Ryanair comes back to Ostend !

[regi]

The facts I have are more ryanair flights than anybody else on this forum , In all my years I have never seen anything like you describe . Pax who fly ryanair spend just as much as pax from any other airline , do you really think that OST will settle for only 2 connections over a 3 year period ? Look at the medium term picture, in 3 years,if this works I would expect a minimum of 20 connections , if not a base . "brugians" are already paying for an airport which is a ghost town .The state employees will just have to do a little work now . If the connections increase , then there will be new employment which will mean less strain on the government finances . Seeing as you are such an economics expert I suggest you study supply side economics rather than the demand driven economics which are de rigeur in Belgium , there are many theories of economics which can be applied all with different results . Don't be so blinkered .
Sometimes you just have to suck it and see , every day i see the hundreds employed at CRL who would be on social welfare were it not for ryanairs presence .

CRL is now by the way a cat III airport so fog is not an issue , they also have the best on time record and most completions from every airline in europe according to IATA.

But we have the experience with Ryanair at Ostend already. We do speak out of experience. Where are all the other connections? Where are all those jobs? Nowhere, they left us after a short while without any compensation or excuse. Many local politicians, business people, who defended Ryanair stood there with red faces by shame and anger.
We should not look at the past? Just Sturm und Drang ? Which guarrantees do we get?

[fretn]

When was the last time you have been to Ostend?
the violence in the media has been overrated a lot...
There might be some problem quarters in the city, but i live in a nice, quiet neighbourhood with no crime at all.
i have never encountered any problems in my home town, the city was cleaned up a lot in the past 10 years.
good transportation system, clean streets & roads, modernisation etc...
i suggest you come back to ostend to see for yourself.

[regi]

When was the last time you have been to Ostend?
the violence in the media has been overrated a lot...
There might be some problem quarters in the city, but i live in a nice, quiet neighbourhood with no crime at all.
i have never encountered any problems in my home town, the city was cleaned up a lot in the past 10 years.
good transportation system, clean streets & roads, modernisation etc...
i suggest you come back to ostend to see for yourself.

answer : last week
You probably have no connections with the law enforcement in your city. Which is in fact a good point, I would say.
The problems with Albanians and Chechnyans was in the press in 2009, not 1999. Shootings, isn't? Short memory?
I hope that you are aware that the security in Ostend is secured by a special police cell , speciliased in eastern european maffia . Luckely enough they do a good job. ( info given to me during a January 2010 diner by policemen (plural) who work with that cell ) Oh yes, small question: why do the police in Ostend carry a bullet proof vest during interventions and not in Bruges? Why do the police patrol at Ostend in the Langestraat with dogs and in combat gear, while in Bruges they just write parking tickets, dressed in normal uniforms ?
But I still like the chicken at the Koekoek.

[fretn]

When was the last time you have been to Ostend?
the violence in the media has been overrated a lot...
There might be some problem quarters in the city, but i live in a nice, quiet neighbourhood with no crime at all.
i have never encountered any problems in my home town, the city was cleaned up a lot in the past 10 years.
good transportation system, clean streets & roads, modernisation etc...
i suggest you come back to ostend to see for yourself.

answer : last week
You probably have no connections with the law enforcement in your city. Which is in fact a good point, I would say.
The problems with Albanians and Chechnyans was in the press in 2009, not 1999. Shootings, isn't? Short memory?
I hope that you are aware that the security in Ostend is secured by a special police cell , speciliased in eastern european maffia . Luckely enough they do a good job. ( info given to me during a January 2010 diner by policemen (plural) who work with that cell ) Oh yes, small question: why do the police in Ostend carry a bullet proof vest during interventions and not in Bruges? Why do the police patrol at Ostend in the Langestraat with dogs and in combat gear, while in Bruges they just write parking tickets, dressed in normal uniforms ?
But I still like the chicken at the Koekoek.

Haha, the koekoek nice of you to bring that up, it's my grandma's business...
small world it is.
It's exagerated (just like the media informed about the cigarette murder, it wasn't about a cigarette those guys had a quarrel for a long time)
But it's the same as in every "party neighborhood" with lots of people (and tourists).
look at the incident in the overpoort in ghent that occured thursdaymorning.
It can happen everywhere, it's even been quite quiet in Ostend lately.
Just to say i'm proud of my home city, and i have no problem walking alone on the street in the middle of the night.

(and in all those years i have never seen a agent in combat gear, you are right about the vests though, but in my opinion police should wear those in every major city)

[luckyme]

For the record, 85% or Ryanair passengers belong to the desirable ABC1 top social groups and 73% are college/university educated. Now call me crazy, but I'd bet that they are not the normal types found staying in youth hostels and vomiting on the beautiful streets of Bruges on a Saturday night. We're not talking about turning it into some sort of seedy, stag party riddled clone of Prague.

The routes (if they happen) will be to test the prospect of further routes. I suggest it will be an uphill struggle but I don't see anybody else willing to give it a go because of the substantial risk of losses assiociated with starting such routes but hey ho.

[Poeli]

When was the last time you have been to Ostend?
the violence in the media has been overrated a lot...
There might be some problem quarters in the city, but i live in a nice, quiet neighbourhood with no crime at all.
i have never encountered any problems in my home town, the city was cleaned up a lot in the past 10 years.
good transportation system, clean streets & roads, modernisation etc...
i suggest you come back to ostend to see for yourself.

