santos From United Kingdom, joined Dec 2007, 711 posts, RR: 0 Posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 6 days 17 hours ago) and read 7835 times:
http://www.qatarairways.com/global/en/latest-press-releases.page
Qatar Airways is to introduce a fifth daily flight between Doha and London Heathrow from the start of the Northern Summer schedules on March 25 next year.
QR075 DOH0635 – 1200LHR 77L D
QR076 LHR1600 – 0050+1DOH 77L D
pnd100 From Canada, joined Mar 2009, 343 posts, RR: 0 Reply 2, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 6 days 14 hours ago) and read 7416 times:
LHR is amazing isn't it? The sheer volume of demand boggles me! There are many similar sized cities worldwide but no one can match the diversity & frequency of international traffic at LHR it seems. JFK & FRA are right up there too. Good for LHR & QR. I was really hoping that QR would serve YYZ but alas they chose YUL.
LondonCity From United Kingdom, joined Nov 2008, 1214 posts, RR: 0 Reply 5, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 6 days 14 hours ago) and read 7207 times:
Quoting hooverman (Reply 1): Wow. I thought Heathrow was slot restricted. How is it that airlines can keep adding frequencies?
There are ways and means of getting slots at LHR. Maybe QR bought from another carrier ? As you know, slots are valuable and that's one reason why cash-strapped CSA exited LHR ... it needed the money from sellling off its LHR slots.
LHR is amazing isn't it? The sheer volume of demand boggles me! There are many similar sized cities worldwide but no one can match the diversity & frequency of international traffic at LHR it seems.
Next year we'll likely see a notable increase in capacity and/or frequency by all carriers into LHR (and a lesser extent all other UK airports) for the summer season as we will have not only the Olympics and Paralympics from July to August, but also the Queen's Diamond Jubilee on top of all the other major international events that happen annually over the summer.
It seems London is the place to be for Summer 2012.
kaitak From Ireland, joined Aug 1999, 11993 posts, RR: 36 Reply 7, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 6 days 13 hours ago) and read 7076 times:
Good news; presumably they bought the slots off another carrier.
Also good news that they're using a 77L; that's about the only carrier using 77Ls (apart from AI) to do this. It's a type on my "must fly" list, along with the 345, 380 and 787!
hooverman From Netherlands, joined Oct 2011, 52 posts, RR: 0 Reply 8, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 6 days 13 hours ago) and read 7017 times:
Quoting LondonCity (Reply 5): There are ways and means of getting slots at LHR. Maybe QR bought from another carrier ? As you know, slots are valuable and that's one reason why cash-strapped CSA exited LHR ... it needed the money from sellling off its LHR slots.
So there are actually carriers pulling away from LHR. I thought it would be a goldmine.
gabrielchew From United Kingdom, joined Aug 2005, 2512 posts, RR: 13 Reply 9, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 6 days 13 hours ago) and read 7017 times:
I'm surpised QR needs the capacity. I've flown LHR-DOH-XXX a few times, and there have always been plenty of seats. Maybe I've just been lucky. Perhaps QR really DO need the A380.
flycro From United Kingdom, joined Feb 2004, 372 posts, RR: 0 Reply 10, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 6 days 11 hours ago) and read 6735 times:
I've flown QR a number of times from LHR and the flights can be at 100%, especially the overnighter, but more like 25-30% on others. I always appreciate the empty flights.
B747forever From United States of America, joined May 2007, 16591 posts, RR: 11 Reply 12, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 6 days 8 hours ago) and read 6319 times:
Quoting EBGflyer (Reply 4): 4 hours on the ground seems like a lot.
LondonCity From United Kingdom, joined Nov 2008, 1214 posts, RR: 0 Reply 14, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 6 days 8 hours ago) and read 6298 times:
Quoting hooverman (Reply 8): So there are actually carriers pulling away from LHR. I thought it would be a goldmine.
