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Yes, our old friend I see. I guess he knows most of the readers & contributors on here also look at that other forum even if they don't post. An update on Air China and Norwegian among others would be useful.
 
Surprising but pleasant move from QR given the recent cut to 15 weekly from 16.

Perhaps the BA tie up helps them sell more tickets?

Also good to see a commonality of equipment, they can now focus firstly on selling 3x B788 per day and if/when they do that, they can look to incrementally add larger aircraft. Good strategy.
 
Re Shanghai, Delhi, Cape Town, San Diego it sounds like there is an article in today's paper. Not good news, Brexit is apparently being blamed for stalling them (I have not read the article so cannot comment).

I'll post a link when the online version appears, but in the meantime keep your eyes peeled!
 
Disappointing but not altogether a shock to some of us, assuming they have stalled. A case of having expectations raised too high?
The lack of mention of Shanghai in particular and any recent press releases by MAN hinting there were more long haul announcements to come for 2017 was perhaps a sign that sealing new long haul routes was getting tough.

I've not read the article either but one factor since the BREXIT vote has been the significant fall in the value of the pound. (whether that is a good or bad thing for the UK economy as a whole is a separate debate). I can well understand this being a factor for San Diego where the traffic would predominantly be UK originating, and possibly Cape Town, although I don't know how sterling has fared against the rand. Looking at the figures, it is not clear whether MIA and BOS have bedded in as quickly as TCX would have liked so one can understand if they are getting cautious about further US expansion. In that context, I don't believe we should assume Virgin's plans for LAX either.

Shanghai and Delhi I would have thought were slightly different in that they could carry a fair amount of inbound passengers and not overwhelmingly outbound, but could be wrong.

It does now look that long haul expansion in 2017 will be more modest than hoped and that the extent of growth in pax numbers will mainly depend on the likes of Ryanair, Easyjet, Jet2 & Monarch getting good loads on their new routes and additional frequencies.

I note the situation re Norwegian and Vueling is also still not confirmed.

Apologies if this comes across as too negative but sometimes we have to accept that rumours, stories, leaks etc., however genuine at the time, will not come to pass, at least as soon as we'd hoped.

On a brighter note, good to see QR showing their commitment to MAN and planning to increase frequency again.
 
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If anyone wants to read that Ken O'Toole article, LAX_LHR has provided a link on the dried fruit forum.

Picking up on a question raised in that forum, it seems Jet2 remains at 15 based a/c for s2017. Wasn't an increase to 17 widely projected? The ACL report summary for S17 referred to slots for 17 based a/c with an increase in seat capacity of 19%. It seems that has been revised so presumably slots have been returned.

Edit: The post by LAX_LHR has now been amended for Jet2 to read 17 based a/c
 
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To be fair, it was mentioned that PVG is still 'highly probable' and we know that this isn't because of Brexit anyway, as BCN has been waiting the same amount of time for slots. I still think Cape Town is also highly likely with Thomas Cook, unless their LGW flights aren't performing greatly.

Great news for QR. Weekly flights to the Middle East in Nov 2017:
7 330 MCT
21 388 DXB
5 789 JED
14 77W/332 AUH
21 788 DOH
5 320 TLV
1 320 ISU/BGW

With the probability for Kuwait Airways, Basra with Iraqi and possibly Amman/Riyadh.
 
I imagine this is the article in question with selected quotes

“What we are hearing particularly with San Francisco is huge interest from the tech sector in Manchester."

"Shanghai remains ‘high on the list of probabilities’ - but, with limited slots available, Manchester is in a queue."

"Also in the pipeline is US immigration pre-clearance, which it’s hoped will be in place in the next three years, along with the expansion of Terminal Two."

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co...ster-airport-passenger-numbers-still-12444140
 
Brexit doesn't appear to be impacting Heathrow ?

Santiago launched last week BA and New Orleans is still downwind plus a number of Chinese have applied for a number of LHR slots ?

Nor Gatwick CX, NAX

That said that is not a criticism, I think we all agree Manchester has to "run" whilst Heathrow and Gatwick "strolls".

It does well in spite of Westminster NOT because of it. The shared society doesn't tend to exist outside the M25 and I think when there is a reference to the NorthernPowerhouse this might in the eyes of some refer to Tring.

Great that KOT is running the show.
Totally focused on Manchester rather than blurred messages re Stansted.

An observation re the White Paper. Manchester really needs to engage , galvanise and form a cohesive strategy of support starting NOW. Those MPs who support Manchester need to be canvassed and indeed employed to maximum effect. The dartboard needs to cover N Wales, Southport, Blackpool Cumbria and Humberside. There is a rich vein of MPs edpecially on the rail network whom see Manchester Airport as critical to local prosperity.

