http://www.easyjet.com/EN/News/20050406_01.html
Inverness, Pisa and Murcia

Hey,

Does anyone know whether these routes be operated by the 737-300 / 737-700 / A319?

Cheers,
Ian.

737-700 to start with I would think, then eventually A319 as I believe both BRS and EMA will be the next 319 bases

Good news for BRS and the local area, especially with the service to Murcia and Inverness. BRS seem to be pulling away from its local competitors - CWL, EXT.. in terms of routes and frequency.

The routes will be operate by the 737-700 & 300 I would have thought. That is until the Airbus' come later on in the year - around December.

Regards,
Chris

Good stuff, more variety for me!!  

Great news for Bristol  

easyJet seems to be very hungry at the moment with new routes announced from Berlin, Basel, Bristol etc. Seems like some more routes will be announced from Aachen/Maastricht soon.

Regards,
RJ100

Inverness?? Is there enough people there to fill a 737? 

Pisa is an interesting one. Am I right in thinking easy don't currently fly there from any of their UK bases - although I think maybe from SXF.

Good choice though.

Quoting EGGD (Reply 6): Inverness?? Is there enough people there to fill a 737?

Just about, however I don't think they'd want to fly on every daily service!  

Cheers,
Ian.

From recollection, around 250,000 passengers flew between LGW and INV last year (on the daily easyJet and 2/3 daily BA flights?) and over 100,000 more on the daily easyJet LTN-INV route.

Not bad for a town of only just over 60,000 population, but it's not just about that of course. The realistic airport catchment is more like 300,000 to 400,000 when you include travellers from as far as Skye, Fort William and Wick, who have little other alternative getting to the South of England.

I don't think it's that strange for INV to have more services, it's pretty much isolated from the rest of the UK, so flying is a good alternative and faster then most plane/train rides. Don't forget about the tourists.

RJ100: Maastricht/Aachen is supposed to be up for 2x daily LGW later this year.

And what would they want to do in SW England? Seems a strange one to me... What about passengers is in the other direction, a good leisure and tourism destination? I wonder if it has anything to do with Scotlands booming skiing industry..  .

Quoting Rick767 (Reply 4): Good stuff, more variety for me!!

And if you'd stayed with Britannia, you could also have been flying to Denver, Hawaii and those lovely night time Tenerife's 

Good news... now, where's Murcia? It's a shame the roads are so rubbish around here - it takes me 1.25 hours to get to BRS, 30 miles away, yet only 2 hours to get to LHR, nearly 100 miles away!

Geoff M.

Quoting GKirk (Reply 12): And if you'd stayed with Britannia, you could also have been flying to Denver, Hawaii and those lovely night time Tenerife's

Don't rub it in Kirkie! No Denver's or Honolulu's in the BY Summer schedule anyway. Could do with a week in Montego Bay though, my mate from BY rang on Sunday just to remind me he was heading out there this week  

I will never miss the night Dalaman or Tenerife's though, so please god don't let that be the next EZY announcement, or I'll have to go to Flybe or something drastic!

Rick, yeah the Denver and Honolulus are winter only :S
Still, surely you miss the Tenerifes?  
Have to admit, night time Dalamans could be scary (was too young to remember that time, although think we landed coming from the South)

I think its great news for INV, the airport has seen a rapid rise in flights even if snowflake pulled out. The airport does have a large catchment area and many people from the Islands have long journeys to make if they want to get to the sunshine routes.
For example: Shetland to Inverness then Inverness to Gatwick then Gatwick to where ever. It could mean that EZY or some other low cost airline could base an aircraft there but more than likely route an aircraft through the airport to fly down to the Med.
Remember that there are a good amount of chaters out of INV. I say well done to Easyjet and hope they expand out of INV. Its a great airport and even greater location in the Highlands.

Most flights out of Inverness are well patronised. Slightly off topic - I visited the Control Tower in May 2004. The ATC there said they were running out of parking spaces for aircraft - especially when delays happen. He cited one instance where an aircraft had to park on the taxiway as the gates were all occupied.

Eastern Airways have just increased services to/from Inverness to Aberdeen & Wick (both about 60 miles as the crow flies).

I believe there is a good market at Inverness - especially for inbound tourist traffic. As for whether locals would want to go to Belfast & Bristol is another question (both new routes due to start in the next few months)