Virgin Atlantic ritorna sul corto raggio!


Scarab

Scarab

Utente Registrato
26 Aprile 2012
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Notizia interessante, pare che SRB abbia mantenuto la promessa di tornare sul corto raggio (l'aver perso la concession per Virgin Train sulla West Coast forse aiuta).

Virgin Atlantic to fly between Heathrow and Manchester

Virgin Atlantic is to begin a short-haul service between London Heathrow and Manchester from next March.

The airline says its first foray into the UK domestic market will provide competition for British Airways.

It will also provide a regional link for passengers using its long-haul services from Heathrow, it says.

Virgin denied the move was a response to Virgin Rail being told it was losing the West Coast Mainline franchise that covers London to Manchester.

The franchise, held by Virgin since 1997, will be taken on by FirstGroup later this year, the government announced last week.

Virgin Atlantic chief executive Steve Ridgway told the BBC the move was about increasing choice for UK passengers.

"Since BMI was swallowed by BA, competition in domestic routes has disappeared," he said.

BA-owner International Airlines Group bought BMI earlier this year.

By offering access to the international hub Heathrow, the new route was about "keeping Manchester and the North East connected with the rest of the world," he added.

The airline says it will operate three daily flights to Manchester using Airbus A319 aircraft from 31 March 2013. Initially, Mr Ridgway said these aircraft would be leased.

Virgin says that 65% of people who fly from Manchester to London then connect on to another long-haul flight, and they want a share of that market.

Fuel prices
Manchester Airports Group said Virgin was already a strong carrier at the airport with long-haul routes to Barbados, Orlando and Las Vegas.

"We aim to support our airlines as they look to grow and we hope the success of Virgin's domestic services will lead to further expansion at Manchester," said Ken O'Toole, chief commercial officer at Manchester Airports Group (MAG).

Virgin Atlantic was founded by Sir Richard Branson, and is 49% owned by Singapore Airlines.

Earlier this month it reported an annual loss because of higher fuel prices.

The carrier made a loss of £80m in the 12 months to the end of February, compared with a profit of £18.5m a year earlier.

BA said in a statement that it was "confident that our excellent customer service and great value fares will continue to set the standard in UK short-haul aviation".
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19324962
 
Virgin Atlantic to Start London Heathrow – Manchester Service from late-March 2013
by JL
Update at 0620GMT 21AUG12

Virgin Atlantic has announced that it’ll launch its first Domestic UK service, with 3 daily London Heathrow – Manchester flight, on board leased Airbus A319 aircraft. Additional information regarding domestic inflight product will be revealed in the coming weeks.

Reservation for this new route is expected to open shortly. Schedule:

VS3041 LHR0920 – 1020MAN 319 D
VS3043 LHR1610 – 1710MAN 319 D
VS3045 LHR2010 – 2110MAN 319 D

VS3046 MAN0650 – 0800LHR 319 D
VS3042 MAN1220 – 1330LHR 319 D
VS3044 MAN1750 – 1900LHR 319 D

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http://airlineroute.net/2012/08/21/vs-lhrman-s13/
 
che serva a BA come wake-up call per il domestico/corto raggio: i piani di rinnovo ci sono, i trials per i nuovi sedili sono avvenuti in primavera, speriamo che ora si inizi con i rinnovi... E magari anche con qualcosa di radicalmente nuovo come il wi-fi a bordo, ci starebbe come il pane anche se a molti non piace.
 
