MANTP Update #91 - courtesy of the MANTP Project Team

Part 1

MANTP Update #92 - courtesy of the MANTP Project Team

Part 1

Juneyao Airlines have submitted an application today for 3x weekly Shanghai Pudong - Manchester - Shanghai Pudong flights from March 2020. It is still planned that Shanghai Pudong - Helsinki - Manchester - Helsinki - Shanghai Pudong will operate in Winter 2019 and continue to Summer 2020. It is therefore forecasted that Manchester will have a daily flight to Shanghai, with 4 out of 7 weekly flights stopping at Helsinki en route. B787-9 will be the aircraft of the route if accepted by the CAAC:

https://twitter.com/SeanM1997/status/11 ... 4851355648

MANTP Update #92 - courtesy of the MANTP Project Team

Two questions regarding the Terminal 2 redevelopment.

Will Pier 2 be a similar pier to the other two, as in a finger pier?

Will the end of pier C at Terminal 1 be demolished when Pier 3 is completed as they look very close to each other?

Cunard wrote:

Two questions regarding the Terminal 2 redevelopment.

Will Pier 2 be a similar pier to the other two, as in a finger pier?

Will the end of pier C at Terminal 1 be demolished when Pier 3 is completed as they look very close to each other?

Hi Cunard

It seems to be a fluid situation with the design of the piers (and some elements of the terminal extension) evolving - so it is somewhat a moveable feast.

To the best of my knowledge the situation is this:

1 - pier 2 will start life as a bussing lounge (and rather larger than I thought) to the remote stands. It will eventually be extended, but the most recent plan was for it to only be something like 2/3 the length of pier 1 (which seems silly so that might change).

2 - the original plan was to demolish the entirety of pier C, but that also seems to have changed. I don’t see how they can avoid demolishing at least the satellite at the end but for all I know they may well be planning to demolish the entire thing (this may become obvious when pier 3 is under construction).

And just to add briefly to the discussion, Pier 3 will actually be the 2nd pier to be built although I forget when it is due for completion.

May 2019: 2.6 million passengers, rolling annual total is 28.9 million.

Link and selected quotes below:

“Traffic to the Middle East saw strong growth, with Doha seeing a 45% increase and Muscat 15%. Singapore also saw strong demand in May with growth of 19%.”

“As the summer continues so does work on the airport’s £1bn transformation. By summer 2020 the extension on Terminal Two will open, offering passengers a host of new retail, food and drink outlets. The existing Terminal Two will then have a full refurbishment and re-open in 2022 as part of the extension.“

https://mediacentre.manchesterairport.c ... n-closing/

DobboDobbo wrote:

“Traffic to the Middle East saw strong growth, with Doha seeing a 45% increase and Muscat 15%. Singapore also saw strong demand in May with growth of 19%.”

Pretty impressive. Hadn't been convinced with SQ but seems to be going well.

by738 wrote:

DobboDobbo wrote:

“Traffic to the Middle East saw strong growth, with Doha seeing a 45% increase and Muscat 15%. Singapore also saw strong demand in May with growth of 19%.”

Pretty impressive. Hadn't been convinced with SQ but seems to be going well.

Indeed - it feels like SQ are trying to make the entire route predominately MAN oriented, which might pave the way to an increased frequency to a daily rotation or the removal of the IAH tag (who knows).

DobboDobbo wrote:

by738 wrote:

DobboDobbo wrote:

“Traffic to the Middle East saw strong growth, with Doha seeing a 45% increase and Muscat 15%. Singapore also saw strong demand in May with growth of 19%.”

Pretty impressive. Hadn't been convinced with SQ but seems to be going well.

Indeed - it feels like SQ are trying to make the entire route predominately MAN oriented, which might pave the way to an increased frequency to a daily rotation or the removal of the IAH tag (who knows).

Do UA put their code on the IAH-MAN leg?

UA don’t put the code on the flight but do let SQ put their code on some IAH connections for SIN pax only. UA ticketed connections are not available to MAN pax. Looking at data from the airport, it seems the average load for MAN-IAH-MAN pax are about 90-110 (some days higher) while IAH-SIN-IAH seems to be about 40-50.

Heavy delay for both CX216 today (13/6) from MAN and CX219 on 14/6 from HKG. CX216 left MAN today at 17:30 (more than five hours behind schedule), whilst CX219 is scheduled to arrive at MAN at 14:51 tomorrow, more than eight hours behind schedule. Anyone know the reasons? Is that something to do with ongoing protest in Hong Kong?

xijiayu wrote:

Heavy delay for both CX216 today (13/6) from MAN and CX219 on 14/6 from HKG. CX216 left MAN today at 17:30 (more than five hours behind schedule), whilst CX219 is scheduled to arrive at MAN at 14:51 tomorrow, more than eight hours behind schedule. Anyone know the reasons? Is that something to do with ongoing protest in Hong Kong?

