The future of Brussels Airlines with Lufthansa

[Conti764]

Conti764, the aiport of BRU has a capacity of 30 million, we are now at 18.5 million. They only need to renovate some old parts of the airport and the problem of to bussy check in area is gone. They have to expand the A pier, not build a whole new building.

At those 'some old parts' one C/I row is taken by the low cost project. Besides, although the airport has a capacity of 30 million, we have an undercapacity in the morning and a huge overcapacity in the afternoon. SN wants to operate their flights in the morning, as do eventual new transatlantic partners. The only possible new customers who would have ops in the afternoon would be Asian companies, but then they don't allign with SN's Africa routes (no or bad connectivity) so an expansion to cope with the paxflow in the morning are necessary, even though the airport has a theoritical capacity of 30 million pax.

[RoMax]

Only Asia carriers in the afternoon? What about the UA they are flying already from 25 october in the afternoon a LHR route for connections with ORD. They can eventually flying the route ORD-BRU and AUD-BRU non stop in the morning and a non stop flight ORD-BRU in the afternoon, exactly for CO. They are not going to fly twice daily to BRU with only a few hours between the flights, but with the codeshare of SN a second dialy flight is not that crazy. This flight will arriver in the afternoon, together with Asia carriers, SN can fly evening flights to AFI. And with al the self chek in the increased capacity in the A pier don't need an increasing for check-in. and even this is needed they can renovate some old parts of the building, there are still empty spaces in the building even with the low cost terminal.

[tolipanebas]

BRU airport may have a lot of unused capacity, but only at times nobody wants it.
Afternoons are really quiet at BRU indeed, especially at the B pier, but for a good reason: those are commercially useless times for transatlantic flights or for flights to Central Africa since they would arrive at their destination at night!

At peak times (i.e. during the morning hours), the airport is already running close to max capacity right now and as this discussion shows, the moment SN decides to add 2 (or even just 1) long haul plane(s) to its fleet, the infrastructure constraints get bloody obvious again!

Add some long haul STAR partners to the equation (FWIW, AC has already announced they'll start daily ops to BRU even before SN is in STAR, so you already see what will be coming once SN is well established in STAR) and it is clear BRU will become a saturated place to operate from half the day!

And what does BRU airport do?
Nothing, they mess around with a ridiculous concept about a Low Cost Terminal for short haul European flights. This airport has to understand it can not be everything to everybody, so it better focus on what will be its future core activity both in revenue and pax numbers, namely that of being the home base of a soon to be STAR alliance airline, owned by Lufthansa and with a very strong focus on network operations to and from AFI.

The Diabolo project indeed continues till 2011, but I don't know if this means they can not start working on an expansion of the A pier westbound before that date? Once the tunnel from Melsbroek to the airport is finished, there should be no reason not to start work on a second wing to the A pier.

Also, might it not be possible to exptend not only the A pier but also the B pier westbound, where the DHL premisses are right now? Obviously the west wing of the B pier would only have gates at the northern side then, and both DHL and Sabena technics might have to be relocated, but it would mean the airport would have additional capacity not only at the A pier, but also at the B pier for carriers that do make a difference.

Quite frankly I fail to understand what there's to be won from hosting some low cost carriers, when you can host a star alliance hub? Airports would kill to have the opportunity BRU is being given right now because of SN's entry in STAR and the Lufthansa buy-out of the home carrier, but somehow they don't want to grasp it, and prefer to just waste space, time, money and capacity on the low end of the markt rather than on the top end. The only reason I can think of is that it offers them QUICKER return on money. They seem to prefer to earn a few cents now, rather than a full euro next year....They'll come to regret this in 5 years time, I am sure!