It needs a discreete propaganda exercise via direct invites, workshops etc using the full armoury in its disposal

Vital we get "stuck in" and not miss the opportunity to influence.
 
MAN and its management are in a good position to take a long term view because in the short term everything is running smoothly. You can afford to do that if you keep adding 2m passengers per year.

The UK has just about found its feet again after the deepest recession in living memory. That the Brexit vote has sounded a note of caution is hardly surprising.

LHR is not a comparator to MAN. Few if any places are. MAN is a major player at the European level, and with the right long term vision, it will keep pulling further up the table of influence.

Getting a UK air policy right is vital, as is linking it to the Road, Rail and port strategies.

It is ludicrous in anyone's book to spend the billions on a third runway at LHR - further entrenching the south East's economic advantage - in order to funnel demand from the rest of the country through it. That money would be better spent elsewhere. However, uess the UK has a policy setting that out, nothing will change.

The right noises are being made. Facilities expand, airlines keep wanting to fly to and from MAN, surface acess is poised for a "great leap forward" and the key cities served by MAN are part of a government project to build a major economic unit.

In the grand scheme of things, the routes we desire over the next 5-10 years are coming. The Tokyo, Shanghai, Bangkok, Cape Town routes are in the pipeline. Improvements to the likes of Beijing, Singapore, Hong Kong, LA are also in the pipeline. There are bumps in the road, but change like this does not happen overnight.
 
I don't want to turn this into a should LHR get a third runway debate, but even without "funnelling" people from the regions through LHR, there is still an abundance of demand that necessitates extra capacity being provided at LHR. The cost of expanding LHR will be met by the airport itself with those costs being passed onto passengers that use LHR. Whilst some taxpayers money will be required to upgrade road and rail transport around LHR, most if not all of this would be required at some point in the future regardless of LHR expansion.

That being said, there is still a major role for larger regional airports (MAN, EDI, BHX, GLA) to play in providing the UK with the best connections to the rest of the world as possible. With the possible exception of BHX, constraining LHR is unlikely to benefit any of the other major airports in the UK regions. Even with just a 5% growth per year between now and when a third runway opens, MAN could grow to almost the size that LGW is now. That would further reduce the impact to MAN of LHR expanding.

Once the details of BREXIT have been laid out, airlines should feel more confident about what the UK economy will look like over the coming years.
 
Hi Coathanger

Yes, the LHR debate should be avoided! Their major challenge will be to credibly demonstrate they deliver what they say can be delivered. Unless they can do that they will never get past the legals (even if they can show it it is doubtful).

All major UK airports have reached the position they are in in an "unconstrained" LHR scenario. We will see what happens over the next 20 years in a constrained scenario.

There is little doubt that the airport commission and its predecessors have got this horribly wrong. If that had got it right, the UK would not be in the present position. A fresh (UK wide) approach and policy is clearly needed.
 
UK Aviation Policy. Have we got a timetable for the period of consultation and White Paper being published?

It seems to me that the timing relative to how the situation is developing on R3 at LHR could be important. If it has already become apparent that LHR has huge legal hurdles to get over, environmental challenges to face and more questions about costs, and is therefore looking very unlikely to happen, then the role of other UK airports - perhaps MAN & LGW in particular - might be seen in a different light.

If, however, at that early stage, the view still is that R3 at LHR will be built even if it takes slightly longer than hoped, I fear the focus will be somewhat different, not only by the government but also by some of the regional airports. And I don't think we should underestimate the influence of the DfT and its civil servants. I suspect the "Sir Humphries" of this world are still alive and persuasive.
 
If the UK government continues to place a high premium on having a world leading "hub" airport, LHR will always be at the front of the queue.

Projecting forward, MAN needs to follow the example set by Munich and Osaka (not necesaraly in terms of grandiose!) which are secondary hubs within major economies that work.
 
MAN and its management are in a good position to take a long term view because in the short term everything is running smoothly. You can afford to do that if you keep adding 2m passengers per year.

In the grand scheme of things, the routes we desire over the next 5-10 years are coming. The Tokyo, Shanghai, Bangkok, Cape Town routes are in the pipeline. Improvements to the likes of Beijing, Singapore, Hong Kong, LA are also in the pipeline. There are bumps in the road, but change like this does not happen overnight.

