Gatwick should concentrate on improving what they have. I travelled through there last week and there were queues for all the toilets with nowhere to sit and wait for the gate. The whole place is a dump.
Against the world class terminals at LHR and the modern transport connections it is a world away. |
This is about UK and the southeast runway capacity in particular and that’s with what the Davies report was tasked with identifying . It’s not and never has been about creating a Mega Hub and Spoke airport for one alliance or another ! And anyway IAG compete extensively for traffic from Southern France, Italy , Switzerland and Germany particularly on their prime long haul offerings to and from the USA. BTW if point to point traffic from the UK regions to the major EU hubs and business centres were as low as 10% they would be losing shed loads of money. Reality is closer to 60% being point to point particularly to Amsterdam and Paris Point to point and full fare tickets need to be around 60% of sales (a opposed to seats occupied) to break even and indeed most are . Paris and Amsterdam in particular generate 100s of thousands of point to point traffic both leisure and business annually Frankfurk true rather less than that and that’s reflected in the relatively few UK points Lufthansa fly to. Just Heathrow Birmingham Manchester and Edinburgh, Munich has rather more point to point leisure traffic in the mix. |
In a surprising revelation by the Transport Committee they have revealed an adverse effect on Northern airports if rw3 goes ahead.
https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/opinion/jayne-dowle-heathrow-airport-decision-another-snub-to-the-north-1-9196371 I wish I was in the chamber today 1330 as the TC are meeting to discuss Graylings response. Coming as it did after the #NorthernFail announcement many journalists in the North across 21 titles who could well have been on-board with HEATHROW expansion , simply see a decision on funding rw3 coming thru at breakneck speed whilst Northern infastructure sinks ever slowly into the mire. Another political own goal that gives wavering Mps food for thought. No wonder Grayling is such a figure of fun |
Surely most point to point traffic from many regional airports will be using Easyjet or other loco, only the business/hub passengers will be using KLM/AF?
|
Originally Posted by Prophead
(Post 10167331)
Gatwick should concentrate on improving what they have. I travelled through there last week and there were queues for all the toilets with nowhere to sit and wait for the gate. The whole place is a dump.
Against the world class terminals at LHR and the modern transport connections it is a world away. That said the operator has made huge strides to improve the Gatwick experience in recent years. Your hearsay evidence should at least focus your thoughts a little on the pressures at Gatwick right now and never mind outside when at 7.30 am there are the more aircraft waiting to depart of of the single active runway stacked nose to tail along the parallel emergency runway and the taxiway than there are up the road ! |
This is about UK and the southeast runway capacity in particular and that’s with what the Davies report was tasked with identifying . It’s not and never has been about creating a Mega Hub and Spoke airport for one alliance or another ! LHR expansion and the hub idea was being approved long before the whole 'new runway anywhere in the South East' red herring was being debated. That came from a political backdown in the face of voters under the flightpath. The reasons for expansion at Gatwick are completely separate to the reasons for expanding LHR and it is not just a case of deciding where to put a new runway in the SE. When BAA decided to expand LHR they owned LGW also. People don't seem to be able to differentiate between the airport business and the airlines. If a 787 can be filled on a route from Doncaster to Boston then an airline will do it regardless of what is going on at Heathrow. A third runway will not take away the profitable point to point routes from the regions. It would probably take some LH traffic from the likes of MAN who have for a long time enjoyed too large a catchment area but that's a good thing for those fed up with an early morning trek over the M62. |
Your hearsay evidence should at least focus your thoughts a little on the pressures at Gatwick right now and never mind outside when at 7.30 am there are the more aircraft waiting to depart of of the single active runway stacked nose to tail along the parallel emergency runway and the taxiway than there are up the road ! That being said, Heathrow has managed to build 2 world class terminals whilst being at capacity almost constantly. LGW cannot even provide clean facilities. The place was a disgrace. |
Originally Posted by inOban
(Post 10167379)
Surely most point to point traffic from many regional airports will be using Easyjet or other loco, only the business/hub passengers will be using KLM/AF?
