What's going on at NRN?

[Pax-man]

Flew out of Niederrhein last light, and couldn't believe my eyes...

After snaking around half of Northern Germany I stumbled accross a big, shiny, spacious ghost town in the middle of nowhere! We were on the last flight out for the day, so you'd expect it to be pretty quiet, but I looked at the departures for the following day and there were only SIX flights on the board before 3pm! Now, I'm hardly a brain surgeon, but the airport must be leaking money all over the place. A guy on our flight suggested it was the result of a low-cost carrier going bust?? Anyone know?

Oh, and for a bonus point, who can tell me which Ryanair airport is the furthest from the actual city it purportedly serves? Niederrhein, or Weeze, or 'Dusseldorf' took me an hour and 45 from just south of Dusseldorf, and that was without a single delay on the road!

Shurely there must be some form of European legislation to regulate this, or can we expect to see Blackpool billed as 'Leeds West' in the near future?!;)

[GOLF-INDIA BRAVO]

Yes V Bird who where based there went bump last year

G-I-B

[Pander216]

What is south of Dusseldorf, Collonge? Or did you drive via Dortmund;)

Rumours are RYR is planing to make NRN a hub in 2006... Furthermore Atlasjet serves NRN a few times per week.
Also NRN investors and fromer V Bird investors are talking of a new low cost start up at Niederrhein in the near future.

But indeed, since V bird died is has become rather quiet in Weeze...

[flugholm]

Okay, here goes: I happen to work at NRN/EDLV.

NRN/EDLV currently is a Ryanair-only airport. Currently, daily traffic is one each to and from CIA/LIRA, GRO/LEGE, NYO/ESKN, PIK/EGPK, plus 2x STN/EGSS. A connection to SNN/EINN will be added in May.

MNG (MD80) and Sky (B737-300) are to resume once-weekly fligts to AYT/LTAI in March or April.

bexx air are to resume weekly traffic to Bulgaria this summer, presumably using someone elses's MD80s.

Both Atlasjet (AYT/LTAI, B757 or A320) and Air Cairo (HRG/HEGN, A321) flights were announced a couple of weeks ago, but there's no news when (and if!) this will eventually happen. Same applies for an unnamed eastern european cargo operator (An 24 or similar), and some kind of small-scale V-Bird resurrection.

It's all very sad...! :mad:

[tom de luxe]

NRN is in the doldrums indeed. There is speculation though that it might be the next German Ryanair base. Pie in the sky, IMHO.
Shurely there must be some form of European legislation to regulate this,
No need for that, as German law will do just fine. Read here (http://www.pprune.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=166255) what Yours Truly posted earlier about NRN's run-in with DUS and the German Courts of Law. The airport has now changed its name to "Airport Weeze", pending appeal.

[virginblue]

The airport has just been renamed for the fourth time since last October

1. Original name: Airport Niederrhein

2. Renamed: "Airport Duesseldorf Prefecture Weeze" in October

DUS airport obtained an injunction against this name, claiming it was misleading because the airport was nowhere near Dusseldorf. NRN airport thought it would be able to outsmart the courts and the airport was...

3. Renamed: "Airport Düsseldorf Regional Weeze" in December. DUS airport obtained an injunction against this name as well, claiming it was still misleading because the airport was nowhere near Dusseldorf. NRN airport thought court injunctions were not to be obeyed and continued to use "Düsseldorf" in its name. The court last week said it had rarely seen such an arrogant reaction to an injunction and fined the airport 500.000 EUR. As a result, the airport finally bowed to the rule of law and the airport was, for the fourth time, renamed and is now trading as

4. Airport Weeze

[airhumberside]

Would a Ryanair route to Dublin work?

Are the Atlasjet and Air Cairo services scheduled and where are they too?

