Am I really reading this right - despite the runway being suitable, the aprons are not?

How much would it cost to upgrade sufficiently so that larger aircraft can be handled? It must be much less than what we're spending down here on a runway extension (and road diversion) for BHX, and despite the airport's 'London Birmingham' aspirations, I think we are always limited by being so close to the big smoke. Auld Reekie on the other hand doesn't have that problem - and whatever the populations differences, EDI is always going to bring in more tourists. If the Ryanair deal has poached routes from PIK, is it not reasonable to at least expect one Middle Eastern route to be viable, whether it is complementing or competing with GLA (I'm not suggesting EK would move, that would be a costly gamble).

Emirates recently announced that Dublin is to be added to its route network. The main runway and many of the taxiways at Dublin have a PCN of 70/R/B/W/T and the main runway length is 8,652ft. This would give a MTOW from DUB of 688,000lbs (vs. 595,000lbs from EDI), however the aprons are currently only 70/R/C/W/U which would limit MTOW to just 585,000lbs if ACN = PCN. The route was announced as initially operating with an A332 which will be fine with the current apron strengths. Presumably DUB are going to provide a stronger stand for Emirates as part of their ongoing improvement works as I've heard more recently that the route is to be upgraded to a B773ER. I'd imagine that this strengthening / new stand should be quite simple to achieve so it’s easy to see why Emirates added Dublin to their route network rather than EDI.

Note that the main runway and many taxiways at DUB have a medium strength subgrade (foundation) whilst EDI's main apron, SE apron and main runway have a low strength subgrade.

Shytalk, I am from, and live in, the Glasgow area but that's grossly over-simplistic. Catchment areas are much more important, and its likely (I have no figures) that both airports have a similar catchment, within, say, 90 minutes drive. Its possible that EDi has a higher catchment over certain times/distances, but really all you have to do is bring Perth and Dundee into the EDI catchment to prove that its catchment is larger.

There's a possibility that EDI is more affluent, despite large swathes of GLA (Bearsden, Newton Mearns, much of the south and west side) being relatively well off. Again, I have no figures to substantiate.

What overrides much of this EDI-GLA bobbins is the fact that RYR have chosen EDI for inbound traffic as much as outbound; and that Emirates have chosen GLA for runway/PCN/infrastucture reasons.

There's room for both to prosper without cutting each other's throats, but what people on this thread continue to fail to understand is that its the airlines making the decisions, not the airport operators.

Oh, and my tower is nicer than your tower? Stop that. Now. :ugh:

How do you explain why EDI has far more scheduled passengers than GLA then? And since EDI can sustain far more scheduled routes and a far higher number of scheduled passengers than GLA, why would long-haul scheduled routes be less sustainable at EDI than short / medium haul routes. I don’t see the logic in your argument.

The simple explanation is that EDI doesn't have the necessary facilities / infrastructure to support long-haul routes and GLA will continue to be Scotland's long-haul gateway until EDI's shortcomings are remedied. If, at some stage in the future, there is a level playing field and EDI gains the facilities to be able to compete with GLA for long-haul then we'll see what happens and whether Glasgow maintains its near monopoly of long-haul routes from Scotland.

Given EDI's higher pax numbers, presumably also at a higher yield (I think it is a wealthier city, not to mention the financial services industry, Edinburgh Park etc), why did BAA decide to sell it, rather than GLA (unless they think they'll get a much better price?).

With a new owner, there is much more incentive to make these upgrades, as revenue that would have otherwise gone to GLA will go to EDI - or had BAA held on, maybe they would have made the changes to thwart further long haul expansion at GLA.

Surely, either way, the work will get done?

The only other reason I could see for holding GLA is a hope that FR can be incentivised to move over from PIK, effectively closing Glasgow's second airport. But hsn't a lot of that traffic already moved to EDI?

It’s all rather complicated so let me try to summarise;

There are lots of limitations at all airports. EDI's are as follows;

• Main Apron and SE Apron have a PCN of 72/R/C/W/T.
• Main runway and taxiway alpha (the main taxiway that runs parallel to the main runway) have a PCN of 74/R/C/W/T.
• North cargo apron, and runway 12/30 are 31/F/C/X/T
• South Cargo Apron PCN is 79/R/D/W/T
• Taxiways Lima and Mike are PCN 31/F/C/X/T

To see the layout of the taxiways, runways and aprons at EDI see; NATS | AIS - Home and look at the “Aerodrome Chart”. For full details of the PCNs etc, see the “Edinburgh Aerodrome - Textual Data”. To see the layout of the stands, see the “Aircraft Ground Movement/Parking/Docking Chart”.

To reach the South Cargo Apron and the SE apron you need to use Taxiways Lima / Mike / Runway 12/30 so the PCNs of these aprons are academic because of the weak taxiways linking them to taxiway alpha. This means that the large stands on the SE apron and the South Cargo Apron are not usable for regular long-haul operations with large wide-bodied aircraft. They can be used very occasionally for ACN>PCN operations subject to CAP168 but cannot be used regularly for such operations.

