Category Archives: Easyjet

Is Turku an alternative for flights to Helsinki?

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Whenever Ryanair start cheap flights to somewhere new, we always wonder whether or not they are also trying to appeal to passengers to use their new airport as an alternative to an existing major city airport.

Sometimes they will make a big song and dance about it (e.g. Memmingen for Munich), even when the alternative is ambitious at best. Yet sometimes, the opposite can be the case – Ryanair may not actively promote a destination as being an alternative, but passengers might still use it, especially if the main city airport is congested or expensive to fly into.

So, is Turku a realistic ‘Helsinki West’?

In many ways, even if it is, this is only in supplement to Ryanair’s long established flights to Tampere – with both cities being just under a 2 hours drive away from Helsinki. Although the train journey from Turku to Helsinki is also around 2 hours, the journey from Tampere is a faster run – taking just 90 minutes.

Despite these short distances, there are actually operational flight routes between Helsinki and both Turku and Tampere, operated by Flybe Nordic on behalf of Finnair. So this would be a rare case of a Ryanair alternative city actually being so far away from the other city that you can actually fly over the distance. Yet, on the face of it, these extremely short internal flights seem utterly pointless – a bit like Flybe operating flights from Birmingham to Gatwick, and exactly the sort of thing that would get Friends of the Earth hopping mad.

So is there really a big cost saving by taking ‘cheap’ flights to Tampere or Turku instead? Going on base prices, Ryanair offer little saving over fierce Nordic rivals Fly Norwegian, especially as the latter does not charge for hidden extras like debit car payments. Unfortunately, the market for budget flights to Helsinki is not as competitive as it has been, now that easyJet no longer offer any flights to Finland, and Blue1 just offer flights to Helsinki from Edinburgh.

Helsinki Airport lags behind its Scandinavian rivals in that Oslo, Copenhagen and Stockholm airports all have fast and direct rail links to their respective city centres. Yet, even on the slow bus, it is still far easier to get to the centre of Helsinki from Helsinki airport than from the other two.

In fact, the question should really be the other way round – to what extent is Helsinki airport still the best option for reaching Turku, Tampere and other cities in southern Finland which have airports? In the case of Tampere, you can even take a short (10-15 minute) bus or taxi ride to nearby Tikkurila station, from where the train to Tampere takes just 75 minutes.

As with any destination, it is always worth mixing and matching in and outbound flights, so you can see both cities for not much more (and sometimes even less) than the price of visiting one. Considering that Helsinki Vantaa Airport is a delightful icon of Finnish design, we would suggest flying into Turku or Tampere and out of Helsinki.

Coventry Airport restarts freight, how about passenger flights?

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Coventry Airport has restarted freight flights, and still has stated ambitions to relaunch passenger flights.

Flightmapping MD Mark Avery was on BBC CWR, discussing the future of the airport.

One possible airline which might be interested in Coventry flights is Jet2, which has slowly been marching south from its well established network of bases in the north (including Scotland and Northern Ireland).

Another speculation would be that easyJet might be interested in starting flights from either Birmingham or Coventry, and that it would be seeking to squeeze the best deal out of whichever airport was most receptive to its demands.

Birmingham Airport might have spare capacity, but it already has a good offering from no-frills airlines, ranging from the bargain basement low cost flights offered by Ryanair, through to mid-market low cost airlines like bmibaby and Monarch, topped off by Flybe, who offer a strong network of domestic routes from Birmingham, together with some flights to key European business and leisure destinations.

  • So, is it time for Coventry to see a return of passenger flights?
  • If so, which airline would be most likely to operate them?

Liverpool to Belfast – Flybe yield to Easyjet

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So Flybe have said that they are pulling out of their Liverpool to Belfast flights, and have come out with the predictable line about high taxes being the reason for the route being axes.

Now even though we agree with Flybe on this issue, it should be perfectly clear that the axing of this route is a simple case of them yielding to fierce competition from a larger rival. Now larger isn’t just about the size (and therefore the marketing clout) of the airline – easyJet were able to operate larger aircraft on this route at much higher frequencies. Flybe can often still compete against airlines that use larger aircraft, as they can offer better timings and higher frequencies, but on the Belfast – Liverpool route, they were only doing 3 flights each day, compared to 7 daily flights from easyJet.

Easyjet use Belfast International Airport, whereas Flybe use Belfast City, but even if this is more convenient for access to and from the centre of Belfast, Easyjet make up for this by offering a better frequency. Easyjet also have a much more natural customer base at both ends of this route, whereas Flybe have always struggled at airports like Liverpool and Bristol.

 

We need Slowjet, not Fastjet

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Plans by easyJet founder Sir Stelios to launch a new airline,  tentatively called Fastjet, a have not surprisingly drawn much derision from within the airline industry. At this stage, we do not know how serious he is, nor do we know exactly what form this airline will take, but we certainly do know that there is little appetite amongst consumers for yet another low-cost European airline.

Some speculators have suggested that this might be low-cost with a twist — for example by either buying BMI itself, or its Heathrow slots, and offering a low-cost service between traditional premium airports. Others think that Stelios might have a go at the low-cost long-haul, or even the low-cost premium long-haul market. Neither of these two options would be a challenge to the easyJet business model, whereas a new low-cost airline, even if using premium airports, would certainly be a direct challenge to easyJet, in a market that is already saturated and unsettled.

Who needs Fastjet? The name brings associations with the latest British Airways advert, which draws nostalgically on their operation of Concorde, and reminds us that the crowded European skies and congested, security obsessed airports are making air travel slower, not faster. So would Stelios’ new airline, in whatever form it takes, really speed the whole game up? We very much doubt it.