KLM/AF offer huge numbers of point to point fares particular via the consolidators and via numerous city break specialists and pick up significant amounts of leisure travellers, oh and don’t forget to Paris they have a deep joint venture operation with Flybe. |
Originally Posted by Prophead
(Post 10167394)
Sorry but that statement is just wrong.
LHR expansion and the hub idea was being approved long before the whole 'new runway anywhere in the South East' red herring was being debated. That came from a political backdown in the face of voters under the flightpath. The reasons for expansion at Gatwick are completely separate to the reasons for expanding LHR and it is not just a case of deciding where to put a new runway in the SE. When BAA decided to expand LHR they owned LGW also. People don't seem to be able to differentiate between the airport business and the airlines. If a 787 can be filled on a route from Doncaster to Boston then an airline will do it regardless of what is going on at Heathrow. A third runway will not take away the profitable point to point routes from the regions. It would probably take some LH traffic from the likes of MAN who have for a long time enjoyed too large a catchment area but that's a good thing for those fed up with an early morning trek over the M62. It is the ONLY real regional airport with significant long haul built up over fourty hard years and yes there is a risk to the services down the line - nothing changes there QF and CX (now back) were encourged to pair with a certain partner carrier Indian service were lost because of GOI interference ( needed to move migrant labour to the sandpit) some years back. South African abandoned ship for ventures new at the end of apartheid. now effectively bankrupt! The operator works bl**dy hard in securing service to benefit the REGION with real local jobs and benefits to the economy. Again I can only refer you to experience with Hub and Spoke model in the US and as a French poster demonstrated above regional airports go into major decline with Hub and Spoke with loss of local jobs. Look to Toulon an airport that barely gets 500,000 annually because AF feel they can force the local populous onto a few ATR rotations a day. Compare to Liverpool as posted previously loss of the Heathrow shuttle ( never made money even in Cambrian days) coincided with a TEN FOLD increase in traffic with local jobs and the economy benefiting when the so called LCC carriers commenced numerous direct point to point offerings . And what’s with the downer in the Marjority of the fare paying and travelling public that can’t afford the bath chair free newspaper sandwich and lounge experience at plus 2 ,5 and 10 times base ticket price. |
Prophead what have you against having a second and major UK regional Hub admittedly supported largely via foreign carriers serving a catchment area of third of the country ? And what’s with the downer in the Marjority of the fare paying and travelling public that can’t afford the bath chair free newspaper sandwich and lounge experience at plus 2 ,5 and 10 times base ticket price. |
It is good that the Govt have finally made a move on expanding LHR after about 30 years of dithering, but surely I can't be the only one to see how this is way too little way too late?
Lets say we have a runway built and ready to go around 2025, which given the commissions, legal challenges and bodged construction companies in the pockets of politicians that are likely to appear is not particularly unrealistic. Looking at the current state of the London airports, LHR will obviously be full as it is now, LGW is getting to the same point now, so will almost certainly be 100% full in 5-7 years time. STN is likely to be close to where LGW is today, and LTN won't be far behind that. Up north I would expect MAN to be in a similar position to STN, although maybe closer to LGW as the new terminal / second runway should allow it some extra capacity. So after LHR R3 opens I'd predict about 5 years of relief for the London airport system before the whole situation starts to repeat itself. The Govt really should have let LHR, LGW and STN build their own extra runways if they wanted too, and let the airlines and passengers decide where they want to fly from (well aware that politicians are way too spineless to make such a move...). In that situation, yes they would not all fill up evenly, but there would at least be more competition, and it could be considered a long term move. LHR would be able to boost its position as a hub but also importantly LGW and STN would be able to grow to help cater for the ever growing O+D traffic, which lets not forget, makes up the vast majority of the air traffic to and from London. As it stands now, as soon as LHR R3 fills up then I feel we will be back to square one, except with the possibility that STN and maybe even LTN in a position to present a justifiable case for a second runway as well as LGW, meaning even longer grass will need to be found this time around... |
Of course I am referring to Manchester Airport- there isn’t another airport south of Lothian that compares to it and yes getting over the Pennines can be tough but still it’s only 40 miles from Leeds and even at the worst it remains considerable quicker to get to via ground transport than ANY of the London options from Yorkshire and Derbyshire . As for Birmingham it sorely under performs to the point of blite for a variety of reasons without doubt including proximity to Heathrow. Again what real support has BA made in developing the reinstated direct services to Heathrow NONE quite opposite in fact ! Admittedly rail remains a work in progress and no thanks to Grayling regional benefits are lost for the foreseeable on that front. However proper funding and completion of the now fractured electrification would still be cheaper on the public purse with evident employment opportunities well beyond the M4 corridor. |
Rutan 16, I think you'll find that Prophead is more than happy for LHR to get the whole of the UK as its catchment area while other airports like MAN's reduce. Afraid it's the sort of arrogant attitude displayed by some avid proponents of LHR expansion. Do you recall his patronising comments about the MAN fan club and spotters which went unchallenged?