[b720]

a cheap option is placing aircraft at distant stands.. no need for a gate with a jetway for every single flight.. as pier B is operating under capacity for probably 18 hours out of 24, the very busy moments some aircraft can be positioned away from the terminal and pax bussed to and from.. rather than expand the pier with all costs that will follow..pier A on the other hand can be expanded as it houses all schengen flights, and SN long haul.. maybe in the future it can be expanded to house all star alliance flights..long haul and schengen.. plus all other airlines flying within the schengen zone

[Conti764]

Only Asia carriers in the afternoon? What about the UA they are flying already from 25 october in the afternoon a LHR route for connections with ORD.

Oh right, you mean that flight UA only operates to preserve slots at LHR? Let's place a bet, the day that UA decides to fly IAD and ORD seperately, both will leave no later then 13u... Besides, the second UA flight ARRIVES in the afternoon and leaves again the next day early in the morning. Now what kind of operation is this, accept for preserving slots?

They can eventually flying the route ORD-BRU and AUD-BRU non stop in the morning and a non stop flight ORD-BRU in the afternoon, exactly for CO.

I seriously doubt the market ORD-BRU is big enough for two daily rotations. With serving both ORD and IAD, UA would already serve two of their hubs from BRU. The story is different for CO, which only has EWR connected with BRU. And even then, if CO would lauch a second flight EWR-BRU-EWR it wouldn't be leaving in the afternoon since such flight would prove useless. Maybe a 757-200 in the evening for extra pax to grab an evening connection at EWR to the US. CO's O&D pax ill mostly leave in the morning flight(s) and O&D pax on an evening flight would probably be low yield.

You cannot compare UA to CO. UA has two hubs in the US that warrant a good market to BRU (one for O&D (IAH) and one for connectivity (ORD) whereas CO only has one hub at the US which can sustain enough pax to BRU.

This flight will arriver in the afternoon, together with Asia carriers, SN can fly evening flights to AFI. And with al the self chek in the increased capacity in the A pier don't need an increasing for check-in. and even this is needed they can renovate some old parts of the building, there are still empty spaces in the building even with the low cost terminal.

Someone just explained to me that evening flights are not possible for SN to the majority of African flights, so they'll stay mostly in the morning.

About capacity,You’l sitll have O&D pax at BRU and this number will rise as well. Encouraging people to do a self check-in is very nice, but even though the check-in desks will dissapear, the qeueing people won’t, and letting them check-in themselves cost more time. Not to forget that there still will be a luggage drop off point. Unless people start printing their boarding passes at home, self C/I will be a good solution, but it will not solve the whole issue…

[RoMax]

From the moment the economy is rising again, Houston can be a good route for CO so 2 hub' s served by CO than. About UA, UA will do everything to beat AA on the route to ORD without SN that would never work in the past, but now everyting is changed. And CO will do everything to beat AA on the route's to New York, the only way is a second daily rotation to BRU. UA again, they can operate both IAD and ORD non-stop in the morning (there is no discussion about) or they can operat ORD-IAD-BRU with morning arrival in BRU and a second, non stop, rotation from ORD with arrival in BRU durring noon/afternoon. They are doing the same now already only with a stop and a plane change in LHR. The A pier need to be extanded but that will take years, in the main time not al the long haul operations can stay in the morning, so airlines must operate also long haul in the afternoon but that will not work without connections to AFI with SN. So some possebilities, SN operate some evening flights to AFI and some US and Asia carriers arrive in the afternoon in BRU or everything stay during the morning, but this will cause big troubles for the B pier. If this last will be choosen (most likly) than there must come solutions for the busy morning.

[tolipanebas]

Someone just explained to me that evening flights are not possible for SN to the majority of African flights, so they'll stay mostly in the morning.

MR_Boeing,
It is just not possible indeed to move most of the flights to AFI to evening slots, due to aviation security issues at destination. Some destinations theoretically could be operated on evening flights too, but what sense is there in shifting only SOME AFI flights to the evening?

