Extra flights to scotland for their school holidays , there was 4 TCX 757s on approach to GLA when I looked that was including our 757 , all of which positioned back to their bases.

Err? I doubt it. I understand Manchester Airport shelled out heavily to get the train operators to terminate at the Airport instead of in town, for the very reason that station departure screens across Northern England would feature Manchester Airport as a destination, most particularly in places like Leeds, Liverpool, Newcastle, Darlington and Carlisle - places with their own airports but no overground rail link to speak of.

And who'd want to go to Liverpool? If the Newcastle-M'cr Airport service ceased, folks would have to change trains at Manchester Piccadilly, making a direct air service twice as attractive.

I agree that such a service is unlikely; but as another poster had mentioned it, I reminisced how nice it would be to have something like the old Dan-Air Link City service - though at a frequency that made sense. Plenty of people fly Manchester-Edinburgh, so those aiming for the Berwick corridor may prefer a Newcastle service.

If they could get someone like Loganair in on it to do MAN and NWI at the same time I think they'd be on to a winner. Or maybe Bmi? Or Eastern, although cracking back into MAN just for NCL may be a bit too expensive. Unless they did MAN-NWI and MAN-ABZ at the same time or something like that.

After getting off to a slow start, it's good to see the SAS Copenhagen route building nicely

It is happening. Even Nexus supported it, saying the loss of Manchester Airport links can be mitigated through cross platform interchange at places like Huddersfield

Section 17 - Track access decisions

so travel to a rival airport is now more difficult - result for Newcastle!

Only a result if Newcastle can secure the routes people travel to MAN for. The likes of Frankfurt, Lisbon, Milan, Zurich etc.

It's a result for Newcastle because:

1. On every route where MAN competes with NCL (virtually all of them!), the journey to MAN is now longer, more difficult. Huddersfield train station might be a lovely place - I've never been - but do I want to lug my cases off there and stand around waiting for another train that might not turn up, etc, etc

2. Thousands of commuters and other train users in the North East aren't being constantly reminded on a daily basis about how easy it is to get to MAN.

Brussels
 

Announced in this mornings journal that BMI are to start double daily flights to Brussels from March 2014.

Cant see this online but its in the paper version I am reading on the train to London where I will be catching the Eurostar to Brussels. So its good news for me

Journal says this will be announced officially later today.

If the 'Director of Rail' at Nexus thinks it's a good idea to change at Huddersfield en route to Manchester Airport I suggest he tries it for himself. The trains are always packed between Leeds and Manchester and the last thing I would want to do is to drag luggage off one crowded train on to another. It's also a step backwards having the trains going to Victoria rather than Piccadilly. But even with the poorer rail service I doubt flights between Newcastle and Manchester would be realistic. Good news on the Brussels service.

BMI
 

Good to have BMI back on The Brussels Route, Wonder if they could do more Routes out of NCL in the Future?

Brussels BMIR
 

Now on Airport website. Good news. Gatwick announcement tommorrow??

BMI to Brussels is very good news, commencing 3rd March at twice daily. I can't find the timings yet so don't know if its a NCL based aircraft, which might open up the possibilities of another route in the middle of the day.

Maybe a Frankfurt flight?

It isn't as if there has never been a service to MAN, Dan Air operated it twice daily ? in the late 70's with a 748. Appreciate that times have changed, however there are now many more routes offered if one connected through MAN, as opposed to 30 years ago, not to mention additional IT flights.
One should accept that NCL will NEVER get a regular US direct service & accept that along with LHR/AMS/CDG & now DUB that it is inevitable that MAN should be added to this list.
It would never be my scene to lump bags onto a train(s) sit for c.3 hours only to lug them off again to stand in another checkin line / security etc. That alone should deter some, then IF as I read there is also the additional hassle / stress of a further change of trains, then there has to be a price that some will pay to avoid all of this.
Furthermore a good number of the people I have spoken to who use MAN end up spending an overnight in a local hotel prior /after to departing /returning from their flight.
If Eastern can make a go of BHX , accepted it's a business based flight, then MAN has to offer some attraction.
My view still remains that the reason that MAN - NCL does not operate is because there is a core of persons at NCL who DON'T want the service! & see it as undermining development at NCL !
All I can say to these guys is that over the past few years it wouldn't appear that this policy has been beneficial to those who reside in the North East.

Skyman - I think you are being overly pessimistic on the prospect of a nonstop NCL-NYC
Granted it won't come in the next 12 months but over time, Newcastle airport will continue to grow and gain more routes. In 10 or 20 years time I could plausibly see some sort of route on something like a 787

Manchester's route network hardly compares to the hub airports that Newcastle has flights to, or some that it doesn't like Frankfurt. For example, to the west coast of USA there's only a few leisure flights to Las Vegas. Plus any service is unlikely to be early or late enough to avoid a hotel stay if you've got an early or late flight with a charter or lo-cost airline. There would also be the hassle of having to change terminals in many cases. I can't see it working.

I guess some would adopt the view "Never say Never" & I accept that things change, for me "Never" is in my lifetime.
I have a long memory of the false optimism that has been generated in every one of the past four decades & as such I feel that I can be reasonably comfortable in the use of "Never" in this context.:sad:
On a slightly different tangent then NY offers a pretty decent holiday destination & I would be the last to dispute that there may come a time when 787's appear NYC bound on a regular basis in the colours of TOM or similar IT carrier.:)

Gill were operating MAN into the Nineties with Sheds, think it ended with leased Bandits?

Also, where did the European JetStream operate to, was that MAN or BHX?

I'd put money on MAN re-starting before TOM to NYC (and knowing my luck, somebodies typing up the press release now!)

I was just thinking before I came on, what are the chances of:

Someone like Jet2 restarting YYZ summer seasonal and Air Transat starting Vancouver/Calgary? Maybe a triangle like EXT was. Along the lines of YVR-MAN-NCL-YVR? or LGW/GLA.

I know this isn't the most affluent area of the country but I know some will be interested in this sort of higher end tourism. I'd like to see more within Europe and Africa too, like Santorini, Cape Verde etc. Maybe Gibraltar? Anna.aero seems to think there's demand for it. Especially if it were NCL-LBA-GIB-LBA-NCL.

Whoopsies, rambling again :/