Rog747

I could swear that I read the word 'TRAIN' in respect of travelling to Southampton Airport..........mmmmm thats assuming there is still a railway in operation by then....

That would be eminently sensible and worth doing, however it’s been discussed for god knows how many years so doubt it will get done

trains
 

Yes quite - very witty.
Seriously, when this Country gets back to a degree of normality and the trains run properly again, (as with everything else that's currently falling apart)
then of course getting to SOU Airport by train is the best choice for many passengers.

Season's Greetings all.....

Seasons greetings to you and all. A big year for the airport in 2023 with the runway completion and hopefully some new airlines/destinations!

Yes a big year for the airport,lets hope the runway extension brings in the required destinations the airport needs to get back in the black.

What can be expected of the airport in 2023 and after the extension is complete? Would be interested to hear thoughts on any possible developments

Eastern’s performance over the Christmas break has been terrible. Basically all flights cancelled. If you want to go to Manchester you can forget it. I flew with them recently and the crew were great but whoever runs it is a total clown. Would be ideal if Flybe could just operate the Manchester route and nothing else. When they have enough planes of course!

Interested in your thoughts as to who will be the first airline to announce some added routes from the airport once the extension is complete?

with Lufthansa’s recent expansion they wouldn’t surprise me. A CRJ900 to Munich or Frankfurt a couple of times a week like at Belfast.

I'm not sure even with the runway extension that a CRJ900 will be workable at SOU. They are modern-day ground grippers and I would be surprised if they can operate BHD-FRA without limitations. Demand for the service = quite possibly.

Lufthansa are intended on using an Embraer 190 on FRA-BHD for their four weekly flights starting on the 23 April 2023.

Lufthansa in my opinion will at some point announce a SOU connection from either FRA or MUN. With the airlines focus now being based around FRA I should imagine that will be the destination Lufthansa will announce. With Lufthansa starting BHD and LGW this year I can't see any announcement from the airline for any further expansion in the UK until at least the autumn.

Lufthansa to FRA and a possible resumption of CDG with Air France would be great additions to SOU.

I personally would also love to see Vueling have another attempt at a BCN connection.

BCN if anything will most likely come from an away based EZY along with PMI/AGP/FAO. Reckon TUI might also add some further routes in addition to their larger BOH offering. Volotea could also be one to watch for a comeback!

I totally avoided using the 'orange word' for obvious reasons!

Unless TUI sub charter other aircraft the Boeing 737 fleet as far as I am aware won't be capable at Southampton even with the short runway extension.

I can imagine Volotea operating on behalf of TUI again but I can't foresee them resuming scheduled operations to Southampton.

TUI dropped their Volotea charters some years ago for both Palma and Ibiza.
TUI were using Flybe for Mahon Menorca (but only buying in seats).
In the more distant past Air Europa 737-300 and -400 was the main Thomsons/TUI chartered airline at SOU and at EXT.
Those aircraft types are long gone, and TUI's own 737NG's will not be able to haul 189 pax in, or out of SOU.

TUI now feature only Palma for package holidays for the past few years, and in 2022 they switched to a BACF EMB 190 98 seat whole charter on a SAT,
and for 2023 they are chartering them again for 2 whole charter flights a week on TUE and again on the SAT.
TUI also take extra seats on the 'scheduled' BACF Palma's which run on a SAT and SUN.
So it seems a 100 seat aircraft works well for them.

As you know BACF have now dropped their IBZ route for 2023, and TUI have not featured any holidays going there for some years now.

I do not think TUI will venture up to larger aircraft anytime soon (such as Volotea again, which is a big jump to a minimum of 156 seats), nor it seems to expand more destinations from SOU, although IMHO it was a huge missed opportunity for both TUI and BACF, when BA first began in 2021 with PMI AGP ALC FAO and IBZ.
TUI would not have gone back to Mykonos -
TUI dropped this island some years ago due to the high cost of accomodation there.

If 2023 at SOU for BACF does not bode that well again, then for summer 2024 will they come back >?

If that is the case then I will be interested whether TUI Holidays would remain at SOU, and only then they (TUI) may think the demand for again using a Spanish charter airline is still there. It would have to be an A319/A320 airline.

Re post 1193 and also me being new to this forum, why can EZY not be mentioned? I think they are the most likely of any airline to test a few routes from SOU

Hi there and welcome to the SOU airport thread - There is also a Bournemouth BOH and an Exeter EXT one too (local airports to Hants and Dorset)

EasyJet has been operating for some winters now from/to Geneva (GVA) to both SOU and BOH purely for the winter Ski holiday market, and mainly flying just at weekends, although some extra weekday flights were added to allow ''long weekends'' away to Ski.
A short season from just before Xmas to March, or maybe to Easter.
This is not a SOU based Easyjet Airbus but the flights come in from, and go back to the GVA base (same for GVA-BOH-GVA)

British Airways CityFlyer also do weekend winter Ski flights from SOU to Salzburg and Chambery.
These BA aircraft base themselves at SOU over the weekend and fly to/from the Ski airports and back to other UK airports on a W basis during the day.
Inghams Holidays and Crystal Ski both offer package holidays on these flights.

Easyjet have not as yet, made any inroads to expand at SOU (as they did at SEN Southend and based up to 7 planes there at one time --- until the bubble burst).
Watch this space as they say -
EasyJet have given up on SEN, but do of course have a huge presence at bases at Gatwick and now Bristol.
However they have just returned flying into SEN with 2023 summer only flights from/to Palma Malaga and Faro.

If they were ever to expand routes to/from SOU then they likely would be from their foreign bases.
They will not likely expand again at BOH due to Ryanair's increasing hold there.

As an example, using non based EZY could generate 350k-400k pax annually with weekly departures seasonal/year round to BFS(4), EDI(4), AGP(5), PMI(3), FAO(2), BOD(2), CDG(4), GVA(5). In order for the airport to initially hit their financial break even of 1.1m pax, this would be a decent start and very doable!

Are there any examples where EZY operate this level of non-based flying?

How many pax do EZY bring through BHX? No based aircraft but an increasing number of routes.

BHX is the obvious example in UK but in terms of daily departures on a much larger scale - 3/4 services per day on BFS alone with no based aircraft.