Most STAR partners (like AC) that are to serve BRU will do so only ONCE daily and will want to make use of ALL the convenient connections their partner airline Brussels Airlines will be offering them, notably towards Central Africa. If SN were to spread out their AFI operations throughout the day, what would that do to the attractiveness of their Brussels' hub to their partners? Indeed, it would drop, since it would mean only SOME of their AFI destinations would be available for connections (unless you'd make the pax wait for half a day that is....).

The key to running a successful African network is to offer as much connections as possible to the STAR partners serving BRU, meaning connecting flights must ALL arrive and leave in a scope of a few hours. That's what a long haul network is all about. Having some leave in the morning and some in the evening is just crazy really as it actually cuts the network offered for connection in half! And it's not like SN's African network is that huge either, is it? Or do you seriously think SN could operate double daily flights to some places? Once for the EU pax and once for the Asian/US pax? NO way!
Remember we're flying triangular routes right now to get a fair loadfactor, so just going non-stop on the most popular routes would already be quite an achievement actually!

Back to square one: if you don't have the loads to go double daily, it is key to have all of your flights leave around the same time, and given the restrictions on some AFI destinations, that means morning departures: period.

It's really BRU which needs to wake up and smell the coffee here.....
AC's surprise announcement they want to start serving BRU because they want to connect to SN's AFI flights should have given it away really: BRU future is with SN, STAR and their extensive network and it should do everything possible to help them grow, rather than waste time and money on dealing with some low cost airlines willing to add some other route to yet another European destination already being served from BRU in return for a seriously reduced landing fee and dedicated low cost infrastructure for their airline.

BRU needs to do like MAN did recently with Ryanair, and tell the Low Costs to pay like everybody else, or get lost; it realy doesn't need them as it has other priorities.

[RoMax]

If you read my last post you must now that I even don't think evening flights to AFI are te sollution. I didn't launch that idea here ok, that was somebody else and I only said that this could be a solution for the busy B pier in the morning. But I am always stay telling that expanding the A pier is the solution not flying evening flights, I think the most of you misunderstand me becaus I am talking about that evening flights. But what are they gonne do with the B pier in the moring, some airliners already drop of their pax and move after that their airplane to another parking space, away from the B pier. And they need to expand the A pier absolutly as fast as possibel for non schengen routes, but this will take years, what are they gonne do in during that years when there are comming extra long haul flights?
And about the afternoon arrivals, 3 of the 6 weekly flights of Etihad arrive after noon and soon their will come the 777 of UA at 15:35. This services has absolutly no connections with other long haul flights and even the EU flights or less in the afternoon than in the morning-noon. So my question wath can be donne for this "problems" if you can call it problems.
And you are absolutly correct about that low cost thing, BRU need to do sommething for their homecarriers (SN, Jetairfly and Thomas Cook) and Star Alliance not low cost airliners.

[tolipanebas]

I think the most of you misunderstand me

In which case I am happy to offer my excuses, it's just that the issue of evening flights to AFI pops up every time the bottleneck of BRU's lack of gates during the morning is discussed, as if it is up to the home carrier to adopt to the airport by flying over the quieter periods! SN is in this to make money, not to help BRU fill its empty terminals in the afternoon....

SN has already shown its goodwill towards BRU by moving their long haul departures to the T zone, but BRU should start to do more for its home carrier, since it will get a lot from it back: the daily AC route to Montreal is just a start and a nice example of this actually, because without SN being in STAR, BRU could have begged the Canadians to start the route for years still! And there is more to follow for sure, but currently it seems all BRU thinks all it needs to do is sit and wait for it to happen.

So my question wath can be donne for this "problems" if you can call it problems.

BRU will urgently have to put their money where their mouth is, and start investing in its infrastucture!Otherwise, the irony will be that whereas BRU has for long been crying how they were lacking a strong home carrier, they will soon be hearing the home carrier (and its partners) complain about the poor infrastructure they are housed in.

