's demand for both airports to operate the SFB/CUN routes with their close proximity / catchment areas.

Another potential reason is DSA is further away from the established Long haul airports of MAN & BHX than EMA is. They can tap into a bit more of the catchment around East Yorkshire/ a bit of North Yorkshire too. DSA also has no Ryanair or Jet2, who will be taking the customer who may be considering long haul and converting them to their short haul flights

Lest we forgot
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-46620393

JET2 fleet at EMA - all middle aged?
 

Just looking at recent ins and outs at EMA, it struck me that the current 5 are all middle- aged i.e. 17- 20 years old.
GDFY Silver/Red Jet2 livery 18 yrs old. Ex-TravelService
JZHF Silver/Red Jet2 livery 19 yrs old. Ex-Transavia
JZHH Silver/Red Jet2 livery 19 yrs old. Ex-TransAero
DRTN Silver/Red Jet2 livery 17 yrs old. Ex Rossiya
DRTE Silver/Red Jet2 livery 19 yrs old. Ex-TransAero
Is this just a WinterSchedule thing or is EMA the Po' Boy of Jet2 bases with none of new aircraft?

it's surely irrelevant provided that the aircraft turn up on time for their planned services and deliver customers from A to B as booked. if they don't, there's a debate to be had - but there could be any number of reasons including trying to burn hours before the aircraft's next major check if EMA is a high winter utilisation base (which I don't think it is) or trying to conserve hours to string out the date for the next major check if EMA base is low utilisation. Or there may be a group of older aircraft sharing a flying programme between them at EMA if aircraft parking there is cheaper than elsewhere in the network. Either way, I doubt the typical customer will have any inkling - or even give a stuff if they had - about it?

Quite so Flightrider. Pre using Jet2 we were long time Monarch flyers and they had some pretty elderly aircraft, some of which are still flying elsewhere, without problems.
It was simply an observation, based on looking at Jet2 flights out of EMA for a few days. Yes, sad I know but for this year we've made EMA our airport of choice instead of BHX as FUE isn't a second rotation, returning home at Stupid O'clock.
Be interesting to see when Summer programme kicks in (and our first flights this year are before then) whether I'm right though.
Shudder the thought but could Jet2 be winding down its EMA flights to benefit BHX?

Should change now its all 737-800 as JZBK is months old and is based now

Who is going to take over at EMA on the Flybmi routes now? Loganair have taken some, it was bad enough when Flybe was taken over and timetables have been changed, who is coming to the rescue at EMA

I often think it was a shame EZY left EMA, which in hindsight was probably a couple of years premature. They could've picked up the slack by BmiBaby with the likes of PRG, VCE, NCE as well as a solid hold on BFS, GLA, EDI, AMS, CDG etc. even the likes of JER, BOD, LIS, NAP would have potential. Unfortunately for them, that boat largely sailed with Jet2 and Flybe having firmly established themselves in the region. Had is gone that way I think EMA would almost resemble a LPL (but with the holiday TOM / MT's of the world) or a mini BRS type passenger operation today.

When Easy left EMA they were all about building up Gatwick. The fundamental problem is that EMA is too close to Birmingham - it will continue with a largely leisure and freight operation but little more. it really is in the right place for freight- the so called "golden triangle" (truck to anywhere in the UK in 4 hours).

As posted elsewhere the small aircraft business travel activity is not sustainable these days unless there is sector specific support ( e.g.oil, banking) or a public subsidy.

Not sure if anyone from EMA reads this forum but parts of the inner ring roads as well as the approach in to the small roundabout could dearly do with re-surfacing.
Doesn't give a good impression of the Airport

I think the road situation maybe due to all of the development at the airport ie UPS new cargo hub plus the massive distribution centres being constructed, maybe this is a contribution to the state of the roads. The Airport is going down in my view we have the opportunity to have a rail line with HS2 maybe we could incorporate it to have a rail link stopping at EMA that would relieve alot of traffic on the roads. It's ok having the warehouses but we need NEW routes developing and USA scheduled services that we were promised when EMA was taken over by MAG

As much as I'd like to see long haul from EMA I can't see it happening any time soon. I feel that maintaining some of our existing routes/frequency may be a problem in itself. For a variety of reasons ABZ/BRU/GLA/EDI have all been hit recently. GR694 had a total of eleven pax yesterday and you have to wonder how viable the route is out of season. A hub service is required so that people like me could use the airport again but there's no sign of that happening at the moment. Cargo has been, and may well continue to be, the main growth area - having the worldwide freight connections on our doorstep has helped our business no end and I would guess it has encouraged many others to locate in the vicinity - so I don't think it's all doom and gloom!

