bmi baby @ man

[Knifedge]

bmi baby announced today a move into manchester, routes to be announced on Monday.

A fourth base will be announced soon. details on their website.




Wingtips to the sky.

[stick-shaker]

For pax in the middle catchment area between LPL for easyJet and MAN for bmibaby the deciding factor will not only be fares but car parking charges. Peel Holdings, owners of LJLA, might want to re-assess their potentially weakened position here - current charges are disproportionate to the economic area and revenue will dramatically reduce when pax given another local option that is more convenient take their business away.

[Anne.Nonymous]

Sounds like a very astute move to me! They have the infrastructure and the feed into Star Alliance - to say nothing of bmi transatlantic routes.

'tiny' keeps growing.

Anne :p

[flappless]

How long will it be until EZ buys baby ?

[Anne.Nonymous]

Flappless

Don't hold your breath...... the word that I am getting is that they are not for sale!

Anne

[StarAllianceGold]

Can't see baby providing through routing on Star Alliance, as it's not a member.

To do so would also move away from the no-frills point to point standard.

Are bmi still struggling to decide whether they want to be full service or no-frills?

I really hope baby isn't sold off, as there wouldn't be much of bmi left :( :(

Hope I'm wrong and that they have a plan that will work.


*G

[paxman]

Couldn't agree with you more Stick-man!

The first time I used Liverpool a few years ago, I was astonished to discover that my car parking fee (for a long weekend) was more than twice the price of my EZ return ticket to Nice.

I pointed this out to Stelios and complained to Peel Holdings - but being a mere, well, Paxman - I was of course ignored.

I've continued to use Liverpool only very reluctantly (irritated too by their often un-announced and seemingly unnecessary roadworks) so I'm delighted to see that Manchester is succumbing at last to low cost airlines. About time!

I just hope that Baby doesn't merely fly to Palma, Barcelona, Nice, Belfast and all the other boring destinations...

[Buster the Bear]

Bmibaby has confirmed that Manchester will become its 3rd hub on 01May03 when it will base 2 Boeing 737s for flights to the UK, Ireland and mainland Europe including possibly Amsterdam, Brussels and Paris however the airline will make a route presentation on Monday.
Bmibaby is also expected to announce a 4th hub soon.

http://community.the-underdogs.org/smiley/misc/before.gif

[dwlpl]

Current long stay car parking charges for a three day stay at:
Liverpool = £29.80
Manchester = £32.60



And a four day stay at:
Liverpool = £30.90
Manchester = £33.70

[paxman]

Glad to see the prices at Liverpool seem to have gone down dwlpl.

But then there are alternatives to "official" car parks at Manchester aren't there? (Not to speak of buses, trains etc which actually go to the place?) I don't need to park at Manchester - I can take sensible public transport there.

But anyway, aren't you the plonking statistician who claims Nottingham has a bigger population than Manchester? Or something like that? Are your car park figures any more trustworthy?

[dwlpl]

Get it right.

I did not give Nottinghams stats, but the combined total for EMA's nearest cities. But if you want it broken down here it is Nottingham 267k, Derby 222k and Leicester 280k.

Back to the airport car park charges. The charges are those PUBLISHED BY BOTH airports and publically available to anyone who cares to look for them. Also there are now alternatives to the official car parks at Liverpool now as well. I think you will find Liverpool, has and always will have, lower car park charges than Manchester. It is a policy decision taken by the airports managers and owners.

[paxman]

Thanks dwlpl, glad to see you confirm I got it right - I said "something like that" - re your strange Nottingham statistics.

I note you say nothing about the non-existent public transport nor the cavalier roadworks nearby.

I have nothing against Liverpool Airport itself, especially not since they cleaned it up last year, just that it's car park charges are outrageous for somewhere at the back of beyond.

Unlike all other British airports (with the possible exception of Benbecula) there really isn't much alternative to extortion. If you want to fly from Liverpool you have to put up with car park robbery. That land must have cost tuppence! You can't even get discounts (from card issuers, bonus point systems, online ordering, the AA, anyone...) that you get even at Gatwick or Stansted, let alone Manchester.

