Waterford Airport

Dilbert75

L1011 wrote: »

https://www.irishtimes.com/business/transport-and-tourism/airline-yet-to-apply-for-irish-licence-stops-selling-tickets-1.3134403

Oops

Shows the structure they're going to use anyway - "tour operator" like Citywing paying an actual airline to operate the flight

That might be a good thing, rather than trying to start an airline as well as set up a new route.

road_high

Dilbert75 wrote: »

Hard to know. They could have applied in plenty of time by other countries' standards but had the application get bogged down here. No idea if that's the case but there are possible reasons other than incompetence.

Still incompetence- surely you'd perhaps find out a timeframe for the application before taking people's cash...?
I deal with government departments so do appreciate how difficult it can be to get answers and responses sometimes but something so critical would be worth waiting to confirm

road_high

Where abouts are/were the WAT passengers coming from in the main?
I'd imagine circe 50% co Waterford with Kilkenny and Wexford making up the vast bulk of the remainder?
Were they having any success further afield?

man98

road_high wrote: »

Where abouts are/were the WAT passengers coming from in the main?
I'd imagine circe 50% co Waterford with Kilkenny and Wexford making up the vast bulk of the remainder?
Were they having any success further afield?

I think the very problem with WAT is that Kilkenny and Wexford passengers don't make up nearly 50%. I would imagine that the vast majority of passengers are based in the area inside of New Ross, Carrick-On-Suir and Dungarvan and all towns and villages closer to the city. I do know of a few people from further away that used the services but it's a chicken and egg case, insofar as there being very little advertising in those areas due to a lack of funds, leading to fewer passengers, which results in the airport receiving less funding.

road_high

man98 wrote: »

I think the very problem with WAT is that Kilkenny and Wexford passengers don't make up nearly 50%. I would imagine that the vast majority of passengers are based in the area inside of New Ross, Carrick-On-Suir and Dungarvan and all towns and villages closer to the city. I do know of a few people from further away that used the services but it's a chicken and egg case, insofar as there being very little advertising in those areas due to a lack of funds, leading to fewer passengers, which results in the airport receiving less funding.

Well no you wouldn't really have enough of a population to support a regional airport depending on those places. They used advertise a fair bit in kilkenny and Wexford but as you it's chicken and egg...the time savings never negated the costs really as you can fly very cheaply from dublin and also jets, not turbo props which personally hate flying in

man98

road_high wrote: »

Well no you wouldn't really have enough of a population to support a regional airport depending on those places. They used advertise a fair bit in kilkenny and Wexford but as you it's chicken and egg...the time savings never negated the costs really as you can fly very cheaply from dublin and also jets, not turbo props which personally hate flying in

As a Wexford native I must say that the main reason I know about these flights is because I've always taken an active interest in Waterford Airport... the airport do indeed fund billboards at times but they're far from effective in swinging passengers to look at the website and book flights there, despite the airport's best efforts.

Masala

man98 wrote: »

As a Wexford native I must say that the main reason I know about these flights is because I've always taken an active interest in Waterford Airport... the airport do indeed fund billboards at times but they're far from effective in swinging passengers to look at the website and book flights there, despite the airport's best efforts.

There is no magic bullet on getting a message across to the public about your services!!

As a wise man once said..... half my advertising is wasted but I don't know which half!!

ShoulderChip

Any update on this? Just looking for flights home at Christmas at this stage 😔

Stovepipe

The business park is keeping the aircraft open, not commercial flights. Waterford people have always claimed that they support a local airport but cold hard reality is that they don't and won't until you get a credible jet in there, so it has to be a 737 or A320. Maybe Cityjet with their new Sukhois could be persuaded to operate a summer schedule to LCY? Is there anyone willing to run a freighter, even an ATR, from there?

JCX BXC

Keep in mind LCY failed from ORK.

You need Stobart in, otherwise I don't see a future.

marno21

JCX BXC wrote: »

Keep in mind LCY failed from ORK.

You need Stobart in, otherwise I don't see a future.

In fairness, Cork has LHR, LGW, and STN, and Kerry has STN and LTN back the road.

LCY could be viable in a W formation with one of the Dublin routes.

JCX BXC

marno21 wrote: »

In fairness, Cork has LHR, LGW, and STN, and Kerry has STN and LTN back the road.

LCY could be viable in a W formation with one of the Dublin routes.

Could you genuinely justify replacing a DUB rotation with a WAT one? I'm sure no airline could. Plus I can't see Cityjet or BA cityflier any bit willing.

Also, Cork still has STN/LHR/LGW, which strongly competes with anything WAT could technically offer.

Locker10a

I think they should really push one of the tour operators like Falcon or Sunway to do a couple of charters from there next summer, they could do thing like Reus once or twice a week ideally with the SSJ from cityjet. As o believe they do from DUB this summer. This would be a great way to start jet service from the airport, and it may inspire other operators to look into it.

Stovepipe

Why can't they fit in an ATR cargo at 21.30 like the Dub rotation? These are timed to fit into European freight rotations... You start putting the word to SE business people that an ATR freighter will put their goods in France (or even Southern UK) in under 90 mins, to link up with road, rail or even further haulage. Also, given how many Irish holiday in Northern and Western France, offer summer rotations to Brittany and Normandy. If I thought I could be in Rennes in under two hours, rather than drive to Dublin or Cork...apart from that, give the commercial flying schools financial incentives to establish subdivisions there. Cork and Weston get very busy.... Relatively quiet airspace with lots of room for training......offer horse haulage to the bloodstock industry. Big aircraft go to Dublin to haul horses but even ATRs and 146s can haul horses and can fit into the smaller airports in the UK and they are only an hour or so from the main bloodstock centres in Ireland.....get a parachute school in; lots of rotations demand fuel and hungry jumpers to feed....offer incentives to business jet owners to base their jets there. It's a hidden sector of Irish aviation that is very wealthy for it's size.

