Recently, there may have been a slight drop in the number of freight flights operating through Coventry at night. Also, due to the recent 'downturn' in the local car building industry, there haven't been that many extra cargo flights during the day (a large proportion of the extra freight flights through CVT are for the automobile industry).

Also, recently, executive jet/prop movements seem to be down (which is also the case at Birmingham I believe). Presumably, these along with the freight flights bring in a fair chunk of revenue for the airport.

Just noticed aswell there is a charter through the airport terminal in the morning, a Titan 146 from Stansted & out to Baden Baden. Do the Minardi/EAF flights use the IPF?

Fried Chicken

Recent reports in the local paper suggest that TOM have spent a lot of money buying the airport/fighting the local council and are not seeing a good return on their ££££.

How long before the real TOM bosses in the fatherland pull the plug, as HX has already moved on.

Could winter 05/06 be the last as LTN is not a million miles away?

EGBE,

Do you mean a report in the Leamington Courier by any chance?

Yes, the fight will have cost TUI a fair bit of cash, and I'm sure certain locals would love to see them "cut losses" and run.

Somehow though, I don't imagine that will be the case - the rumoured €10m for the lease of an airport of this size seems extremely cheap, legal costs aside.

Even allowing £5m for these, and a further £7m to build the terminal, they still have a bargain, considering that BHX spent £11m just re-instating their terminal rail link.

LTN might be just down the road, but the locals have been saying the same about BHX for the last 18 months. So what? Two different airports, different facilities, different cost regimes.

Even if TUI were to pull the entire Thomsonfly operation (discussed on other threads), I would expect another airline to move in fairly quickly.

CVT has had to face up to opposition from a vociferous minority of local objectors and a monopolistic rival just up the road.

My money is that neither will get their way, and passenger flights from CVT will be here for the long term.

OK, so rumours starting to fly around of possible sale of the airport.

Any speculation on a possible buyer? Macquerie seem to have the cash, but wouldn't that put them on a direct path with MMC? Are MAG into buying much - might be a nice two fingers up to BHX.

Would also expect TUI to have a good relationship with Peel, who no doubt would like a foothold a bit further south?

Council continuing airport fight

"Warwick district councillors have voted to continue their opposition to plans to expand Coventry Airport.

It had been expected they would abandon their objections following a lengthy and expensive legal battle.

However they decided on Thursday by four votes to three to continue the fight, against the advice of senior planning officers.

A public enquiry is due to be held, but a final government decision is not expected for several months."



:hmm:

Looks like the pax figures could be down slightly for Nov/Dec due to severla planned runway closures

http://www.thomsonfly.com/en/company_1728.html

Fried Chicken

I wonder what the cost will be to the company having to close the airport mid-week for two days, particularly as these would surely be the days when business passengers are most likely to be inconvenienced, I would have thought that the weekend days would have been better to close?

It will be interesting to see what Thomsonfly will be doing for next summer, as an additional based aircraft with a few new routes has been largely touted. Operational issues aside, the base has been extremely successful, with most routes performing very strongly, although I've been surprised at the lack of German expansion and the decision to discontinue Marseille!

Council to do a U-Turn?
 

Just heard on local radio that Warwickshire Council are going to do a big u-turn and approve the development at CVT. Short Story Here

Can't find any other sources as yet.

This will be very good news for Coventry Airport, as well as those who use the airport. I'm unsure at the moment exactly what the expansion will be, but there is a definite need for better passenger facilities, as the current ones would be charitably described as "cosy" or "basic."

I can't find any pictures of the proposed terminal which had been up on the Coventry Airport website when Thomsonfly first began flights, but it would be nice to see what is planned.

Also of note would be whether or not an extra aircraft from TOM will be based at CVT, and if so, to what destinations?

Bill Savage was talking about various cities on his wish list, many of them "proper" destinations as Archie Muir might call them.

DUB and GVA would certainly suggest hints of Blue & Orange being interested, but can anyone settle the runway issue once and for all with regards to:

1) FR's 737-800s
2) Anything reaching TFS?

Or has he let the cat out of the bag with regards to a runway extension?

As for those councillors at WDC, so much dithering, they all clearly need a holiday. If it meant they could end their animosity once and for all, I'm sure local tax payers would be happy to point them in the direction of their friendly local airport and assist them in going away on some kind of "educational trip".

I'd suggest they head off to Venice, where they could learn a few tricks about how to handle bureacracy. However, I doubt there is a mayor in all of Italy who could boast of squandering 2million Euros on trying to stop something he'd already given permission for on three previous occassions.