Dobbo, even I, cautious though I am, would hope that Shanghai, Bangkok and Cape Town happen within less than 5 years if you were applying those routes to the 5-10 years time frame you mention. After all, those 3 were originally anticipated for 2017. Or were you referring to other desirable routes?
 
I would be surprised if the routes mentioned did not happen within 5-10 years. I suspect many more equivalents will.

I'll set out some thoughts on this later.
 
To be honest I'd tend to view the new aviation policy rather pessimistically. How much of the last one has actually been implemented?

It would seem to me the model that Germany has would be the best one to follow (though avoiding the fiasco that is Brandenburg airport).

They have a main hub at Frankfurt which they are expanding. (LHR)
Secondary hub at Munich, with plans for expansion (MAN)
Smaller hubs/focus cities at DUS, CGN, & BER with a small selection of long haul routes (EDI, BHX, GLA, etc).

I don't know quite how the legal system would work with Heathrow. The airport (and government I believe) have said no new capacity will be released until air quality & noise targets are met. Would the legal system allow Heathrow to expand on the assumption that those targets would be met and if they weren't that no new capacity would be made available?
 
To be honest I'd tend to view the new aviation policy rather pessimistically. How much of the last one has actually been implemented?

It would seem to me the model that Germany has would be the best one to follow (though avoiding the fiasco that is Brandenburg airport).

They have a main hub at Frankfurt which they are expanding. (LHR)
Secondary hub at Munich, with plans for expansion (MAN)
Smaller hubs/focus cities at DUS, CGN, & BER with a small selection of long haul routes (EDI, BHX, GLA, etc).

I don't know quite how the legal system would work with Heathrow. The airport (and government I believe) have said no new capacity will be released until air quality & noise targets are met. Would the legal system allow Heathrow to expand on the assumption that those targets would be met and if they weren't that no new capacity would be made available?
 
It depends on the nature of the policy. It obviously has to be achievable and realistic. It has to (broadly) follow market forces and not distort them too much in any direction. Finally, aviation is one element of the UKs transport system. The policy must dovetail with road, rail and sea policies to make the best use of resources.

As regard to the legals, there is always a way through but LHR faces so many genuine obstacles in areas that over the years have engaged legal principles (e.g. financial, commercial, environmental, political) as well as the standalone legal problems themselves (e.g. competition, environmental) that charting a course through them will be tough and time consuming - even by UK standards.

For what it's worth, there is merit in the German system. The UK is probably 10-20 years of economic growth and rebalancing from that point but perhaps this vision will be realised over this timespan.
 
Some excellent points.

Interesting that the introdiction of this White Paper has somehow crept under the radar. Not suprising I guess with Brexit and indeed a personal favourite of mine "The NHS" exercising opinion.

What I do not want is yet another bloody civil service inspired White Paper with Sir Humphreys ink all over it, highlighting the 97% of benefits re Heathrow with Manchester lumped in to the "last paragraph" on the "last chapter" embedded with Norwich and Exeter under that cringeworthy "Regional Airports Tag" Somehow this ideological mind set has to change.

Within Westminster Manchester may as well not exist , the trick is having the expertise and guile to confront this opposition and sieze the day placing Manchester on a proportional footing to Heathrow.
 
This appeared on another forum.

https://www.london.gov.uk/about-us/...tions/surface-access-upgrades-essential-third

It really does emphasis that the ground plan for Heathrow is , well a bit of a shambles.
Whilst I think TFL are against Heathrow and appreciate they have an agenda at least they have detailed where they think the shortfalls actually are rather than bland assurances from Mr Grayling that "everything's fine".

Interestingly in another document I have seen, it suggests that the Government have recently hijacked the proposed capacity of the Elizabethan Line suggesting IT will be the answer to Heathrow expansion. To say this is a tad optimistic is a very juicy understatement!

Crossrail as it was originally known was planned to handle increased local traffic for London before Heathrow expansion was ever an option.

More worryingly even this announcement was so rushed the civil service minister involved was baffled by the figures, and did not seem to realise that adding x number of pax after 2025 on this new line was not the full story as of course all the Heathrow pax are likely to have baggage, whereas the locals for whom it was planned would not ....this effectively takes out 20% of the new capacity at a stroke which the line was supposed to generate!

Oops


This is only a smattering of the anticipated problems.

TFL are increasingly nervous that passengers not using Heathrow who simply live around Heathrow will be totally gridlocked.

They are equally sceptical over the disaster which is "The Heathrow local congestion charge" , this is supposed to be for LHR pax only , not the locals, there will have to be a technical system that disallows these although as yet ideas as to who is paying seem at a minimum!

Not exactly a Manchester development but interesting nonetheless !
 
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