Severe weather in HKG.

https://twitter.com/cathaypacific/statu ... 8302825473

Qatar airways have commenced their triple daily service with effect from today (previously 18x weekly).

This comes off the back of MAN reporting a 45% growth in QR’s traffic to DOH during the course of May (I’m sire at least some of that is attributed to DXB’s runway closure).

Update #94 courtesy of the MANTP team

May passenger statistics:

Norwegian will add a 2 weekly Bergen flight from October 28th Mondays and Fridays

User001 wrote:

Norwegian will add a 2 weekly Bergen flight from October 28th Mondays and Fridays

Good prices too. May take advantage of this for a winter break.

An interesting article from the American side on VS at MAN and future plans.

I think the headline and quotes are a little misleading (reference to the 2019 programme being “planned” implies it is something for the future when it is actually being flown now) but the direction of travel is generally positive, and there are interesting comments about increasing frequency and turning the LAX route year round.

https://www.travelpulse.com/news/airlin ... -plan.html

Are they any plans to renovate T3? The airside departures area is dreadfully dated now. The arrivals area is too, reminds me of a bus shelter terminal.

CX219 from HKG tonight operated by B77W (B-HNR) instead of A35K.

Airlineroute has reported that Icelandair are to use DHC8s on MAN services 2 weekly from 15th July to 14th September and will also be using leased A319s in July and August

What are the prospects of additional CX service to HKG? CX already upgraded the MAN flight to 35K, wondering if there is possibility for additional capacity with a second frequency? An evening departure/early evening arrival into HKG could provide some additional connection opportunities to AUS/NZ. Could we see this route move from 7 to 10x weekly?

David_itl wrote:

Airlineroute has reported that Icelandair are to use DHC8s on MAN services 2 weekly from 15th July to 14th September and will also be using leased A319s in July and August

Interestingly the block times haven't changed, and still show 2h 45m. That's a bit ambitious on a Dash 8.

DobboDobbo wrote:

An interesting article from the American side on VS at MAN and future plans.

I think the headline and quotes are a little misleading (reference to the 2019 programme being “planned” implies it is something for the future when it is actually being flown now) but the direction of travel is generally positive, and there are interesting comments about increasing frequency and turning the LAX route year round.

https://www.travelpulse.com/news/airlin ... -plan.html

We need VS to pull their finger out with their expansion plans W19 is still not showing ATL daily but JFK is on the 332. The west coast needs to be year round if VS do take over MT or MT drop the route it will go year round.

DobboDobbo wrote:

by738 wrote:

DobboDobbo wrote:

“Traffic to the Middle East saw strong growth, with Doha seeing a 45% increase and Muscat 15%. Singapore also saw strong demand in May with growth of 19%.”

Pretty impressive. Hadn't been convinced with SQ but seems to be going well.

Indeed - it feels like SQ are trying to make the entire route predominately MAN oriented, which might pave the way to an increased frequency to a daily rotation or the removal of the IAH tag (who knows).

I'm suprised it hasn't gone daily yet.

AA100 wrote:

What are the prospects of additional CX service to HKG? CX already upgraded the MAN flight to 35K, wondering if there is possibility for additional capacity with a second frequency? An evening departure/early evening arrival into HKG could provide some additional connection opportunities to AUS/NZ. Could we see this route move from 7 to 10x weekly?

I would imagine it would go back to a 777 before it goes more than daily although I would love to see a late afternoon/early evening slot to reduce transfer times in HKG

As a frequent traveller to the Far East, I think there is demand for a double daily SQ fight in the longer term.

The rationale being I’m sure I’m not the only one who would prefer a 13 hour + 1 hour flight to reach somewhere, as opposed to the 7 + 7 that the ME3 result in currently.

I don’t necessarily foresee this as much incremental traffic for MAN, but maybe a steal from ME3. Obviously depends on how SQ would hypothetically want to pursue this business.

Introduction
Back in September 2015 I decided that I should start to correlate statistics for Manchester and use 2005 as a reference point for historical data. My file now consists of 14 years of monthly figures and 486 destinations that have been served from Manchester over that period.

Destinations that are either new (no passengers since my records started in January 2005), or have not been served for a number of years - if the latter then the month and year of the last service is shown.

No new destinations were served in April 2019.

