View Full Version : BM's US route Plans
Anybody know what US routes British Midland will be adding over the next year or so ?
Will they be ex Manchester or LHR ?
Thanks in advance
Max Angle
27th Jul 2001, 19:32
Rumours abound as per normal. A340 to Hong Kong and A330 to Middle East out of LHR are both doing the rounds at the moment. I think it will be hard for the us to make money out of MAN in the long run so it has to be LHR. Atlantic routes not on for the moment however. When something does happen we will not know any sooner than amybody else does!.
I would be interested to see the load factors for the current routes. Was on MAN-IAD-MAN a couple of weeks ago. Only 3 pax in J on the outbound and 6 on the return. Two fo those were Diamond club Gold certificate upgrades (my wife and I). Without premium traffic greatly up on this I don't see how it can be viable.
Did "new economy" out and "the business" back. "new economy" was okay, I probably would not pay for it myself but I was very impressed by "the business". Beats BA "flying beds" by a wide margin.
Electric Sky
27th Jul 2001, 21:37
bmi are getting good loads on both IAD and ORD but not too many of them up the front. However, for a new service I think these are excellent loads.
I see any expansion in the next year or two being from LHR, whether it be US or not.
ES ;)
Ringwayman
27th Jul 2001, 22:14
The last I heard was 80% loads on the ORD route and 75% on the IAD service.
As for expansion, it will be LHR short to medium term (with the possible exception of a JNB service from MAN?) with the bmi hierarchy believing that open skies for LHR will be beneficial to MAN due to a raised profile in the US following the introduction of the inital batch of 5 routes they've plannned for from LHR.
Ringwayman
The Guvnor
27th Jul 2001, 22:39
I flew MAN-ORD-MAN a few weeks back in J. Was extremely impressed with the onboard service; rather less impressed with the seats, though! According to Weber (the manufacturers) bmi redesigned them somewhat ... with the result that they are narrow and have a rather truncated seat cushion (so feels like you're about to fall off). The latching mechanisms for the videos didn't work too well, either!
On both my flights, Y was packed whilst the premium cabin and J cabins were all pretty much empty.
Catering was absolutely first class; and the onboard chef was a brilliant idea!!