TWB - SYD direct flights

[Turkeyslapper]

Gday

I came accross this article recently in reference to Sky Trans flights between Toowoomba - Sydney.

Plans for air services take off | Toowoomba News | Local News in Toowoomba | Toowoomba Chronicle (http://www.thechronicle.com.au/story/2011/10/20/plans-for-new-air-services-take-off-skytrans/)

Will it work? Can anything other than a Dash 8 use TWB with the longer rwy? Hope it works (I am from TWB) but am a little sceptical.

Thoughts?

Cheers

Turkey

[VH-FTS]

For a moment I thought it was going to be about good old McFarlane and his vision of a major airport down near Gatton. Glad to read it was about Skytrans.

The comments below the new story make interesting reading. I was going to reply then realised life is too short. Skytrans have flown the Dash-100s into TWB before, I can't see how the airport will need much more of an upgrade. Possible a bigger carpark and an upgrade of the 1970s terminal.

A lot of growth at Skytrans at the moment - notice them flying into Mackay more regularly. Hopefully the growth doesn't happen too quickly and cause financial difficulties down the line.

[chimbu warrior]

Not an original idea.

If my failing memory serves me correctly, East-West proposed a service from Oakey to Sydney years ago (not sure if they ever operated it), and Advance and Norfolk Airlines operated YTWB-YSSY with Kingairs over the years.

I think the greatest challenge will be at the Sydney end; making the community aware that the service is on offer, and also getting terminal access. Don't expect any help from the majors.

[chimbu]

Indeed, not original.

EW or ANSW used to operate Mascot- Casino- Twba return by F27 as long ago as 1960. IFR, RPT, two pilots and two flight attendants

Likewise, most of Queensland was serviced by TAA F27's.

If aviation progresses much further we will soon be in the 1950s.

[mates rates]

East-West Airlines operated SYD-OKY-SYD in F27's in the early 1980's to pick up the TWB traffic.THe result was not that successful commercially.This resulted in the service being combined with OOL.So it then operated SYD-OOL-OKY-OOL-SYD for some time before being dropped.A direct TWB service was not seen as viable because of the TWB airport,weather and navigation aids.

[Fieldmouse]

The issue will be slots. Sydney doesn't want regionals and unless someone wants to give up another regional slot I can't see a service getting up anywhere near the peak periods which is when business pax want to travel to avoid overnighting where possible. That will affect the business case. Good luck with it.

[VH-FTS]

Can a Dash-8 100 land/take-off at Bankstown? An ATR-42 can.

But would these business travellers being targeted want to land in the western suburbs? The more I think about it, quite possibly.

As mentioned in an above post, the weather at TWB can be very ordinary - OVC001 or thereabouts is very common. Could get costly having to bus people across from Brisbane or Oakey.