I always recall reading this story and was surprised by the departure of Aer Arran from Luton. I think we need a new carrier to take over what proved to be popular and sucessful flights for a very large local Irish population.

Irish carrier Aer Arann has announced that its route between Luton Airport and Waterford carried 9,106 passengers last month - a cross-channel record for the airline.
The 9,000 passenger mark was surpassed again on its flights between Luton and Galway, with overall passenger traffic on the route up by 30 per cent compared with August 2006.
Aer Arann started the Luton-Waterford flights four years ago and boosted flight frequency on the Luton-Galway route three times a day on four days a week last May.
"This news is a great follow up to last month's announcement that August 2007 has been the busiest ever for Aer Arann since the airline began operating commercial flights from Waterford Airport in 2003," commented Colin Lewis, head of sales and marketing at Aer Arann.

Right you are compton, I got it in My head it was 6th of November. :ok:

Surely someone will step up onto the route. Someone smallish, Manx2 with a DO228? Eastern with a J41? New startup who smells an opportunity..

Manx2 brand not likely to do well in Ireland since ORK crash, failed to make any traction on new services before quick pull out last year.

Fair point, I guess I just mean an operator of that size would probably make a better go of it with slightly smaller equiptment. Alot of other people seem to mention Flybe with the DHC8.

Could be a nice little earner for one of the smaller guys.

Is BMI Regional a silly suggestion for LTN-WAT?

If Aer Arron could not make this route work, no other airline could.

As for Manx2 - Forget any other reason, they are not really for LTN-WAT...

I am surprised that Aer Arron has not made this route seasonable though, or has pax been to low throughout the year?..Also IMO Aer Arron would have been better using either LTN or SEN, not both for this route.

EDIT: Silly me, Aer Arron have pulled out of WAT, so the above is irrelevent.

On another note, bravo El Al who have nearly doubled their services out of Luton, utilising an extra B737. They seem very committed to this route, considering they have a couple of B744s going out of Heathrow every day.

ATR v Q400
 

Even if the Q400 operated light........surely she's not that much more expensive if any to operate than an Atr.
DID RE operate the route with 72's?

Shamrogue

Ernest I dont really understand your point about if Aer Arann couldnt make it work nobody else could. They are one of the worst run airlines I can remember at LTN in a long while. When they finaly got things up and running properly they ruin the London route by moving it to the coast of england. Passengers flying over their destination only to back track to it in cars/trains all for the sake of stobart...

Aer Arann split the route as you know....But in the end neither SEN or LTN have benefited at the others expense. The route should have been left out of LTN. AA have pulled out of WAT, in any case.

I wonder if Easy could use WAT as a filler route, like jet2 do with Belfast from BLK?.
No: It did not make any sence at all.

I would think that the Waterford- London service would be too thin for an Airbus but I guess it is all down to the fares charged.

As the recent USAF C130s departing via SIG flight plans, I assume the experiance at LTN was alot better than Mildenhall!! Arn't these guys VVIPs anyhow on what the do? :ok:

I was wondering why the C130's were at Luton. Maybe they were picking up some of the towns taxi drivers for a free holiday at Guantanamo Bay.

LTNman, I nearly choked on my honey sarnies and I still haven't stopped laughing!

I think you will find they were supporting the troops in Middle East. Don't they deserve a little R&R in London b4 going back to US?

Hmm...I bet whoever emptied the toilets on the C-130's at Signature found it an "interesting" experience compared to a Gulfstream or Challenger! :eek::eek:

Buster....I think they are called Honey Buckets!:}

You never know, they might have stopped off to see if their jobs were safe from today after the US elections, rather than sitting in a shack in Suffolk!:mad:

Some shots of both the hercs departing if anyone is interested.