[Pax-man]

I must confess that I was amazed at the size of the terminal, considering it's location. Can anybody point me in the direction of the story behind it's construction? Please, please don't tell me it was a pile of EU money....:rolleyes:

[flugholm]

You can't really tell when you look at it these days, but the core of the NRN terminal is quite an old building. It was used for U-boat construction in WWII in Hamburg. In the early fifties it was transported here and served as the main maintenance hangar at RAF Laarbruch. Laarbruch closed in 1998/1999.

In 2002/2003 the hangar was transformed to the main pax terminal. NRN opened May 1st, 2003, and Ryanair started flight operations that day. The terminal wasn't completed in time for this, so another hangar was used as an interim pax terminal until August 2003.

Yes, it looks quite flash for an over 60 years old U-boat hangar!

And, yes, at least some EU money went into it. Money that is being poured into all the holes that retreating military bases leave...

For pics, try http://www.pro-niederrhein.net/fotos/HTML/index.htm
and http://www.sgniederrhein.net


Airhumberside:

>Would a Ryanair route to Dublin work?

I think so! And so would Munich, Berlin, Vienna, Helsinki and a few others. V Bird pax figures were not quite bad right before they ceased operations in October 2004, but it was too late then...!

>Are the Atlasjet and Air Cairo services scheduled and where are they too?

Both would be charter. Atlasjet would be to Antalya AYT/LTAI and Air Cairo to Hurghada HRG/HEGN. But as I said, no news wheather these services really will start. These days, I don’t believe anything until I hear „XYZ123, ILS established.“
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[virginblue]

And so would Munich, Berlin, Vienna, Helsinki and a few others. V Bird pax figures were not quite bad right before they ceased operations in October 2004, but it was too late then...

Pax numbers mean nothing, it is the yield that matters. VBird more or less gave their tickets away thorugh permanent seat sales and hardly had any ancillary revenues. It is not difficult to have bums on your seats, the question is if you can afford them.

Even Ryanair's numbers to STN are weaker than from other German destinations although tickets are rather cheap from NRN.

[tom de luxe]

>Would a Ryanair route to Dublin work?
I think so! And so would Munich, Berlin, Vienna, Helsinki and a few others. V Bird pax figures were not quite bad right before they ceased operations in October 2004, but it was too late then...!

Just a few questions:

:confused: Did V-Bird make any money? (Hint: Are they still around?)

:confused: How do FR's loads and yields compare with other German bases, or EIN for that matter? (not too well, it appears - just check FR's farefinder :E)

:confused: Is there intense lo-co competition nearby? (Easy from DTM and CGN, Germanwings and HLX from CGN, Air Berlin from DTM, CGN and DUS, DBA from DUS and CGN)

:confused: How do these airports compare to NRN? (there're more centrally located, and easy to reach by car & public transport)

I'm afraid NRN will be one of the ex-military conversion's White Elephants. (And Black Forest Airport of EUjet fame will be next in line.)

[flugholm]

tom de luxe , in a word, you just summed up everything that keeps me awake at night! :sad:

[Avman]

I think that NRN's worst enemy is not it's geographical location but access. It's not easy to get to. I used it last year and although the parking and the (V-Bird) fare was cheap, the drive (1.5hrs) was too long and cumbersome for my liking. I decided then to stick to DUS, CGN or BRU which are less than 1 hour away. Nice little airport though.

[jabird]

Considering all of the above, why did DUS bother making so much fuss about the IATA coding?

Sounds like another legal fight just for the sake of it. Has anyone done a CoBA on how much free press these legal fights get v the cost of the lawyers' fees?

I'm sure the ROI is very positive for many of FR's own battles against trading standards and the Euro-bureaucrats, but when other airports and airlines are just out to protect their monopoly positions, it just seems to backfire, and waste lots of their own & tax payers' money.

[tom de luxe]

The issue at the moment is not the IATA denomination, but the name "Dusseldorf" itself.