JCX BXC

You're overestimating the size of that market by an absolutely massive amount.

Keep in mind cork doesn't have freight services.

Stovepipe

One ATR a night is hardly overegging the pudding; that's a small tonnage compared to an A300 or even a 737 Cargo, for a catchment area that reasonably covers from Gorey to Kilkenny and well down into East Cork. Air freight operators have moved stuff as diverse as fresh seafood to computer chips to tools and machine parts out of Ireland, as well as carrying international mail and newspapers. An airport that has a direct route, literally, to Northern France has the potential to reach out and exploit it. Even Stobart could place an ATR for summer charters, even on an ad-hoc basis. Sometimes, it's just simple stuff; back when my employers operated the F50, the amount of times we could have shipped tourists bikes, and other property, except for the very small holds, and made a few quid on it. At least an ATR has a bigger hold. There has to be a function for an ATR ad-hoc cargo because several times, I have encountered situations where aircraft parts had to be moved, asap and the wrong aircraft had to be used (either too big or too small). I also know of several situations where there was no aircraft to be had and valuable freight had to go by road and ferry and the cost went off the clock.

JCX BXC

Cork lost its ATR42 freight service last year, if Cork cannot sustain it how could Waterford?

Stovepipe

No idea. lack of advertising? cost? I really don't know, but I'd guess that it's down to lack of awareness. I don't know what road freight rates are like, to compare.

JCX BXC

Stovepipe wrote: »

No idea. lack of advertising? cost? I really don't know, but I'd guess that it's down to lack of awareness. I don't know what road freight rates are like, to compare.

Ah here, now you're just clutching at straws.

The market for air freight is vastly different to road and rail freight anyway. Air is only suitable for light industries transporting high value items at fast speeds, road and rail (and boat) transfer everything else.

Stovepipe

Like I said, I don't know how much it actually costs but I know that air freight in and out of Ireland has moved everything from a locomotive to diamonds; horse air freighting is routine and they are not easy to deal with. The airline I work for used 737 combis, way back when, and made a great deal of money off it and even 330 belly cargo made money. The Combis were sold off and not replaced, a decision that was regretted even then. So far as I can tell, Dublin generates enough work for a couple of A300s and 737s a night, which leads me to believe that a market place exists further South.

ironclaw

Stovepipe wrote: »

which leads me to believe that a market place exists further South.

Two problems I can instantly see with anything heavy, for Cork or Waterford:

- Nearest rail is over 10km and both bring your via a city. Dublin has the port tunnel for a straight run out.

- Dublin sits on the M1 motorway. Cork is on the N27 but its not exactly a straight shot to the M8 and Waterford, although upgraded a little, is effectively on a backroad.

So as an existing operator, do you either try set up a new base in the south or do you just send your stuff the 1 to 2 hours north to Dublin? Ireland isn't that large, nor are the distances too far to do so. That said, I do believe if prices for commuter traffic out of waterford was remotely comparable to Dublin / Cork, it would see a surge. However when you could go to Malaga from there, many years ago, it was twice the price.

Storm 10

Very little being said on the resumption of flight at Waterford, is there any update or have things fallen apart with the bad planning of the operation

Fox Uniform

have things fallen apart with the bad planning of the operation

No.....MK2 is looking very good indeed

JCX BXC

Fox Uniform wrote: »

have things fallen apart with the bad planning of the operation

No.....MK2 is looking very good indeed

What

dzilla

The plot thickens
http://www.wlrfm.com/2017/11/14/councillor-joe-conway-expresses-concern-about-new-flights-from-waterford-airport/

road_high

dzilla wrote: »

The plot thickens
http://www.wlrfm.com/2017/11/14/councillor-joe-conway-expresses-concern-about-new-flights-from-waterford-airport/

Link appears to be gone? What were they saying?

L1011

road_high wrote: »

Link appears to be gone? What were they saying?

That some ACMI carrier (Backbone) is doing Christmas flights, moaning about the age of the fleet (1990s CRJs) and something about the cut off date for a new flight to be secured for some govt funding being 01/12/17

I didn't read the article in full intending to go back to it!

questionmark?

Post from the other Waterford thread courtesy of mooseknunkle.

https://touch.boards.ie/thread/2056796721/91

A Waterford Councillor says he has some concerns about potential scheduled commercial flights from Waterford Airport to London Luton.

BackBone Aviation – based in Denmark are set to provide the service, initially for the Christmas and New Year period, and extend to a more permanent arrangement into 2018.

There have been no regular scheduled services from the Airport since June 2016.

Independent Councillor Joe Conway says he welcomes any movement towards getting the facility back up and running but he has questioned Backbones ability to provide a suitable service in Waterford.

The first centres around operational capability. BackBone Aviation is currently listed as having just two aircraft – both regional jets with a typical passenger capacity of about 50. They have an average age of around eighteen years – one 20 and the other 16. They are thus considered ageing and reliability is a function of this.

Their take-off distance required is around 5,500 feet and because Waterford has a maximum runway length of 4,700 feet the current aircraft stock of BackBone could not operate out of Killowen.

Councillor Joe Conway says the critical date for central government subvention, is December 1st.

Transport Minister Ross has stated that no further money is going to be made available to an airport with no flights, and he thinks this may well be a contributing ingredient to the arrangement to lever central funds once again for the facility.

Shn99

https://flyinginireland.com/2017/12/emergency-funding-approved-to-save-waterford-airport/

JCX BXC

I didn't realise the airport was in such financial difficulty. If so, I wouldn't have hope for the future.