The PCN of the main runway is marginally higher than that of the main apron so the constraining factor is the PCN of the main apron i.e. 72/R/C/W/T. This PCN is inadequate for long-range B773ER operations (see my earlier post) but it is fine for many other long-haul aircraft on the kind of routes that EDI might attract e.g. A332, B763, and even a B744ER. That said, the stands on the main apron are all too small for anything larger than a non-wingletted B763 and stands are scarce at EDI, especially at peak times and overnight.

The cost of upgrading the links to the SE Apron and the South Cargo Apron to be equivalent to at least 74/R/C/W/T should not be too high (in the context of airport construction works), nor should the cost of additional stands and apron space. Increasing the PCNs to > 72/R/C/W/T on the aprons and > 74/R/C/W/T on the main runway and taxiway alpha would be a much bigger job as would expanding the terminal in the vicinity of the SE pier and swapping international flights to the SE pier and domestic back to the cul-de-sac on the main apron i.e. moving domestic flights back to where they were when the terminal opened in the late 70’s.

Some of the decisions BAA have made regarding infrastructure at EDI over the past 10 years or so have been puzzling to say the least, for example;

• Why, when they built the large widebody stands on the SE Apron, didn’t they strengthen the taxiways leading to these stands? They are less than half the strength necessary for regular long-haul wide-bodied ops. It’s as though BAA only ever intended to allow short-range ops by large wide-bodied aircraft from these stands e.g. the rugby charters to Paris and Dublin.
• Why did BAA allocate stands 9 and 10 to BA and stand 6 to BMI? These allocations effectively blocked the two possible B744 sized stands on the main apron (the former stand 6A and the stand that used to exist between 11 and 14).
• Why was the South Cargo Apron constructed using the weakest of all subgrades?
• Why didn’t BAA take the opportunity to strengthen the main runway when it was resurfaced a few years ago?

These and other decisions have been puzzling to say the least. You can perhaps explain some of them by reference to all of the news stories in recent years about BAA’s large debts and shortage of funds but even allowing for that some of the decisions are really difficult to understand.

BAA were crippling EDI for the traffic they wanted exclusively at GLA. Casting my mind back, didn't they do similar at PIK to prevent expansion there?

BAA have identified catchment areas and despite - according to BAA - EDI's being smaller, it still outperforms GLA. Propensity and disposable income? Perhaps.. But I still think RASCO's figures are more reliable.
The Regional Airports Review looked at access to each airport expressed as population
against
travel times.



The RASCO figures showed:

1-hour access time by road:

To Edinburgh Airport : 2,536m or 50.1% of the Scottish population

To Glasgow Airport : 1,982m or 39.2% of the Scottish population

To Prestwick Airport : 1,401m or 27.7% of the Scottish population

2-hour access by road:

To Edinburgh Airport : 4,01m or 79.2% of the Scottish population

To Glasgow Airport : 3,756m or 74.2% of the Scottish population

To Prestwick Airport : 3,407m or 67.3% of the Scottish population

Crippling...If that was the case why has EDI seen more growth than GLA and despite being mostly FR Euro routes, has gained far more than GLA and all still under the same ownership ? I am not quite sure what exactly is it you want. :confused:

Ryanair announce IBZ, MJV, SZZ and MMX. Thats ontop of VRN for the summer. Looks like BLQ and RAK dropped.

Joe you're just not credible when you come out with crackers like that! It's not a plot, they just didn't want to spend the money when they thought they could muddle by on much less investment. Prestwick was well maintained by the BAA, even after years of losses and declining traffic. They used to resurface the aprons and taxiways quite a lot more often than happens today, believe me!

The main problem here is Ryanair isn't glamorous enough to count as real growth, you can have as many B737s to the usual suspects as you like but it still doesn't register alas.

'Crippling' for large aircraft infrastructure...why didn't BAA cater for it at EDI?

Didn't BAA construct something at the end of one of PIK's runways, effectively
ruling out any future expansion.? As for credibility I'd prefer mine to those who believe long haul wasn't corporately engineered at GLA. Do they honestly think
it was demand rather than infrastructure driven?

I think you've hit the nail on the head. Given BAA's limited resources due to the amount of debt they were carrying, it made sense to try to maximise revenue at EDI and GLA based on their respective strengths and weaknesses. As a monopoly provider of airport capacity in Scotland, there was no incentive for them to invest in facilities at EDI when these facilities already existed at GLA. It's only since the MMC got involved that the Chinese walls were built between the management teams at EDI and GLA. Since that time, EDI has done nothing to make the airfield more attractive to long-haul operators and all the press releases in recent years about additional long-haul routes from EDI to the USA, China and the Middle East have come to nought.

