Belfast City
 

Any rumours off Ryanair replacing BHD for another route?

Both EMA & BHX look a sorry state of affairs this winter re ryanair.

Give or take one or two EMA shows 19 routes this winter with 14
cancelled or summer only.

Some days just three based aircraft needed now that BHD has gone
although some days it is has to be a minimum of four without changes.

Baby are rumoured to be going back to three daily on the Belfast
which will take care of some of the loss.

How about flybe Belfast City, the sheer numbers FR were carrying are
difficult to ignore and I know BHX has five/six daily BHD but with FR carrying 19384 in July they must seriously take a look at this route.

By the way FR BHD overtook BHX - BHD which was up but only 17914.

Pete

I could understand FR getting rid of EMA-BHD maybe last year or the year before when the route was still becoming established, however, this summer has seen pretty good sales on the Belfast City route, so this comes as a bit of a shock!

OliWW

The departure of FR from BHD, and therefore from the EMA-BHD route has everything to do with politics, and very little to do with passenger numbers.

There are surely performance penalties for the 73H into and out of BHD, but I would bet a small amount on BHD refusing to dance to Michael O'Leary's tune having at least as much to do with it.

Having watched the local news its has nothing to do with 'BHD refusing to dance with FR' more so the local government/politicians/public enquiry over the rwy extension at BHD. Its a shame as passenger numbers where good but its the usual thrw toys out pram scenario, cuts the nose off to spite the face.


Regards

rgds to the winter, TCX will have 1x A320 throughout until about the end of Feb, early Mar when the 2nd will arrive, but will also have a B752 from Sun-Tue...

TOM have a B738 and B752 throughout

bmibaby NEW EXTRA FLIGHTS TO BFS
 

bmibaby.com will add 5 extra weekly flight between EMA & Belfast.

I believe it will be; 3 x daily Mon - Fri (excluding Wed with 2x daily)??
1 x Sat and new 2 x daily on Sun

Flights to go on sale early next week.

Good to see bmibaby committed to Belfast and indeed it's EMA base, where it has stuck out this route even with FR's £1 fares and upto 3 x daily on the BHD route!

Its nice to see Bmibaby interested in ema, and nice to see a Thomascook 757 in at times in the week along with a 737 and 757 for Thomson. I think ema need to attarct another airline to the airport even thought Jet 2 are adding extra routes next year, i think its time to start to attact some attention from airlines like Flybe or even a transatlantic flight to new york, or extra routes from Thomson and Thomascook, its not like ema doesnt have the catchment area for some real buissness but some money need to be spent in the departue gates ie more seating space especially gates 1-5. Its nice to have seen some travel service, viking, onur air and koral blue charters this summer :)

Its been nice to see these airlines yes... but next year, probably not... Koral blue operated for Kiss as well as Viking, so the chances of them being back are pretty small! Travel service ops on behalf of TCX for a limited time, saga have now gone due to the collapse of goldtrail, and onur have a reduced timetable here... Yes EMA does need more airlines for sure, but it needs real airlines and not low cost airlines... KLM, BMI, AF, SAS etc...

OliWW

No full service airline would put up with the shambles that is security at EMA,back down to the Ryanair check in area most days and why? because instead of investing in more security lanes, Penny removed them to create a fast/express lane at £3.00 a pop, it's all self defeating because people spend less time and money in the shops, all so the airport can pull a bit back to pay for Ryanair to fly from East Midlands.

In many way EMA is better placed than BHX to serve long haul traffic, in terms of space and runway length, but to bring EMA up to scratch of most European airports would cost over a £100m, there is not a single air bridge so anything bigger than than a 767 is a non starter and the arrival's hall is a joke

Heard TCX A321 at EMA winter 2010/11 ops include SSH and HRG..

Security in a morning is a total nightmare, especially thursdays when there are about 19 departures first thing, there just isn't enough space to expand, the terminal is at full capacity, the only thing which isn't is the check-in hall which at the moment has spare desks free everywhere, but this doesn't stop the TOM and TCX desks being free'd up... The airport needs a total re-build, otherwise its future will be in the hands of FR... 1 minute they will want to expand to as many aircraft as they can afford, and the next pull out...

I agree with all comments about the terminal at EMA, its like a series of B&Q warehouse sheds put together to make a passenger terminal. Whilst I don't doubt that EMA has got some long haul potential, no matter what your runway length I can hardly see EK, PK or indeed any major carrier landing a 773 to park up with no airbridge (imagine the J Cabin pax faces!) and an arrivals hall that is full and queuing outside when just a couple of 737s off load. Sorry guys but as facelookbovvered said you need a major terminal upgrade that will cost a fortune and see FR and maybe Baby and Jet2 run a mile!

I agree we dont want another low cost airline and we need some airlines such as bmi, sas, lufthansa, as for tcx and tom i see pleanty of room for expansion at ema for routes but ema has space on the airport ie the old airport viewing park for another ramp and terminal, ema has held back too long relying on these low cost airlines and attract other airlines along with these low cost airlinies it will be nice to see another jet2 757 and see more of the movements with there 22 flights a week instead of 9. Its going to be interesting to see what happens at ema over winter and summer 2011, i still can see baby in mind with more route. Like youve said its going to be a shame to see all these charter airlines leaveing ema and if things dont change ema will continue on its down hill slip. :(

Arrivals Hall shambles
 

Got to agree with the comments above. I flew out to BRU a couple of weeks ago and the secuirty queue at 0530 on a Tuesday stretched all the way from the security area right to the other end of the building.