Two years ago, then easyJet boss Andrew Harrison came up with a much more interesting proposal, the easyJet eco-jet, which was the concept for a new aircraft to be delivered around 2020, which when combined with other changes to European air traffic control, could deliver emission savings of up to 50% per passenger mile travelled. This at the time had many revolutionary features, and whilst not technically a jet, as it would use to rear mounted propellers, it would represent a step change in the airline industry. Cruising speeds would be around 10 to 15% slower than the typical jet aircraft used by the low-cost airlines, enough to take advantage of the efficiency savings rear mounted propellers will offer, but not so much a difference as to put people off from using it.

We’ve been through the low-cost revolution, and there is little that Stelios is likely to be able to deliver to develop this further, certainly in terms of European flights. We are still crying out for further developments in the environment revolution. Some people say that the term environmentally friendly flights is an oxymoron, but we have always begged to differ. Now is as good a time as any to bring forward the slow jet.

Brandt New Airport to open in time for London 2012 Olympics

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So there will actually be a brand new airport open just in time for the 2012 London Olympics.

Complete with its own high speed station and a terminal capable of handling 50m pax per year, situated between two runways. It will be a major hub for Easyjet, Ryanair and AB. Visitors will be able to reach the Olympic stadium in about 40 minutes, stopping by at the parliament or even the zoo if they wish. There’s only one small problem…….

….. it is in Berlin!

Unfortunately, this is no laughing matter. Frankfurt Airport has also been able to build a third runway as Heathrow bursts at the seems.

I have been following the new Berlin airport project for a while, and it has not been without controversy and delay. Yet somehow, the Germans can show us that it is possible to complete major infrastructure projects and deliver on long held promises. when I read that the opening date for this new ‘Brandenburg International’ or ‘Berlin Brandt’ airport is 5th June next year, I thought to myself ‘that’s quite close to the London Olympics.  How ironic that after some 10 years of wrangling, this airport is opened just as London takes centre stage – yet myriad airport projects were promised in the UK to meet this deadline.

Now every UK airport project has to stand or fall on its own merits, and it needs to have a business case which goes long beyond 2 weeks of games. But just think if all of this had been built in time for the games:

  1. Second runway at Stansted.
  2. New terminal at Stansted.
  3. Third runway at Heathrow.
  4. Runway extension at Birmingham (now in preparatory phase).
  5. Second runway at Birmingham.

Instead, we just have to do with yet another airport being added to London’s long list of out-of-the-way sheds. At least Easyjet will be ready with 10 new routes from Southend Airport in time for the Olympics, even if very few of them will be of interest to Olympic teams or spectators.

Now let’s see what happens if FIFA cleans up its act, England put together a successful bid for World Cup 2026, and a high-speed maglev network is promised and delivered by then, on-time and under-budget. Pig just cleared for take-off from Stansted runway 22 Left!

Cheap flights to Denmark – Copenhagen v. Billund?

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I’m flying to Billund next week, courtesy of those kind folks at Ryanair, who sold me a one-way flight to Billund from Birmingham for just 1p. There’s various places in Denmark, Sweden and Finland that I want to visit, and I’ll be flying back from Helsinki to Gatwick with easyJet.

A few weeks ago, my brother went to a wedding in Malmo, Sweden, which is just across the fantastic Oresund bridge from Copenhagen. He flew with SAS direct from Birmingham to Copenhagen, and was waxing lyrical about the service. That’s all well and good, but in these price conscious times, it isn’t surprising to find so many people grabbing the cheap flights with Ryanair.

Now I know that everyone’s motivations for travel are different, but if you wanted to visit three of Denmark top attractions, then you might well start in Billund, which is home to Legoland, before heading on to Copenhagen via Odense, which is the birthplace of author Hans Christian Andersen.

Personally, I’m off to immerse myself in Danish urban design, so Odense’s network of urban parks will be the highlight of my trip, but say you are visiting various different places in Denmark, and you have a choice between flying with Ryanair to Billund (flights available from London Stansted, Birmingham, Edinburgh and Dublin) or with another airline to Copenhagen (wider choice of different departure airports).

Which would you do?

Is this the beginning of the end for bmibaby?

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Following on from yesterday’s news that Lufthansa can’t find a suitable buyer for bmi, we’ve had confirmation today that jobs are going to be axed, and that routes will be curtailed at Birmingham, Manchester and Cardiff.

So, is it wise for bmibaby to concentrate their efforts on one large base at East Midlands airports. They say that they want to concentrate on ‘growth routes’, but with growth comes competition, and Ryanair are already very well established at Castle Donnington. Right now, can bmibaby really push themselves as the ones who offer a ‘more pleasant’ experience over Ryanair’s cut-throat service, or will customers continue to vote with their wallets and choose the airline which gives them the cheapest fees? When going after business passengers, it is much easier to play on offering services which take people closer to where they want to go, but is this so important for the leisure passenger – especially when East Midlands airport itself is playing a hybrid game of serving the three cities of Nottingham, Leicester and Derby, and also trying to poach passengers from Birmingham, without being directly adjacent to any of these cities.

Easyjet might be out of the way at East Midlands, but there will have been obvious reasons why they made a commercial decision to pull out. Baby reducing their presence at Manchester leaves room for Jet 2 or Easyjet to add more services, whereas Ryanair and Flybe will swoon over any signs of weakness at Birmingham, and leave tiny with very little opportunity to come back in once the economy starts growing again. As for Cardiff? Not exactly Ryanair’s favourite airport a few years ago, but if baby reduce their presence there, Cardiff airport operators will have many more reasons to do a deal with Ryanair.

This scenario could easily see bmibaby exposed as a one-airport operator within a few months, with very few other places to go to. It would then be only a matter of time before Ryanair came in and made a pincer movement to finally kill off baby for good.