The problem is that hub services have been tried, and failed. DUB (for North America), AMS with KLM, FRA and BRU with BMI / Star Alliance, for a variety of reasons, mostly the proximity of BHX and to a lesser extent LBA that makes multi-daily connections to serve these hubs properly unviable. If EMA / GCI can only muster 11 PAX out of the holiday season is dire, and frankly surprising. It make you wonder who is bank rolling the service. That might just have been a bad day.

Long haul passenger schedules are pie in the sky, won't happen - ever, not least because the airport's owners want to attract that traffic to MAN first, and then STN. Again BHX with it's limited long haul is one hour down the road from Nottingham, Derby and Leicester so where is the business case for Emirates, Qatar, Air India or PIA - who serve the VFR traffic opportunities that undoubtedly exist from those three East Midlands cities?

Cargo is the business for EMA, along with bucket and spade traffic to European destinations. Sadly, it looks as though some new business in the way of Cargo Logic may have gone to DSA; surely one that EMA would have wanted to capture. However against that the parcels integrators continue to grow and prosper.

So far as road infrastructure is concerned, once again the Department for Transport has spent millions not improving the access to the MI from the A453 westbound, with traffic still queuing over a mile towards the J24 island at peak times because they have done half a job (no different to what they to across the UK road network by the way) by not putting in proper sliproad directly on to the M1 and flying the A453 over the M1. They'll be doing it all again in 5 years time! Then there is Donnington Park, and whenever there a big events getting to the airport is difficult and stressful. Dualing the A453 past the airport was obvious, but hasn't been done, I don't know if it has even been considered. The local authorities need to sort out whether they want a worldclass regional airport or a racing circuit / entertainment venue. Presently the two don't work together

Crusher1
I agree with you last comment. (Regrettably) time the persons at the airport to promote EMA and not just sit back in their ivory towers and get paid every month. With extras pay due to the cargo operations that is the only part making the profit. Another thing i check regually on prices i:e Jet2 it is more expensive to fly from EMA than BHX just because it's 45miles away.

not true.....RASK (revenue per available seat kilometre) are broadly similar....

RASK isnt what the Pax looks at - its the £p he pays for bum on seat. And I pay more for my FUE flights ex-EMA than ex-BHX.
However, BHX consign longer flights to second rotations, meaning arriving back at BHX at Stupid o'clck, whereas the EMA is daytime, single rotation and that has an attendant preference = more expensive.
I'll be checking EMA vs BHX for 2020 when they are published. No rush.

Inverness new route and Brussels resumed...
http://www.loganair.co.uk/new-routes-east-midlands

Thanks for the info, BALaddy had mentioned in Feb that they were recruiting, and now finally we have Ema -Brussels and Ema -Inverness may not be a direct route

Drop Off Charges - DOUBLED!!
 

Rip off Britain is alive and well, and residing at EMA!

For £2 you now only get 5 minutes to drop off or pick up, slashed from 10 minutes, so essentially doubled in price. Extra minutes are still charged at £1. So if you were to take 10 minutes, which is quite easily done given the snails pace that even the contactless payment system works, and that's before you start on incompetent drivers who either can't find change, can't find their cards, or even can't manage to park their cars close enough to the machine to pay in the first place you will rack up £7 in parking, as opposed to £2 - so I'm actually wrong in the title above. Prices haven't doubled, they have increased by 350%. Is that some sort of record for a price hike at a UK airport?

I called in at Robin Hood Airport today, there it's £2 for 15 minutes, much more spacious and better laid out parking area, and far superior terminal layout. EMA needs to get it's act together methinks.

Rant over.

Indeed, that's the point.

Imagine you're picking up a family of, say, 2 adults and 2 infants, let's say 1 of the kids aged one, and the other three. You wait off airport until you get a call from the passengers that they're out of immigration, have their bags and are headed for the pick up area (that's how I work it when picking up my wife at EMA (I was dropping her off last night).

Clock starts ticking when the ANPR picks up your entry to the pick up are, and it takes 30 seconds to get from the electronic "barrier" to where your passengers are standing. You've then got to get all the baggage, pushchairs and paraphernalia into the boot, whilst trying to load secure two (probably tired and grouchy) young children into the car, load yourselves, belt up and get ready to move off. From bitter experience I can say it can take 2 minutes to get a 3 year old strapped into a car seat whilst they're mucking around and after their favourite toy. The younger one might be more cooperative! So probably another 4 minutes to get moving, towards the barriers and payment, which at EMA seems to take 30 seconds for each vehicle. 2 vehicles in front of you, and hey presto! EMA (or Manchester Airport Group in truth) gets an extra quid out of the customers. In all likelihood it will be more than that.

