As MarkL reported in another thread, RE are to start flight from Cardiff to Dublin and Belfast City!
Taken off aerarann.com
Aer Arann to launch two new services from Cardiff to Dublin and Belfast City Airports
8th December 2005, Aer Arann, Ireland’s premier regional airline, today announced that it will begin operating two new services from Cardiff to Dublin and Belfast City from 27th March 2006. The airline will operate two flights per day on each route with a 50 seater ATR42 aircraft. Fares and schedules that will suit both business and leisure passengers are currently being finalised and will be announced mid December.
With annual passenger numbers in excess of 1 million, Aer Arann currently operates 26 routes across Ireland, the UK and France with a fleet of 12 ATR 50 and 66 seater aircraft.Commenting on the announcement Micheal O’Callarain, Marketing Manager Aer Arann said “Our commercial team is continually looking for opportunities for expansion and as such we are delighted to be announcing these two new services from Cardiff today. This year Cardiff is celebrating its centenary as a city and its 50th year as Wales’ capital. It is a thriving and vibrant city and we believe that there is considerable untapped demand both on the Dublin and Belfast routes and look forward to developing both services in the New Year
Something has got to give!
Air Wales, Ryanair and Aer Arann on the DUB route, and bmibaby, Air Wales and Arann on BHD! Does CWL need that amount of capacity!
By: Spence_CWL - 9th December 2005 at 21:22
Air Wales’ services don’t fit into REs at all, RE serving routes to Ireland only, Air wales going here there and everywhere. Air wales do operate alot to Ireland, particularly ORK, but theres too much baggage that goes with them- other UK routes, debt, continuing losses. It just doesn’t seem worth it from REs point of view, and Air wales couldn’t afford to buy another a/c, let alone anotehr airline. Close co-operation yes, takeover no. Remember babys frequency to BFS is only going to be once a day, and Air Wales to BHD twice. baby timing is not aimed at the business traveller either, Air Wales is. It is quite likely that RE will try to compete more with baby for leisure pax, and then compliment Air Wales on one of its business timings. Certain baby 737s are full at times conveniant for business, so it’s feasable to operate two services at the same time. For DUB, Ryanairs timing is crap, and Air Wales have not mentioned anything of it so far- it is unbookable, and despite other routes being unbookable 6G have named routes that will go on sale- NCL & ABZ- with increased frequencies etc and promised to correct website mistakes. DUB however has not been mentioned. Possibly they have given it to RE, and RE have let them operate NQY & EXT to ORK instead of starting it themselves.
By: allmcc - 9th December 2005 at 11:56
This all seems very strange unless of course, reading between the lines, the BHD announcements are a precursor to closer co-operation between the two airlines. If you look at the business model of both, they are very similar – operating niche routes which traditional locos wouldn’t look twice at because they are looking for maximum yield for minimum outlay. In addition, both airlines operate a one type fleet, in both cases happen to be ATR42/72s. It is obvious that there will be a massive over capacity to BHD if both go ahead notwithstanding the WW service to BFS.
This will be Aer Aranns’ first venture into Air Wales’ main base directly competing with them on one route – does anyone else suspect what I do? – a merger or even a takeover on the cards! There definitely seems to be more to this than meets the eye.
By: andrewm - 9th December 2005 at 11:36
No way in hell that CWL – BHD needs that much capacity. I would predict Aer Arann to drop off first then Air Wales.
Will be interesting to see if Aer Arann base at BHD for their ORK and CWL services for the summer schedule. If they do I would guess they would introduce at least 1 more route from BHD.
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December 8, 2005 at 10:46 pm