Would it really be in the overall national interest if NCL lost its EK flight, EDI its QR, BHX its AI or MAN its CX so airlines could boost already good frequencies from LHR? What about the job losses and investment in those areas even if a few might be created on Merseyside or Teesside if airlines decided flights to LHR might be viable. And you are quite right. In terms of passengers, I believe higher growth is much more likely to come from leisure travellers and airlines such as the lo-cos than some extra feeder flights within the UK and perhaps a few more long haul routes. I would have thought LGW was more suitable for that sort of growth but then what do we ignorant Northerners know. Incidentally, in recent weeks, I've noticed there have been quite long periods of the day when holding for LGW has been far longer than that for LHR. One day last week I counted 20 a/c on approach or in the stacks for LGW. Traffic for LHR was getting in without delays or perhaps 1 small circuit. Originally, I thought the purpose of setting up the Airport Commission was to assess the need to meet airport capacity in the South East. Wasn't it later that a requirement to retain the UK's hub status was added in the final brief? It was almost tantamount to pointing the Commission in the right direction so they came up with the right conclusion, but I shouldn't be so cynical. |
Look to Toulon an airport that barely gets 500,000 annually because AF feel they can force the local populous onto a few ATR rotations a day.
We're actually a bit better than that ( 320s and CR900s ) these days but you're more or less correct what you say - if you're going to anywhere other than Paris, nine months of the year you still have to connect through Paris, while the other three months there's still only AF who offer through fares from TLN.And no relationship with FlyBe out of TLN even though they show up a few times a week through those three months. But I'll have to disgree with you and agree with inOban - most point-to-point travel from European Regional Airports is LCCs these days, and the European Legacies' networks in Europe are now primarily to feed their hubs. This past winter, it was possible to fly LHR > CDG > JNB with AF for less than half the price of BA's direct LHR > JNB. Conversely, BA's price for MRS > LHR > JNB was about 40% cheaper than AF via CDG. Why ?? No idea..... |
There was an interesting post a while ago from a regular longhaul traveller, who said that the benefit of using a ME3 hub was it meant that when he landed in the UK he was home; if he came via LHR he was faced with hanging around for an infrequent and unreliable onward flight. The addition of Ethiopian will make it even easier to avoid using LHR or any European hub, not because the terminal experience is poor, but because of the way the journey is divided up into manageable sectors.