And incidentally lplwpl - just looked at Manchester Airport's official website which confirms your figures are completely wrong and that long stay car parking is currently available their for £4.20 per day.

Look again at stick-shakers note - the deciding factor will be car parking prices.

What price John Lennon?

[Landing_24R]

Routes are:

Alicante, Belfast Intl, Cork, Malaga, Munich and Palma

Cheers
Landing_24R

[Localiser Green]

Fairly predictable... with the possible exception of Munich. :rolleyes:

Can't believe there is not a peep of bmi baby's launch on the Manchester Airport website....

Also correction Munich is not a route it is Murcia!! bmi baby screwed up their booking system, and have put Munich instead on the drop down list :eek:

[Landing_24R]

Localiser is indeed correct, it's Murcia ('Costa Colida') not Munich.

More details (from the website)

Alicante daily From £38*
Belfast (International) 3 x daily (Monday - Friday), 1 x Saturday, 1 x Sunday From £12.50 *
Cork daily From £25*
Malaga daily From £38*
Murcia weekly From £38*
Palma daily From £38*


Landing_24R

[dwlpl]

paxman,

Not my stats, but they are the figures from the last census.

Liverpool has online car booking and has a discount. I have not used this method so I do not know how much this is. There are a number of alternative sites for car parking springing up and they have courtesy transport for their customers.

The prices I got for Manchester was from their site at http://www.manchesterairport.co.uk/content.nsf/Pages/CF3567C25AF4C460802568F1004CDCF9!OpenDocument

Because you mentioned a long weekend trip the figures I looked for was for the same. The figure you now quote, £4.20, is for pre-booked space for Feb2003 and is for a MINIMUM 8 day stay.

Now for public transport. The Government has given grants to MAN for the introduction of rail and tram systems to the airport, something that they have not given to LPL. The government has criteria for rail links to airports whereby an airport must have a minimum of 10 million pax per annum to qualify for the grant.

Finally, as I have said before, its Liverpool Airport company policy that says LPL car parking will be lower than at MAN.

Routes are to:
Alicante *1 daily
Belfast Int *18 per week (*3 weekday, *1 Sat, *2 Sun)
Cork *1 daily
Malaga *1 daily
Murcia *1 weekly (Sat)
Palma *1 daily

[Rockwell]

paxman

Correct, dwlpl is well versed in collecting numbers and equally selecting those that make his point. Bit like he claimed in a previous post on the installation of 'airbridges' at LPL, when he knew full well they were merely a platform over the service road down to the apron, to stop the odd passenger being run over and not airbridges in the accepted sense. Economical with the truth, comes to mind.

I too look forward to bmibaby and others, (e.g. Hapag Lloyd) starting up and as has been said, Monarch do an excellent service too. It should also be borne in mind that MAN has long had low fare operators such as KLMuk, which may not claim to be the proverbial low-cost airline, but their fares can and often do, compare with LPL's, at the same time providing an interline service and checked-through baggage. KLMuk presently offer eight flights daily (seven on Sat) departures MAN-AMS. Compare that with Easyjet's five flights LPL-AMS and sort yourself out.

KLMuk have increased their schedules by popular demand. If the demand was not there, and the fares too high, then they would be shutting up shop, would they not? Likewise Lufthansa will shortly increase their MUC-MAN flights to six daily.

Low cost, in one form or other, has been around at Manchester for a while, it was just not marketed as such.

As has been mentioned many times before, the major part of revenue income generated at Liverpool Airport comes from car parking, plus the recent addition of new retail lettings in the terminal. Peel get next to nothing from Easyjet and Ryanair, which is why those two airlines operate from there. If the charges were increased then, like the sensible operators they are, they would be off elsewhere. Peel own all the car parking land which is part of the airport.

If you thought that the last lot of LPL roadworks were a problem, then prepare for the worst when/if the new dual carriageway commences on Hale Road. Still, it may do away with having to find one's way through the night's offering of burnt out vehicles on the rundown council housing estate.