I don't agree at all. I study @ Ostend, The only thing I hear from my co students is complaints about how Ostend is. It's not normal that students who go out @night get a gun against their head.
And clean roads? I still have to discover them then.
But anyway, this is off topic. Imo, it would be good for Bruges and EBOS!

[fretn]

When was the last time you have been to Ostend?
the violence in the media has been overrated a lot...
There might be some problem quarters in the city, but i live in a nice, quiet neighbourhood with no crime at all.
i have never encountered any problems in my home town, the city was cleaned up a lot in the past 10 years.
good transportation system, clean streets & roads, modernisation etc...
i suggest you come back to ostend to see for yourself.

I don't agree at all. I study @ Ostend, The only thing I hear from my co students is complaints about how Ostend is. It's not normal that students who go out @night get a gun against their head.
And clean roads? I still have to discover them then.
But anyway, this is off topic. Imo, it would be good for Bruges and EBOS!

Where do you reside in Ostend? i can tell you some direcly if you want in your neigbourhood.

[Charlie Roy]

In the February/March edition of Ryanair's inflight magazine Bruges as a tourist destination gets mentioned on Page 105, where they suggest "Hotel Pand" and a visit to the Friet Museum. Not the first time their magazine has promoted Bruges, and in this case for free

[Acid-drop]

Bruges can be easily reached from Charleroi

[jan_olieslagers]

Bruges can be easily reached from Charleroi

Exactly as easily as Charleroi can be reached from Brugge ...

[regi]

Bruges can be easily reached from Charleroi

Exactly as easily as Charleroi can be reached from Brugge ...

But the subsidies are to bring Spanish tourists from Gerona to Bruges, not to Charleroi.
( tourists in Charleroi ? )

[luchtzak]

I have read an article in De Morgen (author Douglas De Coninck) this weekend about the financial compensations that will be provided to Ryanair for starting up flights from e.g. Ostend to Malaga. I will scan one of the documents that was included in the article as soon as I have some time available! It's a must read!

[galaxy]

REMOVED

http://www.mediargus.be/ng/public/stati ... 645A773D3D

[cathay belgium]

Yep,

Shocking analysis, stupid belgian politics but great for ghent-brugge-ostend students,
they can go subsidied partying in Spain, the spanish people to Bruges?

Another typical Belgian politic nutcase ! Oh God,did you really voted for them ? Yes,I presume

Ciao,
CX-B

[cnc]

Yep,

Shocking analysis, stupid belgian politics but great for ghent-brugge-ostend students,
they can go subsidied partying in Spain, the spanish people to Bruges?

Another typical Belgian politic nutcase ! Oh God,did you really voted for them ? Yes,I presume

Ciao,
CX-B

the article is a piece of junk

[sn26567]

The article does not basically say much more than what I wrote on 5 March, quoting Michel Ghesquière:

• If you say Ryanair, you say subsidies. Ryanair is said to have gotten subisidies (a total of one million euros) from the cities of Ghent, Bruges and Ostend, the airport of Ostend and the Flemish Minister of Tourism Geert Bourgeois, the same man who heavily criticised subsidies to Ryanair in Charleroi.
• Bruges hoteliers expects some 20,000 tourists a year coming with Ryanair.
• SN Brussels Airlines, Jetairfly, Thomas Cook Airlines and Brussels Airport are not happy and have protested. The tour operators see Ryanair as an unfair competition to their own operations from Ostend.

The journalist only added some inside information about the political dicussions leading to the subsidies.

[regi]

still nothing on the Ryanair website.

[Acid-drop]

Honetly, I don't see how you can understand the subsidies as negative:
They bring so much back to the region that for 1 euro invested, you have maybe 10 or 15 euro back.
The tourist have to sleep, to drink, to eat, to move, to call familly... VAT for the state and benefits for local companies.
plus the jobs at the airport itself, or around it : cleaning, bus, taxi.
No mather how you turn it, it's beneficial for the region.
Many region of Europe understood the same, and I think nobody regreat it ... certainly not in Charleroi, that's for sure.

[sn26567]

Honetly, I don't see how you can understand the subsidies as negative:
They bring so much back to the region that for 1 euro invested, you have maybe 10 or 15 euro back.

This is probably true in most cases, but in this particular case I see more Belgians flying from Ostend to Gerona and Malage than Spaniards coming to Bruges. The role of subsidies is not to entice natioanls to visit foreign countries, but to bring in foreign visitors. I doubt that in this case the subsidies will have the intended results. Let's wait and see, nothing is final yet.

[regi]

Honetly, I don't see how you can understand the subsidies as negative:
They bring so much back to the region that for 1 euro invested, you have maybe 10 or 15 euro back.

This is probably true in most cases, but in this particular case I see more Belgians flying from Ostend to Gerona and Malage than Spaniards coming to Bruges. The role of subsidies is not to entice natioanls to visit foreign countries, but to bring in foreign visitors. I doubt that in this case the subsidies will have the intended results. Let's wait and see, nothing is final yet.

and we had the experience of Ryanair at Ostend already...