What sort of a bunch of robbing b@stards do the airport management think they are?

The airport does (helpfully!!) advise that if you want longer you can spend £4 and park in the short stay carpark, but even that is double what you could have paid previously in the drop off / pick up zone.

The issue with the EMA zone is it really isn't fit for purpose. If you're picking up PAX at peak IT arrival times, with a couple of 738s disgorging from bucket and spade flights the area it totally unfit for purpose. If you have the misfortune to be dropping PAX off during one of these busy periods getting out of the area, for reasons previously stated within the allotted time frame is also a challenge.

I don't "do" social media; if I did I'm sure I'd be "taking to Twitter" to whinge bitterly.

I've not been to EMA since I moved to the North West a few years ago... but as my local airport is the Home of MAG (owners of EMA), I feel I can answer this:

Professional, practised, and thoroughly robbing b@astards. That's what sort they are.

And where can you fly to from DSA compared to EMA? Is DSA really more spacious, or was there just nobody there?

It's not rip-off Britain - its paying for what you need. If it takes you a long time to load the car, it is no different than paying more cos you have to have hold bags rather than just a carry on.

An off repeated point, but in real terms flying is now dirt cheap - airports have to make money some how.

The drop off point is certainly more spacious and better laid out than it's EMA equivalent. The terminal is certainly better designed, though undoubtedly smaller in terms of square metres, but certainly fit for purpose, something that cannot be said for many airports, EMA included.

I absolutely accept that airlines baulk at paying for the services they use, one of EMA's two principal airline customers certainly falls into that category. I also accept that it was UK government over reaction to one incident that lead to dropping off passengers on terminal frontages being stopped (it hasn't in many other European countries) and enabled airports to milk the passenger in the way that EMA does. I even reluctantly accepted the £2 charge for 10 minutes as it was just about workable. However there comes a point where at busy periods it is pretty well physically impossible to get through the drop off area within the minimum charge period and that is unfair - plain and simple.

Totally agree with you SWBKCB :D Although now Tui are taking their B788 up the road to DSA next year, maybe they will try and get a bit of extra revenue from the 300 extra pax per Dreamliner flight they will have :O

Jet2.com Summer 2020
 

Jet2.com (LS/EXS) Summer 2020 schedule finally released. Two new destinations Izmir (ADB) and La Rochelle (LRH) and going up to 8x based B738s (that's correct, no more 733's).

That railway line off which the distribution development spur runs could be a very useful asset for EMA, and for the wider Midlands infrastructure, cutting out, as it would, the dog leg for passenger train services from Nottingham to Birmingham that takes them via Derby, and lengthens the journey time by minimum 10 minutes. Were the whole line to be upgraded, allowing higher speeds, and Castle Donnington station reinstated at Hemington, which a little ingenuity a free shuttle bus could be put in place for to transfer rail passengers from the new station to EMA passengers could be attracted to EMA from towns like Tamworth where the airport of choice would undoubtedly be BHX. EM Parkway could also be served by free shuttle bus. Problem is with such ideas is they require a mentality for a joined up, integrated public transport system, which appears to be an incomprehensible concept to UK planners.

Sums it up very nicely

Just lucky??
 

Reading all the bad things about EMA here I was beginning to think I'd picked a 'wrong 'un' in forsaking BHX for EMA this year. So with some trepidation on May 12th we set off on our first round trip of the year.
Distance is 15 miles more but took only 5 minutes longer than to BHX. Traffic via M42/A42 was 'normal', certainly not as manic as M6. Only issue was the roundabout at Donington Services etc where traffic flies round there and you just have to pick a gap and go for it. The A453 was fine (its only a mile or so on it anyway) and road surface was OK inc airport roads.
Check in was 9am. I expected busy but Jet2 had us done in 10 mins. I had bought Express Security based on BHXs long queues but there WAS no queue, or very minor, so probably wasted my money there.
After following the ubiquitous black sparkly path of 'Duty Free' into Airside we felt it was all quite laid back and not always in your face like BHX. Gate info was clear and boarding didnt need a bus or airbridge. Might have felt different if it had been raining. Lol.
On time departure.
Inbound arrival was on time too.
Baggage carousels were 'busy' - 3 flights allocated to one carousel - but even so, doors open to being in Meet & Greet Reception was no more than 20/25 mins.
No biometrics for Passports, the good old-fashioned personal check working well.
Y'know what - instead of dreading the next run, end June, we're actually looking forward to it.
Were we just lucky?