daz211...Not accounting for economic geography.
Primera staged a large event to coincide with their transatlantic launch plans in Cambridge clearly stating the "Cambridge Corridor" is very important in their planning.
Not to mention North & East London of course.
I might also query an overall public perception of Wizz..Yes well known @ LTN for multiple flights to "Eastern Europe" but not really perhaps a huge advantage over a new entrant into a "new" created market.
If WIZZ comes to fruition they clearly regard the Primera concept as a valid business model to emulate.

If I want a flight to Toronto to visit family like most people these days I would do an internet search. If a low price was the main focus I would not give a monkeys about the name of the airline or even if I had heard of them.

I have a friend who has just booked a flight on Norwegian and wanted to know who they were so for many people the price and the departure point is the only consideration.

The plan is to feed in customers from E Europe where connections to the eastern N America are sparse and expensive. Looking at the proposed development plans, could a starter extension to both ends be added as part of the parallel works?

I quite agree, though is the same not true for Primera out of STN?
I think the point about wizz being well known is somewhat made irrelevant by your (totally correct and very accurate) post above

If Buster is right (and transfers can be made to work), Wizz would start with a huge advantage over Primera.

Assuming, of course, the 321 (CEO or NEO) can do LTN - East Coast USA

I wonder how Lufthansa Group (Lufthansa, Austrian, Swiss) would react to some of their business between North America and Central/East Europe migrating away...

There was a plan to do just that with the new parallel taxiways joining the runway from the ends rather than the side near the end but there was money to be saved by shortening the taxiways so the plan was dropped.

Taxiway and BHX
 

The prospect of a full length taxiway ever reaching the end of 08 (in the future) has now probably been made impossible, due to the fact the current digging in that area—appears to be excessive.

It is interesting to note that Norwegian has pulled out of the Spanish market to and from BHX.

Just to pour some water of the fire, of Wizz starting ops from Luton to the USA anytime soon, a few things need to be considered...

Wizz Air are not due to receive the A321neo's until 2019-2024, and seeing the huge demand for the A320neo family aircraft type, I doubt Wizz Air will be able to jump the delivery waiting list.

That then moves us on to their exisiting A321ceo's... The Airbus website states the maximum range of this aircraft type is 3200 miles with a "Typical Seating" of 185 seats, Great Circle Maps states the distance from Luton to New York JFK is 3447 miles.

When you factor in Wizz Air operate their A321's in some of the highest seating configuration on the market, this is going to limit the range further. Also the distance of 3447 miles distance, does not factor in the jet stream, which aircraft fly against when flying west bound and need further range to account for this.

There is a reason why we are not seeing the existing A321ceo's operated by other airlines, currently flying transatlantic. Take for example Aer Lingus currently operate the A321ceo and these are only operated in Europe. The airline chose to lease Boeing 757's from ASL to open some new markets from Dublin, to Hartford, Philadelphia, Newark and Toronto for example, as the existing A321's are not up to the job, they have however ordered A321LRneo's to replace the leased 757's in 2019.

Hopefully Wizz Air will prove me wrong and can operate the routes, but on paper it does not seem to be possible.

Just one final point, Wizz Air have ordered the A321neo which has the range to reach the north east of the USA, but if the airline is serious about flying to the USA, they should be considering the A320LR neo. Which has an even longer range and specifically marketed by Airbus as an aircraft for the transatlantic market and to replace the 757s that currently fly these longer thinner routes.

Sen to USA
 

It seems that Southend are now pushing connections to various USA destinations via Dublin.

So the big question would be whether Wizzair change any 321neo orders to 321LRneo, if this does occur then we will know that they are serious about this from 2019, how late they can make amendments to existing Airbus orders I don't know but would have thought that discussions might already being made.

Wonder if any of the narrow body TA trees might be willing to try the A322LR?
As far as I am aware airbus dobt hadecorders for that aircraft - surely more seats with similar performance makes it more viable?

What do you mean by 'narrow body TA trees'?

There is no A322 on offer let alone a A322LR so how would airlines be willing to try it!

I phone auto correct - should have been TA triers.
Thought Airbus had announced the A322\LRneo - looked and had very similar spec to a 757.

Maybe they changed their minds.

Airbus didn't change their mind.

There is no A322 it's not currently happening and it's an idea that's been banded about on forums such as this but no commitment from Airbus who are concentrating on the A320/321 NEO.

Can you explain 'As far as I am aware airbus dobt hadecorders for that aircraft'?

It's something you might be 'aware of' but to be honest it's confused me!

Seems that the airport has been having a deep look INSIDE the CTA for the placement of a second terminal. The location under consideration is on the south side of the CTA. The only place available would be next to the second multistorey on the site that is earmarked for the car hire centre. A terminal here could serve the south stands via a pier but any other apron would have to be on the other side of Delta and the new Taxiway Foxtrot so would need some sort of link.

If true and this source should know, it seems a strange location as the CTA can’t cope with a single terminal let alone a second one but the new drop off zone that is going in next year and the station would be fine for both terminals.

I have another location which seems far more realistic away from the CTA but I can’t go into that plan just yet for confidentiality reasons but that plan is older than the CTA plan so might be out of date and the CTA location might be the replacement location

As that South CTA area has had 08 Localizer issues in the past, I wonder if that site is wise!

I've said this before, but the construction of taxiway foxtrot provides a unique opportunity to allow access to the part of the field to the east of where foxtrot will be. When they construct foxtrot they should do it with a cut and cover tunnel. Once foxtrot is complete, they can then build a joining cut and cover tunnel under taxiway delta without major disruption to aircraft movements. This would create underpass access from the CTA to the eastern part of the field. This access could be used for airside passengers, an extension of the DART, airside road or landside road or combination of the above.

