Lufthansa to launch Berlin routes from Manchester and Birmingham
Published: 09/11/2011 - Filed under: News »
German flag carrier Lufthansa will add daily services from both Manchester and Birmingham to Berlin next summer, to co-incide with the opening of the city’s new Berlin Brandenburg Willy Brandt Airport.
The flights will commence on June 3, departing Berlin for Manchester at 0700, and for Birmingham at 1825, arriving at 0755 and 1920 respectively. The return legs will depart Manchester at 0830 and Birmingham at 2000, arriving at 1130 and 2250 respectively. The service will be operated by two-class A320 aircraft.
The timings mean return day trips will not be possible, but the services will still be of benefit to business travellers living in the Manchester and Birmingham catchment areas. There are currently no direct, non-stop flights between Berlin and Birmingham - Easyjet flies from Manchester to the German city.
Lufthansa also offers a three times-daily service from London Heathrow, operated on its behalf by subsidiary Bmi, although it's not clear what will happen to these services should Lufthansa's sale of the loss-making carrier to IAG go ahead.
The forthcoming Berlin Brandenburg Willy Brandt airport (located next to the existing Schonefeld facility and named after former German Chancellor and Nobel Peace Laureate Willy Brandt) is creating several new opportunities for routes from the UK.
Aside from these additional Lufthansa flights, Jet2 recently announced it will launch three times-weekly flights between Leeds Bradford and the new airport in Berlin from June 1, 2012 (see online news November 3).
It's also worth noting that the new airport will allow Lufthansa to provide Berliners with the sort of air services which they should have enjoyed years ago. Besides the launch of two new UK routes into Birmingam and Manchester, Germany's national airline will add non-stop service to around 30 new short-haul destinations plus two cities in the Middle East region.
They range from Helsinki, Stockholm and Reykjavik in the north to Barcelona, Rome, Bucharest and Istanbul in the south. For the first time Lufthansa will also operate out of Berlin to Beirut (Lebanon) and Tel Aviv (Israel).
In the past, Berliners who have wanted to fly Lufthansa to any of these destinations would have had to change planes in, say, Frankfurt or Munich which would have added time and extra expense to their trips.
When the new airport opens Lufthansa says it will offer its premium travellers a “significantly bigger Business/Senator Lounge” (compared to existing facilities at Berlin Tegel airport), along with a larger first-class check-in area.
For more information visit lufthansa.com.
Report by Mark Caswell and Alex McWhirter
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