Million passenger routes (Rolling annual figures)
Amsterdam - 1,045,211 passengers

The following domestic statistics are missing from the CAA report for April.
All airports have report for this month

Moving monthly and annual figures - based on CAA statistics/MAG statistics
Monthly passengers - 2,390,976 +8.18%
Annual Total - 8,050,122
Moving Annual Total - 28,838,398 +3.22%
Monthly Movements - 16,577 +2.78%
Annual Movements - 58,579
Moving Annual Movements - 202,109 +0.21%

Top 25 destinations - by passenger numbers


Top 25 destinations with highest percentage increase.


Figures for the European and long haul destinations that I consider to be the main points for our connecting traffic.


Comparison of top 25 destinations - April 2009 versus April 2019


Major changes to Domestic traffic


As an added bonus I have also been working on trying establish the load factors on certain routes. The following uses the CAA monthly data, FR24 for movements and Planespotters.net for configurations.
You will note that JFK shows over 100pc and I have not been able to discover why as the input looks to be correct.
When looking at certain routes please remember that the aircraft may be operating via an intermediate point.


CAA statistics for April are final.

MANTP Update #95 courtesy of the MANTP Team

Update #96 courtesy of the MANTP Team

A number of the updates were already covered in Issue #95 but are included for continuity from the original document.









































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Does anyone know why there is a flight IA265 on its way to MAN this evening from Baghdad?

MANMatthew wrote:

Does anyone know why there is a flight IA265 on its way to MAN this evening from Baghdad?

Flight Radar says it’s coming Sofia. Is this a fifth freedom flight?

Just our regular weekly service that has operated for a couple of years. Used to come in at the weekend via Malmo. Just does a tech stop in Sofia.

David_itl wrote:

Just our regular weekly service that has operated for a couple of years. Used to come in at the weekend via Malmo. Just does a tech stop in Sofia.

Thanks. So there is a normal service between Baghdad and MAN? Sorry for my ignorance.

Yes the service operates with an A320 on a weekly basis. People tend to be ignorant (No insult intended) of its existence.

Scottiedog wrote:

Yes the service operates with an A320 on a weekly basis. People tend to be ignorant (No insult intended) of its existence.

Thanks mate.

Some interesting comments from Sir Richard Branson about Virgin Atlantic’s plans at MAN, and an interesting allusion to MAN-LAX moving to a daily service.

Link and article extracts below:


Sir Richard says, “There is great potential for LA-Manchester. In general, Los Angeles is very important to us.” He noted that Virgin Atlantic has been flying to LA for 30 years and is currently doing 30 flights a week.

Why Manchester for Virgin Atlantic expansion? Sir Richard pointed out, 1/3 of people in England live with two hours. The city, according to Branson, is a hotbed of British entrepreneurship and “the gateway to the North,” with lots of new business.

A spokesperson added that the city is a vibrant cultural center with a lot of affinity with Los Angeles, “growing in food and artistry,” a generous sample of which was on display at the LA event.

Nonetheless, Branson added, “Manchester was a pretty unexciting city if you go back 20 or 30 years. We helped put them on the map.”
The market is reacting very positively to the new route with actual sales, he says.

“Bookings are very strong,” while the move to daily service will make it easy for customers to become aware of it.

Another factor making Manchester an important destination for Virgin Atlantic was the group’s takeover of British regional low-cost carrier Flybe Group.  Flybe has a significant short-haul business around the United Kingdom. Just as important, it can potentially feed more passengers onto Virgin Atlantic long-haul flights.

Branson maintains Flybe will be renamed “Virgin something.” The Virgin Group is part of The Connect Airways consortium which also includes a hedge fund and Southend Airport. The group bought the regional airline for just £2.8 million in February.

“The ambition is to build a short-haul feeder airline that can connect with Virgin Atlantic,” noted Branson, clearly still fascinated by the airline business. The former Flybe “has good landing slots in Manchester and elsewhere. It has 76 planes, including DeHavilland and Embraer aircraft.”

Branson says, “We’ll fly from regional airports,” with Manchester perhaps providing an alternate to London airports approaching capacity. There are hints that the strategy might include the acquisition of other struggling British airlines.


https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.forb ... rvice/amp/

Now now Dobbo. We have an airport that's struggling because we don't have 30 to 40 flights a day to New York which is indicative of low demand that MAN has. Back in the real world though... The Saturday transatlantic arrivals with a combined Virgin/Thoma Cook block then the other ones.

