Ryanair today published its Summer schedule at Brussels Charleroi Airport and confirmed that it was terminating its Brussels-London route with effect from 29 April next. The current Charleroi-London route operates with up to 8 daily flights, carries over 360,000 passengers annually, with these customers saving over €36m per annum compared to the higher fare alternatives from Zaventem.
Ryanair confirmed that this 10% reduction in daily flights at Charleroi was the first element of its response to the European Commission’s recent decision to increase costs at Charleroi and require that Ryanair’s passengers should pay higher fares. Ryanair will appeal this decision to the European Court in Luxembourg, but while this appeal is underway, there will be reductions in flights and services at Brussels Charleroi, as aircraft capacity is reallocated to other lower cost airports.
Announcing these cutbacks today, Ryanair’s Chief Executive, Michael O’Leary said;
“These capacity reductions are bad news for customers at Brussels Charleroi, but good news for other lower cost airports. As the Brussels-London route had the lowest fares, this route cannot be sustained if costs are to be increased as a result of the Commission’s decision to increase ticket prices by €6 to €8 per ticket. These flights will now operate on lower cost routes between private airports such as London Stansted, Glasgow Prestwick, Stockholm Skavsta and London Luton.
“Ryanair will shortly be meeting with Brussels Charleroi Airport and the Walloon authorities to agree a way forward. If these talks result in a new agreement with a similar low cost base as before then Ryanair’s low fares will continue at Charleroi. However if costs are increased, or the Walloon Authorities do not share our vision for the lowest possible air fares for ordinary people then there will be further flight reductions and route closures, as aircraft are sent to other airports where the cost base is already significantly lower than Ryanair’s original costs at Charleroi Airport”
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Bad news for Charleroi! Also the end of a low cost route between London and Brussels! I wonder which route from Charleroi will be next to face the chop!:(
By: Jeanske_SN - 26th February 2004 at 18:01
Originally posted by Matthew Murray
It appears Low-Cost airlines want low-cost airports…
However I don’t call TV a lowcost operator, They fly to primarily airports. easyJet also flies to primar airports on the most of their destinations.
By: Jeanske_SN - 26th February 2004 at 17:56
ARGH sorry but that thing about 8 daily flights between stn and crl is not true, it’s 3 on weekdays!
London Luton isn’t flown from CRL!
It was bound to happen… there is so much competition between BRU-LON->VLM (ANR-LCY, BRU-LCY), BMI (LHR-BRU), BA (BRLHR-BRU), TV (BRU-LCY (codeshare VLM), SNBA (BRU-LGW)
I think this come to a total of 30 return flights a day… Isn’t that a bit too much?
By: Mark L - 26th February 2004 at 17:23
This seems to be more spite towards Brussels than anything else, as they could quite easily continue to operate the route at a healthy profit. I can’t really comment on whether it was justified or not as the whole debate over the wheelcahir case got so shrouded in politics, opinions, and sensationalism that I completely lost track of what happened :rolleyes:
By: martin_EGTK - 26th February 2004 at 17:21
Could this be an opportunity for Virgin Express to return to the British market? I seem to recall them saying that if Ryanair left any of the Charleroi routes they would commit to taking them over.
By: wannabe pilot - 26th February 2004 at 17:18
Well I think we could kinda see this coming, but it is very bad news for Charleroi. I don’t think the EU are doing themselves any favours at this time, especially when the Airline Business is still slowly picking up after Sept 11th.
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February 26, 2004 at 5:10 pm