Let's face it, BRU hasn't invested much in its terminal infrastructure for almost a decade now, which is unseen at any EU airport, so any bragging about how 'modern' and 'good' BRU is, is actually misplaced.
BRU was a nice place at the turn of this century, but that's almost a decade ago..
It's time to start planning ahead, or soon the airport will be caught in exactly the same trap as it was in the 80s: an airport with an infrastructure built for the EXPO 58!

[Kapitein]

Conti764 wrote:

The T-zone only provides capacity for 4 widebodies. You cannot fit six widebodies into the area. If they expand it to 10 gates, they can only use 6 gates for widebodies. Of course, they could maximise the use of these gates, but it would be a logistical nightmare and not very cost effective. Sure, they could still expand the T-zone further, but before you know it, you're up to A40 sort of speaking and the A-pier becomes an international terminal. If SN wants to grow 'unlimited' a new terminal is the only option.

In the existing layout it's indeed possible to put 6 wide-body's on the same time at the T-zone: Northside 3 A330's, southside 2 A330's and a 767-300.

[Conti764]

In the existing layout it's indeed possible to put 6 wide-body's on the same time at the T-zone: Northside 3 A330's, southside 2 A330's and a 767-300.

I clearly misjudged the start of the T-zone. I thought it started at A65 and not at A60... My bad

[Conti764]

@ MR_Boeing,

First of all, you cannot compare UA to CO...

CO from EWR has two major advantages: EWR is an airport whitch serves NYC, the 'center of the world' and has enough O&D traffic on its own, even more since CO has some very lucrative corporate contracts. Besides that, it is a power hub of CO for US connections and beyond. CO can easily warrant two daily flights between EWR and BRU, and with big equipment (at least one 772 and 76X a day). I fail to see where CO would get the clients to fly IAH-BRU...

UA flies to BRU from two of their hubs. IAD is pretty strong on O&D traffic for obvious reasons (Washington and Brussels are the number one and number two political capitals in the world, NATO,...) but for ORD to work well, they need to rely on transfer pax since I doubt the O&D market between BRU and ORD is so big. You can see prove if you look at AA's operations. They fly a 752 to JFK (mostly for O&D traffic of which they will use a lot to CO) and a 772 to ORD, I bet mostly with transfer pax since ORD is a bigger hub to AA then JFK, but are reducing it again to a 763. So at best I can see UA operate one 772 to IAD and one to ORD. Like pointed out already, the second UA flight in october is to preserve slots at LHR, you can see it at the very unconvenient times. It arrives when all connecting possibilities are gone and it leaves again when those planes still have to return to BRU. Maybe, if everything goes really well, UA can at a certain time consider a third daily flight to one of their West Coast hubs, but I doubt we will see this soon.

I'm afraid you overestimate the market for BRU a litlle, esp. transatlantic. Times have changed and many airlines first fly their pax domestic to one of their big hubs and then fly them abroad from there. I'm far from a professional, but I think only four or five airports in the US can have a direct link with BRU, that's it.

[Conti764]

But what are they gonne do with the B pier in the moring, some airliners already drop of their pax and move after that their airplane to another parking space, away from the B pier.

Yes, but that's logical since these planes arrive very early and leave again pretty late (like UA) and so it is pointless and very expensive if they leave it at the gate for several hours.

And about the afternoon arrivals, 3 of the 6 weekly flights of Etihad arrive after noon and soon their will come the 777 of UA at 15:35.

Etihad doesn't care much about offering connections on SN's African network. Ergo, their home base is located pretty well for African flights, maybe even better then BRU. EY saw and grabbed a very good opportunity to fly to an underserved airport with no flights to Asia, and no EK flights, so they could attract pax from the BRU market and have them transferred on their international network.

[Conti764]

SN has already shown its goodwill towards BRU by moving their long haul departures to the T zone, but BRU should start to do more for its home carrier

Like it's a burden for SN... It's actually a pretty good situation for them to transfer their Euro pax to African flights and they have a very nice lounge in this zone, I only see advantages for SN.