05:20 Orlando Thomas Cook A333
06:50 Atlanta Virgin B744
07:10 Punta Cana Thomas Cook A332
07:10 Bridgetown Virgin A332
07:15 New York JFK Virgin B744
07:20 Cancun Thomas Cook A332
08:05 Orlando Virgin B744
08:30 Las Vegas Thomas Cook A332
08:30 Varadero Thomas Cook A332
09:00 Orlando Virgin B744
09:55 New York JFK Thomas Cook A332
10:55 Los Angeles Thomas Cook A332
12:30 Los Angeles Virgin A332

05:00 Punta Cana TUI B789
07:55 Cancun TUI B788
07:15 New York Newark United B764
10:45 Toronto Air Canada Rouge B763
09:00 Philadelphia American B763
10:05 Houston Singapore Airlines A359

9 routes for VS/MT covering 13 flights a day with 8 A332, 4 B744 and 1 A333. Maybe replace one of the LAX services with BOS or reinstated SFO which would then mean 3 to 5 services where a bigger uptake of business class could take place,

There is no doubt the prospect of BE and TCX long haul joining the VS umbrella is intriguing.

As to whether these are glorified charter routes, or few and far between, I’ll leave to those better able to judge...

David_itl wrote:

Airlineroute has reported that Icelandair are to use DHC8s on MAN services 2 weekly from 15th July to 14th September and will also be using leased A319s in July and August

Hi David, I'm guessing that these changes are because of fleet shortages due to the continuing 737 MAX issues, and not pax numbers?

Does anyone know when American are going back to using a 787-8 on the Philadelphia route? Thanks Matt.

Luftymatt wrote:

Hi David, I'm guessing that these changes are because of fleet shortages due to the continuing 737 MAX issues, and not pax numbers?

But why would they choose one station over another to replace with a smaller prop.
Wouldn't thank you for that trip with everyone with connecting luggage...

by738 wrote:

Luftymatt wrote:

Hi David, I'm guessing that these changes are because of fleet shortages due to the continuing 737 MAX issues, and not pax numbers?

But why would they choose one station over another to replace with a smaller prop.
Wouldn't thank you for that trip with everyone with connecting luggage...

Because of the dash Range MAN and DUB have been chosen to get that 'downgrade'. Love to see it try CDG or MUC! In other words, no conspiracy, just a small matter of how far they can fly. Either that or canx the flights all together.

Because of the dash Range MAN and DUB have been chosen to get that 'downgrade'. Love to see it try CDG or MUC! In other words, no conspiracy, just a small matter of how far they can fly. Either that or canx the flights all together.

That should be obvious, but back to my question, is the reason the MAX issue or pax numbers?

Probably the 2 weakest days as we are getting a mix and yes the MAX is the problem as they should have quite a few by now and most airlines are struggling to find replacements

Landed at Manchester from Montego Bay yesterday

We had the "pleasure" of using the new terminal

Started off by waiting 30 minutes for them to fix the walkway for us to be able to get off the plane (explanation was that they needed 2 staff to do it and only one was available)

Really long walk to get from the plane to baggage (over 10 minutes) 2 small travellators only on the way that if working would take care of about 1 minute of the walk - but only 1 of the 2 was working

The place looks so uninviting - like an old hospital

Hardly any toilets to use when you get off the plane (literally 2 toilet cubicles (zero urinal) for gents and 2 cubicles for ladies) - the queues were so long most people didn't wait to try them

Very unimpressive all round to say this is a brand new terminal

When is the next annual Manchester runway viewing day with lots of stalls?

iscottburdon wrote:

When is the next annual Manchester runway viewing day with lots of stalls?

Are you referring to the Aviation Fair hosted by the TAS? If so, nothing has been announced yet.

David_itl wrote:

Now now Dobbo. We have an airport that's struggling because we don't have 30 to 40 flights a day to New York which is indicative of low demand that MAN has.

Don't forget lack of feed. No feed + no "London" prefix by the name = no demand for TATL service. a.net logic at its best.

User001 wrote:

by738 wrote:

Luftymatt wrote:

Hi David, I'm guessing that these changes are because of fleet shortages due to the continuing 737 MAX issues, and not pax numbers?

But why would they choose one station over another to replace with a smaller prop.
Wouldn't thank you for that trip with everyone with connecting luggage...

Because of the dash Range MAN and DUB have been chosen to get that 'downgrade'. Love to see it try CDG or MUC! In other words, no conspiracy, just a small matter of how far they can fly. Either that or canx the flights all together.

Yet GLA (nearer) was not downgraded?

by738 wrote:

User001 wrote:

by738 wrote:

But why would they choose one station over another to replace with a smaller prop.
Wouldn't thank you for that trip with everyone with connecting luggage...

Because of the dash Range MAN and DUB have been chosen to get that 'downgrade'. Love to see it try CDG or MUC! In other words, no conspiracy, just a small matter of how far they can fly. Either that or canx the flights all together.

Yet GLA (nearer) was not downgraded?

Maybe the forward bookings from GLA justified keeping the 757 whereas MAN and DUB flights had less and could get away with being downgraded to a Dash 8? Mind you, I don't think the Dash 8 has spare range to fly further than that.