When I arrived back there were 5 border control posts open plus the automated gates for no more than 25 pax and the place was deserted. And yet when I arrived from Malaga last night at 0025 you couldn't move in the arrivals hall and they only had 2 posts open and the auto gates were shut. Result? 40 mins to get through border control. What an utter shambles.

And don't even get me started on the shopping emporium....

The whole place needs a complete overhaul, new terminal, airbridges, and a proper arrivals hall. I'm sorry to say that I just can't see it happening.

Boeing i totally agree, although I went through LTN the other month and it was 6 times as bad at security the dep lounge seemed to be smaller than EMA.
Clearly they can't cope with the am peak and in the evening suspect all the Border Agency Staff are tucked up in bed (that will get me nicked next time no doubt). I also hear a lot of the old bill have been / being made redundant.
EMA is defo on a downwards spiral and it's not going to get better, i suspect worse

From October 31 Flybe will take over Ryanair's route to Belfast City with 2 flights daily.

Why would they be interested when they already fly into Birmingham just down the road? Go much outside the Derby/Leicester/Nottingham triangle and you're already encroaching on to the catchment areas of BHX/MAN where they are already established and the facilities are infinitely better than can be found at EMA. The infrastructure is acceptable for the likes of Ryanair et al, but not good for those airlines who like to market themselves as a cut above the low-costs.

In addition, does EMA and its immediate catchment really have the potential to be able to sustain the type routes such 'legacy' carriers would be interested in? Obviously Derby and Nottingham have a fair bit of business potential, but is it enough to attract the legacy carriers up the road from BHX? I would suggest not.

Unfortunately I think EMA has found its niche with freight and low-cost traffic. And I think previous contributors are correct when they say that to turn things around, the cost of upgrading the infrastructure would be so great that they would destroy the niche they have created by driving away the likes of Ryanair, and still might not be able to attract more upmarket replacements.

Just my 2p-worth!

This will be Flybe's only route from East Midlands, maybe a motivation to look at other possible new routes from East Midlands.

Just a real world comment about airbridges.

They come a long way down the list of priorities for most airlines.

STN has them, virtually no airlines use them. Extensions at LTN were built without them. Air France, bmi, CityJet, FlyBE all regularly use stands at EDI without link access to the terminal building.

From an airline's persective they are cost items and often avoided.

For all those who think an airbridge or two is going to attract a New York service, or a long haul airline like EK - stop wa***ng on airliners.net and read some business newspapers. Whatever aircraft type you think would be "nice to see", adding an air bridge aint goning to make it happen.

What EMA DOES need to sort out is its terrible ramp layout and need for pax the be held in gates while a flight at a neighbouring stand unloads and pax walk in front of the terminal windows to the arrivals door. This really slows down peak turnround times.

What EMA DOES need to attract is a network carrier with full connectivity at a hub such as FRA (but recent German tax hikes make the country a very bad place to connect now), CDG, AMS or GVA.

What EMA DOES need to sort out is security queues.

Comments about venturing out of the Derby/Leicester/Nottingham triangle immediately puts you in BHX/MAN catchment area shows a lake of geographical knowledge.

Comments about the East Midlands region lacking businesses to support non-leisure destinations shows a lack of knowledge of the East Midlands region. The region homes some of the UK's largest and most profitable companies. Rolls Royce Aero Engines, Toyota UK Cars, NEXT Retail, the centre of the UK's brewing industry, University Hospitals and medical reseach specialist centres, Bombardier trains etc etc.

The very fact that EMA is the UK's second largest freight airport clearly indicates the presence of local businesses that operate on an international level.

The weakness at the moment lies firmly with the management of EMA, and the MAG. No airlines - low cost or network carrier - are in a position to open speculative connections. They are attracted to airports that operate an very active marketing department and route development team and show willingness to become partners. The lack of investment by the big airlines at EMA clearly indicates that these departments at EMA are not pulling their weight.

I would suggest the airport spends less time trying to attract awards for its bus services and more time focusing on contacting and supplying airlines with strong up to date Management Information that graphically illustrates the EMA catchment area's demographic.

Coming back to the terminal building, there is no doubt that it's organic hotch potch growth from the original building really is starting to show and the real solution would be a rebuild - but as rightly pointed out this would require huge capital investment.

Nevertheless, huge improvements could be made with the provision of full arrival/departure passenger segregation enclosed within a building, with access via steps directly from each aircraft stand (or every other one).

Any who have experienced delays at the UK border can be assured that queues at STN in the weekend evenings are horrendous. Queues at LGW can be massive. LTN regulalry squeezes every arrival past 2 UK Border inspection posts. EMA is not alone in this problem, and the issue lies with the UK Immigration and Border Agency and their inability to staff appropriately for the time of day and flight schedules.

In my experience most Control Agencies at UK airports have the self belief that they are almost divine in status and therefore for superior to any requests for co-operation from Airport Companies.

I am sorry for this being a bit of a rant. :ok:

EMA management could do with a trip up the A1 to go spend a day at NCL....

I was amazed when I left NCL to see EMA, thinking EMA would be similar to NCL or even better owing to EMA's larger catchment.

Apart from a similar car park lay out thats it - except NCL had the brains to put the staff car park closest to the termianl, not the furthest!

The new termainal layout at NCL is very impressive and a new CEO has had a great inpact. Secruing investment from Emirates, who largely sponsored the new very modern looking control tower.

It's a bit of the old 'chicken and egg' question as does the airport expand first to attract airlines or obtain airlines first so it can expand??

NCL did the former and it has worked wonders................ think it was one the only UK airports that sustained growth through the downturn.