I thought exactly that!

Any growth is likely to be modest - probably just the one new route for this winter. .Follow one of the Bard's more famous works starring two characters from the phonetic alphabet and see where you end up.

Or even "Two Gentlemen of ………"

Busiest May ever (passenger numbers up 4.3%), but perhaps clouds on the horizon?

https://www.edinburghairport.com/abo.../come-what-may

With loss of four FR flights per day to STN, I think they'll be lucky to show any growth this month. Although Int'l seems strong in spite of the loss of Wow and Norwegian.

Last time I checked the fares for direct flights to New York were eyewatering, compared with flights via another hub.

That would suggest the direct New York flights are doing well

Bird strike.

Obviously I don't know but it might well be better to run pretty full 757s at a juicy yield rather than have to drop prices to fill a 767.

The growth in May 2019 of 4.3% to 1,381,187 passengers equates to an increase of 56,943 passengers. The CAA data for June 2018 showed 66,903 passengers travelled between Edinburgh and Stansted. I don't know how that is split between the two airlines on the route (EZY and RYR). However looking at the CAA data for winter 2018-19 shows monthly increases of c37,000 - 48,000 on the EDI<>STN route; most, if not all, of those increases could be attributed to RYR's return to the route after not operating it in winter 2017-18 so we can expect RYR's substantial reduction in frequency to result in around 40,000 - 45,000 fewer monthly passengers for the remainder of this summer and slightly more in the upcoming winter (since they drop the route completely then).

I don't think the reduction in Norwegian capacity will affect the numbers too much. The now-removed EDI based aircraft routed EDI>OSL>EDI>SWF/PVD>EDI. EDI<>OSL is now done by an OSL-based aircraft so it's only the loss of the EDI<>SWF/PVD sectors that would effect a reduction in passenger numbers, along with the dropping of the non-based EDI<>Spain routes (but they amounted to only a handful of rotations per week as I recall). DL's new EDI<>BOS service will likely offset most of the loss of the EDI<>SWF/PVD routes and increases in capacity from QR (from next month) and EK (daily compared to the mainly five-weekly Etihad it replaced) may offset the capacity lost by Wow and Norwegain's Spanish services.

All that said, it's obviously borderline if there will be any growth in each of the remaining months this summer; if there is it'll likely be anaemic of perhaps a few thousand and so less than 1%. Even if growth does continue during this summer, I suspect that there'll be at least one month during the upcoming winter when there is year-on-year reduction in passengers. The airport's press release ("We do, however, remain cautious as airlines plan their winter and summer schedules for next year and look at new and existing routes as well as capacity on those routes") is clearly managing expectations that there may be reductions in passenger numbers some months during the upcoming winter and summer schedules. Given that GIP are reported to be looking to sell their shareholding in EDI, I wonder what such gloomy monthly messages are doing to the potential sale price?

On Skyscanner I could fly next Wednesday to new York for less than £400 using Norwegian via CPN, and for about £500 by other routes, eg Dublin. A direct flight would cost over £1500.

There's still enough increases on other routes to keep slow growth of around 2-3% going for S19 I reckon. W19/20 is certainly looking challenging at this stage, likely to be largely flat at best. I think there's a good chance STN will return once the MAX issues are resolved and deliveries start rolling in to FR...

No surprise on NYC, there's under capacity on that route during peak summer now given it's lost 3x daily flights in the past couple of years. Supply/demand is a balancing act. I do think there were too many seats, but I now believe it's gone too far in the other direction. Why no wide bodies? DL have chosen to add BOS, and UA are still establishing IAD, instead of putting more capacity on NYC at this stage.

It would come as no surprise to me to see EWR/JFK upgraded to larger aircraft over the next couple of years when DL/UA are next ready to review capacity at EDI. With UA now sending B767s to LIS and MAN, I believe EDI is the only year round EWR route still on B757. With that in mind I'd say it's a matter of when, not if. DL have already used B763s a couple of times this season, not sure if due to pax loads though.

Been reported now that Hainan have lost their licence for the Beijing to Edinburgh/Dublin route according to the CAAC. Maybe time for a new operator?

Can you provide a source please?

Twitter: @SeanM1997
@Airlineroute
More to follow from CAAC soon.

Here: http://www.caac.gov.cn/XXGK/XXGK/TZT...20_197015.html The PDF document shows 'logout licence' against the route. You may wish to download it then upload it to Google translate.

Seems to be a fair few China-Europe routes there. I see Hainan to MAN is for the chop too.

I'm not seeing that MAN is for the chop as it still shows 45% of the license rights being used. I interpret the Google Translate-d document to mean that it's just those that say 'logout license' or have an 'all rights usage rate' of 0% that are for the chop.

I must have misunderstood the document. I thought everything on there was facing the axe.

How can EDI/DUB/PEK be classed as 0% usage though when it's clearly been running and carrying passengers and cargo?

Not all of the traffic is heading to New York, a lot will be carrying on to other destinations. This traffic is now being adequately served by transfers through Boston, Washington and Chicago. Just because the number of seats to New York has decreased, doesn't mean there's now a shortage of capacity - the transfers will have moved elsewhere, freeing up capacity for New York bound passengers.

Even if there is a shortage of seats, increasing capacity is a difficult balancing act, it's not as simple as just putting a 767 on the route. To do so, you need to remove the 767 from another route. So first you need to find a route that is struggling and down gauge it to a 757, or a route that is doing well and can be up-gauged to a 777/787.. but only if you drop a 777/787 destination etc. Given the lack of range of the 757, this is going to limit your options on where you can send it in the first case.

The second option is to add another daily 757 flight, like they used to. However, Newark is at capacity and there are no spare slots available, so to do this will involve dropping an existing route. You've also then got to factor in what else that slot could be used for - are they going to make more money on a second daily EDI, or could they make more launching a new route or increasing frequency to somewhere else in Europe.

The final option is to keep things the way they are, and keep charging higher fares.

You can't just think about EDI on it's own, and what it needs. There's only so many aircraft to go around, so any changes will need changes elsewhere in the system to accommodate it.