Ulteriori dettagli da atwonline:

Virgin Atlantic to enter short-haul market

Virgin Atlantic (VS) will enter the short-haul market next year when it launches a 3X-daily Manchester (MAN)-London Heathrow (LHR) service from March 2013.
The route, which will use three wet-leased Airbus A319s, will compete with British Airways (BA) on the domestic trunk route. It will use two slots currently leased to Cyprus Airways, so there is no impact on VS’s long-haul schedules at heavily slot-constrained LHR.
Future routes will depend on VS winning the “remedy slots” that BA has been ordered to divest by European competition authorities as part of the deal to acquire British Midlands International (ATW Daily News, April 23).
The MAN-LHR route will act as a feeder for VS’s long-haul services, the company said Tuesday. It pointed out that some 65% of passengers traveling from the northwest English city to LHR connect to onward flights. “We have the means to connect thousands of passengers to our long-haul network as well as to destinations served by other carriers,” VS CEO Steve Ridgway said.
The Virgin Group, parent to VS, has been in the short-haul market before. In 1996, it bought EuroBelgian Airlines, rebranding as Virgin Express before merging in 2007 with SN Brussels Airlines, which became Brussels Airlines (SN). SN is now an affiliate of Lufthansa Group, which has a 45% stake in the Belgian carrier (ATW Daily News, Dec. 24, 2008). Virgin Group also retains a stake.

http://atwonline.com/airline-finance-data/news/virgin-atlantic-enter-short-haul-market-0820
 
Conferma che aspettavo da settimane quando BA si e' presa bmi!
E secondo me e' solo l'inizio, qualcosa in scozia potrebbe arrivare pure!
.. prima a feederare era principalmente bmi e ora?!
 
In quale Terminal verranno posizionati i narrowbody di Virgin? Mi sembra che al momento il T1 sia mezzo vuoto mentre il T3 pieno a tappo?
 
BGW ha detto:
In quale Terminal verranno posizionati i narrowbody di Virgin? Mi sembra che al momento il T1 sia mezzo vuoto mentre il T3 pieno a tappo?
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T1, una stronzata catastrofica. Potrebbero usare i gate 24 del T3 e stands al T1 ma a quanto pare non lo si vuol fare... Cosi' si trovano dei voli marcatamente feeder partire da terminal diversi (sia a MAN che a LHR) da quelli di partenza dei voli lungo raggio. Il tutto senza avere una lounge al T1 e usando il terminal con un meccanismo di smistamento bagagli medievale, che non consente cambi sotto l'ora e rotti...mah.
 
13900 ha detto:
T1, una stronzata catastrofica. Potrebbero usare i gate 24 del T3 e stands al T1 ma a quanto pare non lo si vuol fare... Cosi' si trovano dei voli marcatamente feeder partire da terminal diversi (sia a MAN che a LHR) da quelli di partenza dei voli lungo raggio. Il tutto senza avere una lounge al T1 e usando il terminal con un meccanismo di smistamento bagagli medievale, che non consente cambi sotto l'ora e rotti...mah.
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Beh sospettavo che la scelta sarebbe finita sul T1, anche perche' il T3 non potrebbe ospitare un percorso "sanitized" per coloro che viaggiano (in particolare all'arrivo) sul nazionale immagino?
Passando di palo in frasca, la comodissima Great British Lounge (ex BMI, cui avevano accesso i SEN di LH) del T1 che fine ha fatto? E' stata rilevata da BA?
 
BGW ha detto:
Beh sospettavo che la scelta sarebbe finita sul T1, anche perche' il T3 non potrebbe ospitare un percorso "sanitized" per coloro che viaggiano (in particolare all'arrivo) sul nazionale immagino?
Passando di palo in frasca, la comodissima Great British Lounge (ex BMI, cui avevano accesso i SEN di LH) del T1 che fine ha fatto? E' stata rilevata da BA?
Clicca per espandere...

credo di si, era parte della dote bmi se non erro.
 
[h=1]Virgin Atlantic announces London Heathrow to Manchester route from March 2013 with three daily flights[/h]

virgin-kenotoole.jpg
Ken O’Toole, CCO Manchester Airport Group, is happy that Manchester is Virgin Atlantic’s first destination in its short-haul expansion, breaking BA’s new monopoly to London. “We are pleased to see Virgin Atlantic increasing their presence in Manchester and to see competition returning on the London route, as that will be to the benefit of passengers flying from our airport.” However, passenger numbers on the route have declined since 2004.