As far as most of the UK is concerned, hub and spoke out of LHR is a ship that has sailed. |
Of course I am referring to Manchester Airport- there isn’t another airport south of Lothian that compares to it and yes getting over the Pennines can be tough but still it’s only 40 miles from Leeds and even at the worst it remains considerable quicker to get to via ground transport than ANY of the London options from Yorkshire and Derbyshire . Rutan 16, I think you'll find that Prophead is more than happy for LHR to get the whole of the UK as its catchment area while other airports like MAN's reduce. Would it really be in the overall national interest if NCL lost its EK flight, EDI its QR, BHX its AI or MAN its CX so airlines could boost already good frequencies from LHR? Originally, I thought the purpose of setting up the Airport Commission was to assess the need to meet airport capacity in the South East. Wasn't it later that a requirement to retain the UK's hub status was added in the final brief? It was almost tantamount to pointing the Commission in the right direction so they came up with the right conclusion, but I shouldn't be so cynical. |
Actually the third runway WAS approved and signed off by the LAST Labour government then caned by Call Me Dave and his cohorts but I digress . In your last post one could ask so equally why should anyone be forced to travel to Blackpool or Durham to make that short hop to a London Airport ! BTW few in the UK probably make a decisive choice of departure point particularly in the budget sector . No they will look at many of those consolidators and cheap fare offers . They may have a time frame to consider such parent and kids holiday periods and unless they are buying a package from the likes of TUI Thomas Cook or Jet2 or a low cost operator, I am afraid they are likely to see many fares from Heathrow or via one of the hubs promoted far more prominently than offerings the from their local airports including Manchester today and as always was. Sure it’s market forces at work but makes regional airport route development even harder to achieve in the wider economy. That adage used that if the demand exists from xyz to abc it will be met is fluff at best . I already pointed out that Manchester in particular has won and lost a number of routes for other reasons than simply bums on seats. Still it’s a cut throat commercially competitive industry. The regional services are far more blitzed by this than any DESIRE to fly via London and significant customers and indeed trade bodies continue to propagate the myth than Heathrow is the only choice ! Still the disrupters are making progress and so much as Heathrow remains a dominant global force, I think the North needs to have an if not equal, a significant counter weight and that has to be Manchester as a split operation each side of the Pennines simply dilutes the offer to the point where it potentially collapses. Yes it’s a similar if smaller version of the Heathrow viz Gatwick debate. I suppose. BTW i will register and acknowledge some bias as I actually reside within 8 miles of Heathrow run a business in Kent and South Manchester inport from Mainland EU container loads of parts and see both sides. I am far from anti additional runway capacity however have great difficulty with the current R3 proposals on costs and benefits as presented, and predicted especially when all the trends and educated analysis and models point to the major growth potential in the industry being elsewhere. Again I note you tried to ignore the evident case that contrary to one of your arguements key tenants that being of regional services from the likes of Leeds right now already pretty much fail the test . Again BA and indeed customers from Leeds and surroundings haven’t exactly been a sparkly success story and quite the contrary ! The use it or loss it debate at play ! Equally Liverpool HAS grown ten fold WITHOUT the direct London connection, however that said alternative Hub and Spoke routes when presented in the same market have also failed both KLM and Aer LINGUS couldn’t make Speke work for them. Enough said this suggests to me at least anecdotally that in fact long haul travellers in these areas are actually rather smaller in number than believed and if so those future feeders will cost the public dear in PSO grants. |
In your last post one could ask so equally why should anyone be forced to travel to Blackpool or Durham to make that short hop to a London Airport ! BTW few in the UK probably make a decisive choice of departure point particularly in the budget sector . No they will look at many of those consolidators and cheap fare offers . I think the North needs to have an if not equal, a significant counter weight and that has to be Manchester as a split operation each side of the Pennines simply dilutes the offer to the point where it potentially collapses. I am far from anti additional runway capacity however have great difficulty with the current R3 proposals on costs and benefits as presented, and predicted especially when all the trends and educated analysis and models point to the major growth potential in the industry being elsewhere. Again I note you tried to ignore the evident case that contrary to one of your arguements key tenants that being of regional services from the likes of Leeds right now already pretty much fail the test . Again BA and indeed customers from Leeds and surroundings haven’t exactly been a sparkly success story and quite the contrary |
Absolute TAXPAYER bombshell from Sky.
https://news.sky.com/story/amp/a-failure-of-the-heathrow-expansion-could-cost-taxpayers-billions-of-pounds-11397857 |
Originally Posted by Navpi
(Post 10167697)
|
All times are GMT. The time now is 15:06. |
Copyright © 2024 MH Sub I, LLC dba Internet Brands. All rights reserved. Use of this site indicates your consent to the Terms of Use.