Route Development & Rumours

[HPsauce]

With BA and Virgin cutting back on China flights, I can't see us getting anything for the foreseeable future.
A downturn in Chinese students and their families, plus the long diversion around Russian airspace near Ukraine ( Chinese airlines not affected), has made the routes difficult to turn a profit.

 

[IanFarquharson]

With BA and Virgin cutting back on China flights, I can't see us getting anything for the foreseeable future.
A downturn in Chinese students and their families, plus the long diversion around Russian airspace near Ukraine ( Chinese airlines not affected), has made the routes difficult to turn a profit.

This actually helps the Chinese airlines as UK airlines cannot make China pay due to additional flying time avoiding Russia.
So we need to bi-laterals to be updated so the Chinese airlines can add capacity and serve not just London, Manchester & Edinburgh

 

[gulftraveller]

I agree the bilaterals should not be discriminatory. But I just wonder whether the traffic is there.

 

[Birmingham Aviation]

So Leeds has set its long term ambitions for long haul flights to Eastern Europe and the United States.If Birmingham don’t get flights to the USA by then will that be a very bad reputation on the airports expansion plan

 

[Matt995]

So Leeds has set its long term ambitions for long haul flights to Eastern Europe and the United States.If Birmingham don’t get flights to the USA by then will that be a very bad reputation on the airports expansion plan

"ambitions" is the word to note Ant, no chance of LBA get flights to the USA before us, the problem is what carrier? JetBlue & Frontier can be ruled out, American, Delta, United? BA or Virgin? Can't see any of them in the short term, so maybe are only hope iS Jet2, when they get more A321neos maybe? It going to be difficult for any regional UK airport to get new direct links to the USA

 

[Birmingham Aviation]

"ambitions" is the word to note Ant, no chance of LBA get flights to the USA before us, the problem is what carrier? JetBlue & Frontier can be ruled out, American, Delta, United? BA or Virgin? Can't see any of them in the short term, so maybe are only hope iS Jet2, when they get more A321neos maybe? It going to be difficult for any regional UK airport to get new direct links to the USA

Unless Norse operate or air transit get involved.Or there could be a stopover route

 

[BHX492]

Norse, the aircraft are to big and personal surprised that they still exist their business model just won’t allow them to make a profit. For NYC i could see potentially able to manage 2 weekly wide body either 787/A330 and remaining 5 days a narrowbody

Air Transat are just not in the position financially at the moment but maybe they could return at some point.

 

[Birmingham Aviation]

Norse, the aircraft are to big and personal surprised that they still exist their business model just won’t allow them to make a profit. For NYC i could see potentially able to manage 2 weekly wide body either 787/A330 and remaining 5 days a narrowbody

Air Transat are just not in the position financially at the moment but maybe they could return at some point.

Say for example they operated a trial flight :Bhx -JFK-Bhx.Would the flight sell out?

 

[BHX492]

But remember just because it’s sold out doesn’t always mean it makes money. you have to pay for staff , 6+ hotel rooms , airport fees both ends , Fuel (the cost for a one way flight to Tenerife is £6100 alone) and the aircraft leases etc

 

[Birmingham Aviation]

Jesus Christ.Wonder if that’s why it’s taking so long for easyjet to announce more routes

 

[BHX492]

Yep, obviously not to making it complicated it all about figures and they have to be looked very closely as it could end up costing millions if wrong decisions are made. Which is why it takes so long for announcement’s and for agreements to happen between airport and airlines.

 

[Birmingham Aviation]

It’s a case of things like
Airport slots
Time slots
Aircraft Available
Hotel costs
Ground staff available
Room costs
Staff available
Pilot availability


Probably much more to added to the list

Yep, obviously not to making it complicated it all about figures and they have to be looked very closely as it could end up costing millions if wrong decisions are made. Which is why it takes so long for announcement’s and for agreements to happen between airport and airlines.

 

[Matt995]

Jesus Christ.Wonder if that’s why it’s taking so long for easyjet to announce more routes

You need more patience Ant, whats the rush?

As pointed out by BHX492, so many things have to be sorted before a new route can be announced, slots at both airports, aircraft availability, crewing, handling agents, airport fees, the list goes on.. Easyjet will announce new routes when they are ready, and everything has been agreed and signed off, aviation can be a long waiting game!

 

[Birmingham Aviation]

You need more patience Ant, whats the rush?

As pointed out by BHX492, so many things have to be sorted before a new route can be announced, slots at both airports, aircraft availability, crewing, handling agents, airport fees, the list goes on.. Easyjet will announce new routes when they are ready, and everything has been agreed and signed off, aviation can be a long waiting game!

Cheers pal.However things look pretty positive at the moment at bhx.Next year I hope there’s a new airline and over 12.5 million to 13. Million passengers

 

[rollo]

The low cost airlines avoid overnighting crews like the plague. For example prior to setting up a base at BHX EasyJet were operating around twelve flights daily but no night stoppers therefore no overnight crew costs.
Now they have set up base they still avoid those costs, ditto Ryanair and the other low cost operators Wizz and Vueling have no night stoppers.