DUS are very determined not to get sh*fted by MOL and his merry men of NRN Forest. NRN is nowhere near Dusseldorf, so why should they call themselves "Dusseldorf", thus creating the impression that they are. DUS take a stand, something many people in the industry talk about but then hardly ever do (of course FRA didn't object to HHN 'cos FRA owns HHN :} ).

Re taxpayer's money: 50% of the DUS operating company is indeed held by Dusseldorf city council, 30% by Hochtief AG, and 20% by AerRianta. But the lawsuits won't cost a lot as long as DUS keep winning them and are awarded full costs :ok: .

[jabird]

Tom,

DUS are very determined not to get sh*fted by MOL and his merry men of NRN Forest.

> Which the above posts suggests is not a concern anyway.

NRN is nowhere near Dusseldorf, so why should they call themselves "Dusseldorf", thus creating the impression that they are.

> Ditto for all the other Ryanairports. Most consumers know this anyway, so if IATA are happy to give it the DUS designator, let it call itself Dusseldorf Niederhein or whatever it wants.

DUS take a stand, something many people in the industry talk about but then hardly ever do (of course FRA didn't object to HHN 'cos FRA owns HHN).

> There is taking a legal stand for the sake of a technicality, and there is taking a stand by delivering what the market wants. DUS has the road & rail connections, so if that is what people want anyway, why kick a dead dog by going to court to prove it? Larger airports can also earn much more from parking, shopping etc - it will all balance out in the long run - I'm not aware of any "Ryanairport" which has ever seriously threatened the main hub it competes against (in terms of pax numbers), or which would ever really be likely to (I'm talking major international hubs here like DUS, CDG, FRA, MXP etc, not the smaller cities).

Re taxpayer's money: 50% of the DUS operating company is indeed held by Dusseldorf city council

> Who have also tried to ban FR's adverts on their billboards. Protectionism me thinks.

20% by AerRianta

> That well known bringer of competition in Ireland, and shareholder in the equally monopolist BHX.

But the lawsuits won't cost a lot as long as DUS keep winning them and are awarded full costs.

> And where is the court which makes these decisions? Where do said judges fly from I wonder?

It seems a fairly similar case across the industry that the big airports don't like their smaller rivals because they percieve them as taking away their business. Politicians like the big hubs too, because they see them as "predictable", and they want to tell everyone to go there by train (which would be fine if they gave us a few carrots as well as lots of sticks).

We've been here before with telecoms etc. The market will grow anyway, and leave room for both. Major city hubs just need to play to their strengths more, and stop trying to batter the hell out of their start up rivals.

[Pax-man]

It does seem ridiculous to me that NRN could ever be described as a Dusseldorf airport, but then again Stansted and Gatwick aren't exactly in central London, are they??

Inevitably the travelling public will get wise to the location of such airports, and will vote with their wallets. I certainly would not book another low-cost flight to such a location, mainly due to the expense of both time and money in getting to my final destination. Once bitten, twice shy, as they say.

I really can't see a future for NRN, but I also can't see a case for it's initial development. Just how many airports do we REALLY need?

[flugholm]

A quick update of what’s currently happening at NRN:

Ryanair:
EGSS/STN London-Stansted: 2x daily Mon-Fri, 1x daily Sat-Sun
LIRA/CIA Rome-Ciampino: 1x daily
ESKN/NYO Stockholm-Nykoeping-Skavsta: 1x daily
LGPK/PIK Glasgow-Prestwick: 1x daily
LEGE/GRO Barcelona-Girona: 1x daily
EINN/SNN Shannon: 1x daily, from May 3.
(All B738)

Sky Airlines:
LTAI/AYT Antalya: 1x on Tue. (B734 or B738)

MNG Pax:
LTAI/AYT Antalya: 1x on Wed, from June 1. (B734 or MD82)

AtlasJet:
LTAI/AYT Antalya: 1x on Wed, from April 28. (A320-214 or B757-200)

Bexx
LBSF/SOF Sofia: No serious information...


Not a lot, really...
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