To an extent, EDI is in a Catch 22 situation. It can't attract additional long-haul because it doesn't have the necessary infrastructure to provide a reliable and robust service to the airlines and it won't invest in the infrastructure until it attracts enough interest to justify the sizeable investment that would be necessary. Long-haul routes it can’t accommodate at EDI will either be picked up by GLA or a sizeable proportion of passengers to such destinations will continue to route through LHR. The latter has the advantage that BAA then gets two lots of airport charges per passenger instead of one lot if a direct route from EDI or GLA is introduced.

Some might argue that the Chinese wall BAA management introduced between their EDI and GLA operations has changed nothing. The MMC certainly weren’t convinced that the Chinese wall was making any material difference to the level of competition between EDI and GLA, otherwise they would have upheld BAA’s appeal. EDI continues to win most of the additional short-medium haul routes and GLA continues to retain and attract most long-haul.

Many people have high hopes that a new owner at EDI will result in all of its shortcomings being remedied. I certainly hope that this will be the case but there are no guarantees. We’ll just have to wait and see. Actions speak louder than words.

Not quite sure that anything was built at the end of PIK"s runways which would block expansion although there was Heathfiekd Reatil Park built on the old RAF Ayr at the end of Runway 21/03 which I suppose would limit expansion in that area. As regards BAA maintaining PIK in good condition that is very debatable. The terminal was definitely not invested in for many years in the run up to BAA buying GLA - I worked there for four summers as a student from 77-81 and even then there was limited investment. As for the runways, taxiways and aprons around the airfield I can't comment on how they were maintained but they were probably kept in good nick due to the fact that British Aerospece were still manufacturing the Jetsteam variants at that time and there was still a fair amount of passenger , freight and military heavies in and out.

Joe, I was once told that BAA sold land to Prestwick Driving Range to prevent expansion of the Bravo Apron, whether this is accurate or merely rumour I have no idea. However, for things at ends of runways, no. There is a major supermarket and retail park about half a mile or so from the end of the secondary runway.

I'd suggest that those travelling short haul would be more inclined to stick to the one hour yardstick, long haul, don't think the 2 hours matters so much. Just my view.

These figures really illustrate the effectiveness of Scotland's trunk road network - the new Forth Road Bridge will likely not have much effect on EDI travelling times, the upcoming A9 dualling could bring towns as far north as Aviemore within 2 hours of EDi, and maybe just over 2 hours from GLA.

The new M74 has made a big difference to Kingston Bridge traffic - that should help EDI traffic as well as GLA.

Bottom line is that someone living in say, Erskine, Renfrewshire is within 1 hour of EDI - maybe speeding a little :} - but someone living in Seafield or Leith isn't within an hour of Glasgow, despite what Google Maps says. Despite the A720 City Bypass (at non peak times), travel from about half of Edinburgh isn't possible to Glasgow within an hour due to the Edinburgh road infrastructure. Works much better inbound to Edinburgh, from a larger proportion of Glasgow.

Good luck to both, and since this is an EDI thread, as well as my former place of employment, I really want to see both do well.

Yes I do. Like I said, its the airlines who decide, not the operators. End of.

Apart from Emirates and some A330s of Transat and TCX, GLA's recent long hauls are, funnily enough, operated by the same types as those operated at EDI in the past.

B757s of UAL at both,

A310 Pakistan at Glasgow (rumoured to be returning)....Air Transat at EDI;

B767 of US Airways....B763 of Delta at EDI

B763 of BA at Glasgow....B762F of Star Air/UPS at EDI

I'll say again slowly....the airlines decide.

That's all very well but, as per my earlier posts, EDI only has two international stands capable of accommodating any of the aircraft types that you mention and they are already heavily utilised. AFAIK there is insufficient spare capacity on either of these two stands in the morning, so that rules out transatlantic expansion, and there is very limited spare capacity on these two stands later in the day. BAA have shown no inclination to add any more large international stands or to fix the many other shortcomings mentioned earlier in this thread. EDI is also unable to accommodate anything larger than a non-winglet B763 on a regular basis for long-haul routes so that rules out any of the Gulf airlines. So, yes, the airlines decide. They decide that EDI doesn't have sufficient suitable infrastructure to be able to offer a reliable robust service for additional long-haul operations.

Beware not to be seduced by headcount in a catchment area as propensity to travel in general and to the particular destination are more important factors than absolute numbers. I also agree with the earlier comment to the effect that people are willing to travel further to an airport for a longhaul flight than for a shorthaul one. I also think that airlines such as EK that offer complimentary limo services for premium pax extend their catchment areas. If, for example, you wanted to travel from EDI to DXB you either have to accept changing aircaft in London or Europe or accept a comfy limo for a 60 to 90 minutes max to GLA and then no change of aircaft. I know which one I'd do - its a no brainer.