Early morning rush
 

I’ve avoided using LTN with all the development works going on but am currently considering booking flights to Sicily. The flight leaves LTN at 07.45 on a weekday morning. I imagine that’s at the heart of the Wizz rush so can’t imagine a pleasant experience?

Deleted Post, regarding the number of flights with change to Winter timetable.

Flight Radar 24 on my phone app was only showing two flights departing between 6am and 7am, when this clearly wasn't the case!

I count 28 departures between 06:00 and 08:00 today - Sunday morning with another with another 18 flights in the next hour up to 09:00 - taken from LLA website

Giles, I think you will find most airports go quieter over the winter months, routes to destinations like Ibiza, Mahon almost cease for six months, even down here, flights from/to Malaga drop off quite considerably. I note Vueling has three Amsterdam flights today (Sunday).

Just done a traffic congestion check. In July the traffic was queuing all the way from the railway bridge on the A1081. Today at the same time there are no queues anywhere.

The third Vueling Amsterdam flight was a re-scheduled service. Saturday's (28th) evening arrival (VY8406) returned mid-journey to Amsterdam, due to an issue. All 126 passengers were accommodated for the night and travelled today (Sunday).

SunExpress
 

I see SunExpress have increased destinations from Luton commencing June 2018.

Turkey
 

A lot of expansion in Turkey next year. Thomas cook have based most of the schedule in Turkey and Thomson/TUI have brought back the Dalaman flight. Luton have seem to caught a growing trend this year. Not sure about Ankara or Gaziantep but an unserved market so may well pay off. Also looks as if there is more flights to be added with the Izmir flight coming in the morning and not going back to after midnight.

Did hear a while back that TUI are going to base another aircraft at Ltn for next summer due to the loss of Monarch. Don’t know how much truth there is in that statement which is why I haven’t bothered to mention it before.

Sun Express
 

Antalya commences 15/06/18 with flights on Monday and Friday -

XQ530 08:00 AYT - 10:40 LTN /
XQ531 11:30 LTN - 17:45 AYT

Ankara commences 17/06/18 with flights on Sunday and Tuesday -

XQ741 14:05 LTN - 20:15 ESB /
XQ740 21:05 ESB - 23:25 LTN

Gaziantep commences 20/06/18 on Wednesday -

XQ742 14:25 GZT - 17:25 LTN /
XQ743 18:25 LTN - 01:05 GZT

Izmir flights commence 17/06/18 on Sunday and Tuesday (from Izmir) and 18/06/18 on Monday and Wednesday (from Luton) -

XQ884 11:10 ADB - 13:15 LTN /
XQ885 00:25 LTN - 06:15 ADB

Hopefully this will be a success for Sun Express with more routes to come !

Sorry to be late on the December start of Powdair (operated by BackBone, I think) what equipment are they using on the Sion (SIR) route. Thanks.

Forgive me if I'm being unduly pessimistic, but looking at a map Gaziantep airport appears to be about 30 mins drive from the Turkish-Syrian border. Furthermore, the Foreign Office has Gaziantep province very clearly marked as 'Advise against all but essential travel' - thus ruling it out completely for any kind of package tourist.

Who exactly is going to be on this flight ? The flight times seem very much off-peak, and the lack of a LTN-Adana route (Adana as a city has a great population than Gaziantep, is by the coast, has far more air passengers than Gaziantep and doesn't have a FCO warning) means the only people I can think of are those travelling to/from Syria or Syrian refugees. Is this some kind of "Aleppo in northern Syria is closed, and Gaziantep is the nearest alternate airport" ?

I also had to look at a map to ascertain Gaziantep’s location and the same thoughts crossed my mind when I realised how close it was to Syria.

Thank you regarding the "third" Amsterdam on Sunday morning. Am I correct in thinking that the only other 'loco' flying to Turkey's capital Ankara is Pegasus from Stansted. I can see a market there for the many Turks and of Turkish origin in the London area. Regarding Tui they are scheduled to remove one aircraft from Luton for next summer, maybe having second thoughts?

According to their timetable (https://www.powdair.ski/destinations/timetable.html) 5 flights per week from 11 Dec ( Mo We Fr Sa Su) Luton-Sion, equipment not specified, rumoured to be EMB-170 or-190.

Gaziantep
 

This was formally a Kibris route from STN until their demise. Since that time there have been weekly charters around the time of the school summer holidays, though I'm not sure they operated this summer.

Gaziantep has a substantial population of its own, also as noted Adana isn't too far and there is no route there from the UK (also a former Kibris route to STN). It is a bit of a niche route but there is probably just enough demand, though I'd have thought the security services will be taking a very close look at the passenger lists.

Arr good old Kibris I had a lot of dealings with them at STN
Passengers turning up at check in with car parts and house hold appliances trying to bribe the check in staff with sweets and gifts even money to waver the masses of excess baggage most passengers checked in with them red or blue massive laundry bags bursting at the seams grandma hiding round the corner with with about 30kg of hand baggage

Sorry just reminiscing- back to thread

.......bags & bags & bags of Cadbury`s chocolate once airside......

Ryanair have stated that they will 'take up the slack' created by the collapse of Monarch by basing additional airframes around the country, so could we see a 5th at Luton?

Air Berlin at LTN this morning. Management finalising a deal with Easyjet perhaps? Maybe Easyjet gaining additional fleet?

Buster - I would have thought it would be more likely served by non-UK bases, especially thinking of Tenerife, Porto, Faro... etc.