Whether coincidentally or not, within days of being informed that Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Group had lost the UK West Coast rail franchise from the end of this year, Virgin Atlantic has announced that it will start operating three daily A319 flights between London Heathrow and Manchester from the beginning of the summer 2013 season. The airline has said that it will utilise its own slots currently leased to another airline, and will not be relying on any so-called ‘remedy slots’ that it has applied for that BA is being forced to give up at Heathrow in return for EU approval of its acquisition of British Midland. Virgin Atlantic has not yet confirmed where it will source the aircraft and crew from.
With IAG (British Airways) having acquired bmi from Lufthansa earlier this year, the city-pair has now basically become a BA monopoly, a far cry from the choice of five airlines that passengers had in both 2005 and 2006 between London and Manchester.
[h=2]London – Manchester traffic peaked in 2004[/h] Air passenger numbers between London and Manchester have fallen by almost 50% since the peak of almost two million in 2004. Last year, only Heathrow and Gatwick offered flights to Manchester and the total number of passengers was just under one million, of which just over three-quarters were between Heathrow and Manchester.
CHT-LON-MAN-96-11.png
Source: UK CAA

A review of weekly frequencies offered by the various players since the summer of 2004 for the peak summer month of September clearly highlights how the market has declined.
[TABLE="class: post-table"]
[TR]
[TH][/TH]
[TH]Heathrow[/TH]
[TH]Gatwick[/TH]
[TH]Stansted[/TH]
[TH]London City[/TH]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]September 2004[/TD]
[TD]BA 65, BD 47[/TD]
[TD]BA 44[/TD]
[TD]T3 15[/TD]
[TD]VG 47[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]September 2005[/TD]
[TD]BA 69, BD 47[/TD]
[TD]BA 44, LS 17[/TD]
[TD]T3 15[/TD]
[TD]VG 42[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]September 2006[/TD]
[TD]BA 61, BD 47[/TD]
[TD]BA 44, LS 16[/TD]
[TD]AB 12[/TD]
[TD]VG 38[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]September 2007[/TD]
[TD]BA 55, BD 47[/TD]
[TD]BA 44[/TD]
[TD]AB 12[/TD]
[TD]VG 38[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]September 2008[/TD]
[TD]BA 56, BD 52[/TD]
[TD]BA 44[/TD]
[TD]T3 19[/TD]
[TD]VG 31[/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]September 2009[/TD]
[TD]BA 51, BD 40[/TD]
[TD]BA 35[/TD]
[TD][/TD]
[TD][/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]September 2010[/TD]
[TD]BA 51, BD 41[/TD]
[TD]BA 35[/TD]
[TD][/TD]
[TD][/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]September 2011[/TD]
[TD]BA 51, BD 43[/TD]
[TD]BA 28[/TD]
[TD][/TD]
[TD][/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD]September 2012[/TD]
[TD]BA 93[/TD]
[TD]BA 21[/TD]
[TD][/TD]
[TD][/TD]
[/TR]
[TR]
[TD="class: post-table-caption, colspan: 5"]Source: Innovata data
AB: airberlin, BA: British Airways, BD: bmi, LS: Jet2.com, T3: Eastern Airways, VG: CityJet[/TD]
[/TR]
[/TABLE]
Apart from British Airways and bmi, the market has seen airberlin, CityJet, Eastern Airways and Jet2.com all come and go during the last decade.
[h=2]What they said[/h] Virgin Atlantic’s CEO Steve Ridgway said: “Flying between Heathrow and Manchester is just the start for our new short haul operation. We have the means to connect thousands of passengers to our long haul network as well as to destinations served by other carriers. Our new service will provide strong competition to omnipresent BA. It will keep fares low and give consumers a genuine choice of airline to fly to Heathrow and beyond.”
 
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