Summer 2015 Charter updates
 

Looks like Varna on a thursday with Thomas Cook has been canx.

NO Onur flight but still have Pegasus...

Alba Star is to do the Saturday Verona flights now

HH6702: Damn, shame about Varna, I can't find any mention of TOM to Hurghada either, does anyone know if that's still knocking about? Also, how did you get the info on the seats sold, I've only ever looked at the seat map on the website and they're all the same. Good to hear though

johnnychips: Thank, you yes I did make a small typo there, my bad. I am of course fully aware that British Airways never owned Thomas Cook hahahaha

SWBKCB: I'll admit that probably was an exaggeration, to an extent. It would just seem to me that if for example Easyjet based a new aircraft, they already have contracts, staff, facilities set up at NCL, but if a new carrier came in, they would have all of that to set up, and in the long run if it ended up being a very successful, regular route (say if EK goes 2 daily, or UA ended up going 10 weekly+ year round) then the jobs created etc. Would seem to be quite similar, especially considering legacy carriers as a rule of thumb employ more people than locos.

Canberra I think that's probably personal, try not to let me bother you mate, was it my typo or my picking up on the ridiculousness of not funding foreign carriers?

It's hard to think of routes that would be viable and justify spending public money on developing. With this £56m. Is this just for routes from NCL? Or is it for the North East or England as a whole to share? It won't go far if it is shared!

What about T3 or BM to Norwich? Apparently NCL is one of the most requested routes from Norwich (according to the Norwich forum anyway). If LinksAir think they can make VLY-CWL-NWI (good luck to them!) work then perhaps the development fund could help NCL to NWI build up into a long successful route.

KEF seems to do very well but already served up the road in EDI by U2 with the benefit of a lot more inward tourism to EDI than we could. If Icelandair flew it there would be connections to the US. However most of these are very seasonal and will compete with the seasonal United flight which will offer more connections to more places than Icelandair, so I think that's a nonstarter. Would have to be LCC P2P traffic really.

fa2fi, I agree with KEF, maybe if FI did winter seasonal x2 weekly? Lower risk for UA even if they went x5 weekly/daily year round.

BM to NWI could be a good shout if it's as popula as it's meant to be. BM to FRA too? With LH codeshare?

LCC P2P, I've said it before and I'll say it again, EZY to Munich, Milan, Marrakech, maybe Reykjavik? If they gave a 4th frame, maybe more Greek routes, Athens? Sicily could be nice (I don't know how many weekly frequencies one frame can operate, 14-18 depending on sector length?) Winter seasonal to Lanzarote, Sharm El Sheikh, Paphos? I think EZY have realised the market outside of Spain and Portugal.

My addition for the £56 million wishlist would be Turkish couple per week to Istanbul, and return of Venice, LS seemed to have good loads for all I saw.

EDIT: Yeah I think it's just for NCL, if NCL/MME/CAX all got £56 million each we could see some good news from the latter two for once.

It's a national fund - all airports under 5 Million pax/year.:ugh:

I think that the fund should open up routes from NCL to every regional airport in the world with under 5m pax - there does that cover everybody's wish list, or are we going to get more pages of "well I think a twice weekly to xxxx would be good" ?

and maybe after the word “carrier”?

No one mentioned we now have SIDs! Only for use when the Currock Hill Gliding is active - GIRLI (1Y for 25) and (1T for 07)

SWBKCB, The Fedex feeder flight is currently contracted out to Swiftair according to Wikipedia, and I know it's a national fund but I've heard no mention of MME or CAX applying for it. As I said, if they both get £56 million as well... Good!

The FedEx flight has been operated by Air Contractors for years (Wikipedia is wrong... :eek:).

The Regional Air Connectivity Fund is a national fund available to airports with less than 5m pax - £17.5m available this year (and not for each airport :ugh:)

.....and £56m is the overall value of the three year fund.

Easyjet is to axe its service between Newcastle and London Gatwick.

The budget airline, which offers 11 flights each way every week, said the decision followed a review.

It said: "The route will cease to operate from 27 March because passenger demand has not been at a viable level to maintain it."

Newcastle Airport said it was disappointed with the decision, but had secured a deal with Flybe for a London Stansted service.

Easyjet said: "We apologise for any inconvenience caused.

"We continue to serve the North East with 16 other exciting destinations across Europe, from Malta to Geneva to Rhodes."

Graham Mason, from Newcastle Airport, said that landing fees at Gatwick, together with air passenger duty, had had an impact on regional services.

He said: "Actually demand from the North East was strong, but it wasn't so strong the other way.

"We haven't just sat back, but have secured a deal with Flybe for a Stansted service starting in March, and will be looking at other possibilities."

Why's this popped up again - been known for yonks?

Ok, just me behind the times.

No problem, from memory LGW was dropped before STN was announced, so something must have prompted these quotes - was just wondering what?

It was on the BBC (local) website today.

BBC News - Easyjet axes Newcastle Gatwick route

Odd - also heard it on the Radio Newcastle news

Also -

Newcastle Airport voted best in UK (From The Northern Echo)

NCL does seem to be quite good at winning this sort of thing - this is an interesting comment from the article:

Strangely, ever since the cancellation of the route was announced pax traffic has been up by over 30% each month

Easyjet are making money, just not enough money to sustain NCL when they can make more money from Gatters utilising the NCL aircraft. Shame, but business :'(

If that quote is true its very interesting!

Surprised that easyjet awards NCL this.
Most be one of there smallest bases