Let's face it, BRU hasn't invested much in its terminal infrastructure for almost a decade now, which is unseen at any EU airport, so any bragging about how 'modern' and 'good' BRU is, is actually misplaced.
BRU was a nice place at the turn of this century, but that's almost a decade ago..
It's time to start planning ahead, or soon the airport will be caught in exactly the same trap as it was in the 80s: an airport with an infrastructure built for the EXPO 58!

Well, they didn't have to invest much, since the airport was underserved and it's home carrier was a weak, ugly duck (sorry for all the SN'ers who read this). They invested in updating the excisting infrastructure and you must admit the airport actually looks better then a few years ago. Things are changing now with LH taking over SN and the latter joining Star Alliance, but BRU still has time to change things. It's not like all Star Alliance airlines are qeueing to open up routes to BRU before the end of they year. I can only hope though, that BRU is foreseeing a growth in pax and are anticipating to it, planning new infrastructure, etc. etc.

[Buzz]

Conti764 wrote:

The T-zone only provides capacity for 4 widebodies. You cannot fit six widebodies into the area. If they expand it to 10 gates, they can only use 6 gates for widebodies. Of course, they could maximise the use of these gates, but it would be a logistical nightmare and not very cost effective. Sure, they could still expand the T-zone further, but before you know it, you're up to A40 sort of speaking and the A-pier becomes an international terminal. If SN wants to grow 'unlimited' a new terminal is the only option.

In the existing layout it's indeed possible to put 6 wide-body's on the same time at the T-zone: Northside 3 A330's, southside 2 A330's and a 767-300.

I thought they could only park widebodies at the side oposite the B-pier? At the other side there was not enough room for widebody a/c because they would block the taxiway... Is this true or not?

[Conti764]

I thought they could only park widebodies at the side oposite the B-pier? At the other side there was not enough room for widebody a/c because they would block the taxiway... Is this true or not?

It looks like it's not true since every day since the opening op the T-zone there have been A330's at aprron 1 north.

[RoMax]

@conti764
Houston can easely be served by CO if the economy is at a high level (exactly like Detroit, but we can forget that because Northwest) I am not saying a daily 772 or a 764, but a daily 752 or 762 is perfectly possible for Houston. Not because of the connections and so, but for the city and his economy itself.
Chicago is one of the largest airports in the world with connections to the whole USA. For AA this was a golden opertunity to fly this route together with SN and thats wy they upgrade this route this summer, to earn for the last time a lot money on this route. Because they will lost this route if UA fly this together with SN and you can be sure they will do this. So I am not saying a daily 772 for both ORD as IAD but a daily 763 must be possible. And a second daily flight for ORD is not for the first years ok, but It has pottential for the next 5-10 years, you can be sure about that. AA can compete with UA together with SN so they need to leave this route. Maybe UA can connect Los Angeles with BRU, but I think this wil only happen with a stop in LHR, If this will hapen the first years. I think you don't see the potential of BRU, SN together with CO, US, UA and CA can be stronger than you think.

[kiwiandrew]

Houston can easely be served by CO if the economy is at a high level (exactly like Detroit, but we can forget that because Northwest) I am not saying a daily 772 or a 764, but a daily 752 or 762 is perfectly possible for Houston.

are you sure that a 752 is capable of flying BRU-IAH ? I would have thought that it was a bit too far .

[Bralo20]

Maybe UA can connect Los Angeles with BRU, but I think this wil only happen with a stop in LHR, If this will hapen the first years.

Actually effective from next October 21

The "slotkeeping" 777 flights from and to LHR is actually the LHR-LAX-LHR flight. And it is possible to book this through UA.com without a planechange although flightnumbers change.

The BRU-LHR-LAX flight costs about 640 EUR.

[Bralo20]

are you sure that a 752 is capable of flying BRU-IAH ? I would have thought that it was a bit too far .

Since A B752 has a range of 3.900nm at full payload I assume that's not possible. BRU-IAH is aproximately a bit over 5.000nm