As an aside BHX is bang on course to hit just either side of 13 million passengers this calendar year and given the proposed increases in the pipeline by EasyJet and Ryanair will be in all time record territory next year, the future looks good.

So far as a USA route it seems a way off for me to be honest and in my view needs to be to a hub which means an American airline that can bring in traffic generated from there. You would think BHX would be next in line of the regional airports after MAN which has seen significant reductions over the Atlantic and EDI which in contrast is going great guns. So far as the suggestion of LBA being next in line unlikely to say the least for all sorts of reasons being discussed /argued on that part of the forum.

As ever for us LHR is the issuea as American tourists tend to treat Stratford as the place to go on a day trip from London the rest mostly doesn't get a look in, its a bit like many Brits think Florida is like the rest of the country when it's absolutely not.

 

[Nethercote2019]

The low cost airlines avoid overnighting crews like the plague. For example prior to setting up a base at BHX EasyJet were operating around twelve flights daily but no night stoppers therefore no overnight crew costs.
Now they have set up base they still avoid those costs, ditto Ryanair and the other low cost operators Wizz and Vueling have no night stoppers.

As an aside BHX is bang on course to hit just either side of 13 million passengers this calendar year and given the proposed increases in the pipeline by EasyJet and Ryanair will be in all time record territory next year, the future looks good.

So far as a USA route it seems a way off for me to be honest and in my view needs to be to a hub which means an American airline that can bring in traffic generated from there. You would think BHX would be next in line of the regional airports after MAN which has seen significant reductions over the Atlantic and EDI which in contrast is going great guns. So far as the suggestion of LBA being next in line unlikely to say the least for all sorts of reasons being discussed /argued on that part of the forum.

As ever for us LHR is the issuea as American tourists tend to treat Stratford as the place to go on a day trip from London the rest mostly doesn't get a look in, its a bit like many Brits think Florida is like the rest of the country when it's absolutely not.

Talking of Florida … how many flights are there from MAN ? BHX operate 2 787 a week ..& these are mainly for tui cruise pax, US unfortunately is not going to see more flights anytime soon… in my opinion

 

[Birmingham Aviation]

Talking of Florida … how many flights are there from MAN ? BHX operate 2 787 a week ..& these are mainly for tui cruise pax, US unfortunately is not going to see more flights anytime soon… in my opinion

Manchester to Orlando MCO 14 Weekly 2 daily aer lingus daily virgin daily
Gatwick to Orlando MCO 14 weekly 2 daily operated by BA.
Manchester to Melbourne usa MLB 4 weekly operated by tui
Gatwick to Melbourne usa MLB 2 weekly Tui
Glasgow to Melbourne usa MLB 2 weekly Tui
Birmingham to Melbourne usa MLB 2 weekly Tui
Newcastle to Melbourne usa MLB 2 weekly Tui
Edinburgh to Orlando MCO 2 weekly Virgin
Heathrow to Orlando MCO 14 weekly 2 daily Virgin


So there’s approximately 56 weekly flights from 7 airports across the uk that operate with 4 budget airlines to 2 Florida airports
Pretty impressive

 

[Iron Duck]

Manchester to Orlando MCO 14 Weekly 2 daily aer lingus daily virgin daily
Gatwick to Orlando MCO 14 weekly 2 daily operated by BA.
Manchester to Melbourne usa MLB 4 weekly operated by tui
Gatwick to Melbourne usa MLB 2 weekly Tui
Glasgow to Melbourne usa MLB 2 weekly Tui
Birmingham to Melbourne usa MLB 2 weekly Tui
Newcastle to Melbourne usa MLB 2 weekly Tui
Edinburgh to Orlando MCO 2 weekly Virgin
Heathrow to Orlando MCO 14 weekly 2 daily Virgin


So there’s approximately 56 weekly flights from 7 airports across the uk that operate with 4 budget airlines to 2 Florida airports
Pretty impressive

I think Virgin are 12 weekly on MAN-MCO, and you have Norse who operate 7 weekly LGW-MCO too

 

[rollo]

The Tui cruise programme requires the equivalent of six 767-8 every two weeks to fill the ship as its relatively small and not all passengers travel on Tui so the bulk of passengers are still overwhelmingly Disney bound, however the market is much reduced compared to a few years back ( bit like Canada but different reason) due to familiarity and cost. At one point a few years back MAN had around 25 weekly with year round flights BHX 2 summer onlyif I recall correctly

 

[Ray Finkle]

Orlando was once weekly for many years. I'm sure if someone goes back through this forum they will find more than a little moaning about it

There are two families in my office that go to Florida every year from MAN and have done for year because 'it's so much cheaper than Birmingham'. I can't vouch for that as it's not somewhere I intend to go so don't really know the pricings.