Flickr: Gian Gian Gian's Photostream :ok:

EL AL
 

It appears that the El AL news is much better than first thought.
According to their press release from March 2013 they will return to a daily x Sat 767 year round ( plus the extra 737 flights for the peak summer)
They obviously don't want Easy to take over on the route without a fight!
Means on many days next summer there will be four flights to TLV - 2 Easy and 2 EL AL

I understand that the new Hampton hotel near Parkway station is due to open on 27 November - i.e. 18 days from now.
Does anyone have any information about a possible opening date of an exit from the train station to Kimpton Road without walking a mile along Gipsy Lane / Windmill Road ?

Their web site does say 27th November but no details of Parkway exit.
It looks great value if flying from Stansted, only £2 bus fare or a £5 taxi fare to Heathrow. I suspect that the Luton airport passengers won't get a look-in! :}.

COMMITTEE:
DEVELOPMENT CONTROL
DATE:
20TH OCTOBER 2010


It was part of the planning permission for the hotel that a temporary route will be provided so I would have thought it must open no later than the opening of the hotel. The hotel is located to the right of this artists impression of the yet to be built Sterling Place

http://img713.imageshack.us/img713/5...arkwaynewe.jpg

I noticed while I was standing on platform 1 yesterday morning that there is a footpath from the hotel leading to door straight on to platform 1. Don't know what you do about tickets as the ticket office is the other side of the 4 tracks!

Think there is a ticket machine in the small building that contains the entry and exit barriers

October provisional stats
 

Movements Oct 6491 (+ 0.4% YOY)
Movements Rolling yr 71880 (- 0.6%)
Passengers Oct 862009 (- 0.3%)
Passengers Rolling yr 9597003 (+1.6%)

Not such a good month - any ideas why?

Take away the Eastern Europeans who use Luton and those figures would be close to halved.

With over 860,000 passengers using Luton in October I would not call those figures bad as the airport is still operating close to capacity.

Don´t forget half-term school holidays were split this year running into November as we noticed here in Southern Spain but now unbelievably quiet - OK for us residents but not for business I´m afraid. It will be interesting so see if the November passenger figures show any increase.

Gatwick London City Luton
Aberdeen
+15%
+2%
- 20%
Belfast International
+5%
N/A
+5%
Edinburgh
+5%
+0.01
+1%
Glasgow
+12%
+10%
-0.01
Isle of Man
+14%
+13%
- 32%
Jersey
- 7%
+17%
+7%


why has Gatwick and London City performed (overall) better than Luton in relation to domestic flights for October? In addition Luton was once a main link to Ireland, but we seem to have lost almost all connections. Why?

My apologies for the previous entry, I thought I could copy and paste a small spread sheet.

In answer to your last question, a lot of the flights to Ireland were moved by a certain Irish "gentleman" to Stansted.

Luton still has flights to Dublin, Knock and Kerry plus Waterford until 6th January.

OLY1B

TOM012 LTN - SFB recently departed. Whats that one doing ? (Don't say its going to Orlando)
Sorry its vaguely a spotter question but I was just curious.

I don't really know but my best guess is a connecting cruise charter flight.

October provisional stats
 

I am pretty sure some of easyJet's summer schedule and Thomson's charters ended at the end of September or early October.

Especially to the likes of the Greek Islands and also Wizzair end their seasonal flights to Dubrovnik and Split at the start of September.

Was speaking to a couple of old Menzies acquaintances the other day, and they tell of whispers from a certain Asian airline that used to operate the other side of the M11...

Wingspan and length of the A333 too big for LTN isn't it? Their A332s don't arrive for another 2 years.

That's Air Asia X, I assume you're alluding too.

Hmm not entirely sure, what version of the 330 do MNG operate?

And yes you'd have it spot on :E

MNG operate the A332

Tom SFB
 

It was a positioning flight to operate the tom013 SFB-lgw, the aircraft has just come out of maintenance and was due to operate lgw-SFB with no pax as last flight of the season on this route

MM Thanks for your help

Aren't the A333 & B777 very similar and El-Al have no issues operating shedules into LTN?