[justloveflying]

With our beloved BA being the daddy on domestic routes out of Heathrow, I was just wondering what the chances were of say, AFKL being allowed to fly domestic UK routes ?

Essentially “not so” fifth freedom.

Plus the shorthaul cabins and service of Air France and KLM is substanrially better than London Airways.

Would AFKL be allowee to do these routes ? I am sure Mr Mcwhirter will shed light on this.

I remember in 2008, when openSkies between the UK and the US was launched, Air France used to fly a 777 nonstop from LHR to LAX.

It is time BA’s monopoly on Heathrow domestic routed ended. I wonder if Ryanair would offer cheap Heathrow Shuttles one day ?

Wishing a happy festive season

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jwhi56

[BackOfThePlane]

I have no idea whether AFKL, or any other non UK airline would be allowed to offer such flights.

Regardless of the law etc, it would be a complete non-starter.

1. There are no spare slots at Heathrow
2. AFKL would want to use any slots they have at Heathrow to feed their international operations out of CDG & AMS.
3. Even if they did want to offer domestic flights out of Heathrow, they wouldn’t be able to compete with BA (or Easyjet etc on LGW to EDI, MAN for point to point traffic).

The chances of Ryanair operating out of Heathrow are, I would say, zero.

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jwhi56

[AMcWhirter]

Hello justloveflying, with deregulation here I cannot see any reason to stop AF/KL operating UK domestic routes.

BA lost its LHR domestic monopoly in the late 1960s (!) when British Eagle was allowed to compete. The latter was followed some years by British Midland with its famous Diamond Service which led to BA upgrading Shuttle to Super Shuttle in the early 1980s.

At one time Air Berlin operated domestic flights from London STN over two or three main routes. I can recall at least Belfast and Glasgow being served. In the end the routes failed because Air Berlin lacked market identity. So foreign carriers did operate UK domestics.

As for AF/KL from London LHR, yes it would be possible providing these carriers sacrifice a few slots.

But then what is more valuable to them ?

Is it feeding their AMS and CDG hubs with lucrative long-haul passengers or operating UK domestic routes which, as I quoted consultant John Strickland (in a BT domestic aviation feature some years ago) would be a “challenge.”

EZY and Ryanair don’t want the hassle of operating out of LHR because of higher operating costs.

[Rferguson2]

So many UK airlines have tried and failed at UK domestic flying from LHR. Virgin Red. Flybe. And they only tried the routes because they were essentially ‘given’ the slots to operate the domestic routes as part of the mitigation of BA absorbing BMI.

BA’s LHR-MAN routes exist really to feed its long haul routes, you find very few people using them to fly point to point.

Sometimes I am shocked at how few domestic flights there are within the UK. I completely understand on routes like London – Manchester where there is a train (supposedly) every 20 minutes or so and takes around two and a half hours.

But from Manchester the rail routes to Scotland are not great with not a large amount of frequency. The other week I was in Edinburgh for a conference and there were no trains available (strikes) and I was absolutely shocked there are NO flights operated by any airline between EDI or GLA to MAN.

[ASK1945]

RF2 – I used to commute from Manchester to London once, twice or occasionally three times a week and I always took the train – just over 3 hours centre to centre. This was much more convenient than flying and disruption was only as frequent as I then experienced during the period when the line was partially closed closed for revelopment and I resorted to flying. Even some colleagues who lived only a few minutes from MAN did not fly.

But, I did fly when feeding into long-haul at LHR (and LGW when the route operated).

I still go up to Manchester in a reverse return journey – from London – from time to time and it’s only 2 hours and 10 minutes, centre to centre. I use Premium Economy, which is a first class carriage with only the food missing and less than half the price of first. For timing, cost and convenience, it is a “no-brainer” as far as I am concerned.

PS: I used to fly from MAN to GLA/EDI fairly often and the BA flights were always full. I don’t know why BA don’t do these routes anymore.

[Rferguson2]

@ ASK1945

‘PS: I used to fly from MAN to GLA/EDI fairly often and the BA flights were always full. I don’t know why BA don’t do these routes anymore.’

Yes. I don’t get it. I understand BA prefers to utilise its aircraft on high yielding routes ex LHR but I find it strange that not even EasyJet, Ryanair or Loganair (Scotland’s Airline!) each with a large presence in MAN flies to either of Scotland’s two largest cities.

2 users thanked author for this post.

JonathanCohen09, ASK1945

[AMcWhirter]

Certainly there have been Scottish links from MAN in the days of Flybe 1.

In March 2020 when this airline failed its routes were taken over by Loganair and there are web pages detailing these.

You can see Loganair operating up to x4 flights a day EDI-MAN at that time.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-51752375

https://www.loganair.co.uk/our-story/latest-news/2020/loganair-steps-in-to-safeguard-uk-air-routes-after-flybe-collapse

I suppose Covid ended these routes.

During the pandemic EZY began a route from MAN to EDI.

But in June 2021, owing to the number of Covid infections in the Manchester area, the Scottish government banned all non-essential travel from Manchester and EZY axed the route.

https://www.independent.co.uk/business/easyjet-axes-new-scottish-flight-routes-after-manchester-travel-ban-imposed-b1871317.html

In the meantime TPE improved its schedules and introduced new rolling stock from Manchester to Edinburgh and Glasgow.

Direct trains take 3 hrs 15 mins or 3 hrs 35 with an en route change.

But then we have seen the decline in TPE’s scheduling …

[esselle]

ASK1949

The MAN-GLA-EDI services were lastly on ATR and ATP equipment. I thought these the most horrible of aircraft, where the “business class” seats were at the rear of the cabin because the invariably very bumpy conditions felt less severe there than at the front.

[justloveflying]

Thanks for your valuable input Mr Mcwhirter. BA definately need to be challenged on Heathrow routes. By the wayz not sure if someone’s finger slipped, but this topic has been reported as inappropriate !!

Must be someone at London Airways who won’t want competition on domestic routes !

3 users thanked author for this post.

AMcWhirter, Jacob, cwoodward

[FDOS]

For some reason, I couldn’t post on this thread a few days ago.

Although time has passed, let me respond to Alex’s post #1493697 and confirm from user experience that the third Air Berlin route from STN was MAN.

1 user thanked author for this post.

AMcWhirter

[justloveflying]

The landscape or rather skies have changed since BD was a gamechanger. I loved reading your input Mr Mchwhirter as always. I am sure there is a niche for passengers who will pay a little extra to have a more premium experience, which British Midland certainly offered. Either way, BA’s monopoly has to be broken !

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Jacob, AMcWhirter

[transtraxman]

The most effective solution to the problem of access to Heathrow (and Gatwick as well)is to let both airporfts add the extra runway they each want to. That way the extra slot capac ity can be provided for competitors on domestic routes(particularly). Gatwick´s use of its taxiway as an extra runway is a good interim measure but not in the long term.

Another thing is to provide terminal gates to accomodate the extra flights. Bussing passengers out to aircraft is way too old fashioned and is no longer passenger friendly. Passengers should be able to embark/disembarck directly to/from the terminal. This new terminal could be built little by little according to the increase in demand. But something less imposing and less expensive than LHR`s present plans for runway three.

Take off/landing slots and parking slots can therefore be provided to cover any extra demand. However, the last point to mention is that the slots should be protected . i.e. only being able to be used for their designated purpose. Previously routes used by smaller aircraft, including most domestic ones, were pushed out by the big airlines so that they could change their use to middle or long-distance routes using large and thus more profitable aircraft.

The issue is not easy to solve but with some out of the box thinking anything and everything is possible.

[Author]

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