It depends on the route. I feel that PRG is not a high yield route given the competition from LCCs. It's the long-haul routes which are most profitable out of LHR.
trintocan From United Kingdom, joined Apr 2000, 3192 posts, RR: 4 Reply 15, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 6 days 7 hours ago) and read 6216 times:
Quoting kaitak (Reply 7): Also good news that they're using a 77L; that's about the only carrier using 77Ls (apart from AI) to do this.
AC has also used 77Ls in LHR on occasion, indeed a flight of mine from YYZ is my only 77L flight thus far.
Quoting hooverman (Reply 8):
So there are actually carriers pulling away from LHR. I thought it would be a goldmine.
On the surface it may appear to be a profitable (THE profitable) place to be but for some airlines the high costs of operating there coupled with fleet and other issues have caused scale-backs or withdrawals outright. In the last few years MA, OK, BW, JM, Bellview and Virgin Nigeria have left and HM are leaving soon.
The new flight is 0635, the other flights are 0715 and 0750, in addition to the 1720 and 0150 flight. (the times are roughly estimated). So, 3 flights within an hour and a half? The flights are not evenly distributed.
B747forever From United States of America, joined May 2007, 16591 posts, RR: 11 Reply 19, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 5 days 23 hours ago) and read 4487 times:
Quoting QatarA340 (Reply 18): So, 3 flights within an hour and a half? The flights are not evenly distributed.
Once again, that was maybe the only dep/arr slots they could get at LHR.
gilesdavies From United Kingdom, joined Dec 2003, 2903 posts, RR: 1 Reply 20, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 5 days 20 hours ago) and read 3679 times:
Great to Qatar expand, by far my favourite carrier!
Quoting hooverman (Reply 8):
So there are actually carriers pulling away from LHR. I thought it would be a goldmine.
Unfortunately so...
It is mainly the smaller European flag carriers that are suffering and pulling out of LHR...
These carriers offer very few connections through their respective hubs, and these are to places that passengers can already fly to directly.
Also for the likes of CSA, it's the low cost carriers that are killing them... While these airlines might not fly to LHR, they still fly to the London area to the likes of LTN, LGW and STN, and usually at a far lower price.
Also if one of these small European carriers flies several times daily to LHR, they will have peak time slots, and these can be sold for literally millions of pounds if there is demand.
FURUREFA From United States of America, joined Feb 2004, 762 posts, RR: 2 Reply 21, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 5 days 18 hours ago) and read 3226 times:
Quoting skipness1E (Reply 17): If your airline cannot make LHR pay, there's a structural problem with your airline. Read that list again methinks...
Not really. Yields from LHR to many US cities, especially JFK and BOS, are in the toilet and LHR is very much a high cost airport. There's a true network advantage to flying to LHR and doing so from many destinations, which may or may not offset the high cost of doing business at LHR. But it's not exactly a "goldmine" in a pure revenue/yield management and pricing sense; it may do well from a networking planning point of view, however.
AIR MALTA From Malta, joined Sep 2001, 2367 posts, RR: 1 Reply 22, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 5 days 18 hours ago) and read 3082 times:
Another slot going to the Gulf airlines, nothing to be excited about. Hope this madness stops and we won't see EK and QR operate more than 5 daily each.
FURUREFA From United States of America, joined Feb 2004, 762 posts, RR: 2 Reply 24, posted (1 year 6 months 1 week 5 days 12 hours ago) and read 2619 times:
Quoting skipness1E (Reply 23): Odd that LHR-JFK is one of BA's better yielding routes. Must be imagining things. My bad.
I think you'll find that the J/F cabin are mostly deep corporate disounts, and that Y has a significant percentage of el cheapo Y fares connecting to Europe.
26 jet72uk: Crazy to have 5 flights a day to DOH. + the BA one.
27 Pe@rson: Evidently a large part of QR's traffic would be connecting beyond its DOH hub.
28 Viscount724: Air Seychelles is also ending LHR service next month, currently 2 x week, as part of their plan to terminate all of their Europe services by the end
29 ACES320: Corporate discounts does not mean operating straight at a loss. Quite the opposite. Revenue Managers dread uncertainty. The capacity manager's nightm
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