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British Airways timetable for leaving Terminal 1 published (and some T5 to T3 moves)

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With the new Terminal 2 at Heathrow now fully operational – albeit, unknown to most people, still using the old Terminal 1 baggage system so far – British Airways has published the timetable for its full move out of Terminal 1.

Over the course of the next 8 months all Terminal 1 flights will be moved.  This will allow BA to consolidate its operations across Terminal 3 and Terminal 5.

Heathrow Terminal 3 Virgin

The first stage, moving Dublin and Belfast to Terminal 5 and moving Barcelona from Terminal 5 to Terminal 3, took place three weeks ago.

The next stages are:

June 30, 2015 – Hanover, Luxembourg, Lyon, Marseille and Bilbao flights will move from Terminal 1 to Terminal 3

June 30, 2015 – Amman, Beirut, Baku and Cairo flights will move from Terminal 1 to Terminal 5

October 14, 2015 – Miami, Denver, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Vancouver, Cape Town, Accra and Nairobi flights will move from Terminal 5 to Terminal 3

The October list of moves is a bit of a surprise.  These are, in general, routes which do not have a First Class cabin.

You may remember back in June I wrote that Cape Town, Phoenix, Vancouver and Las Vegas (EDIT: originally wrote LA) would be flown with aircraft which retain the ‘old’ First Class seat.  This will not be sold as First Class but as Club World.

What about Miami though?  From October 14th next year this becomes an A380 service.  Yet anyone flying to Miami in First Class will not be able to use the Concorde Room because that is only in Terminal 5.  All very odd ….

More details on the move from Terminal 1 and the new Miami A380 service can be found on ba.com here.

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Comments (24)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • matt says:
    17 Nov17 November 06:23

    LA with no First? Unlikely.

    • squills says:
      17 Nov17 November 06:57

      This was explored before. It’s because those aircraft used have no ‘new’ First standard seats. So anybody expecting ‘new’ getting ‘old’ would be pretty disappointed (with knock-on effects for loyalty etc).

      Whereas when you book BA Club but get ‘old’ First seats, you’re delighted 😉

      • Daftboy says:
        17 Nov17 November 07:04

        Pretty sure he meant Las Vegas

      • Scott says:
        17 Nov17 November 13:40

        I have a Club World return booked from LAS in late April next year. MMB says I can select a seat and shows the seat map including Old First which you can select. However, once you click to confirm it says;

        “Sorry, we are unable to confirm your seat request(s) at this time. Please try again later or check in at the earliest opportunity in order to choose the best available seat(s)”

        I tried the call centre and they said they also couldn’t book a seat but I should keep trying online. Anyone have any ideas why this might be? This route is supposed to be served by older 747, but does this mean they haven’t confirmed that yet?

        • Rob says:
          17 Nov17 November 13:53

          I think they will only open ‘old First’ when the sell a certain number of CW seats – at least that was the plan.

          • Scott says:
            17 Nov17 November 14:01

            But I can’t select a seat in Club World either. If I try a seat in the Upper Deck or Main Cabin I get the same message. Looking at the Seat Map only 1A/1K and the bassinet seat in the main cabin are showing as unavailable, which I am assuming is the standard availability policies. It does appear that they aren’t allowing anyone to reserve a seat. All my other flights on the same itinerary have seats booked with no problems.

          • Rob says:
            17 Nov17 November 16:39

            That is just weird then!

        • anon says:
          17 Nov17 November 15:08

          Your e-ticket likely isn’t issued.

  • alex says:
    17 Nov17 November 07:15

    Stunned that Miami is moving to terminal 3 that’s a bad move imo!

    • Swanhunter says:
      17 Nov17 November 10:19

      It used to be there for many years at BA’s sole T3 flight. Lots of economy passengers, lots of connections, relatively low yielding route

      • DV says:
        18 Nov18 November 00:05

        In the pre-T5 days MIA was T3, and BA F passengers had to use AA’s “Flagship Lounge”, which was very poor compared to BA’s lounges. After several years of decline, OW lounges may be much more attractive. Are there any on T3 now?

  • Andy Brown says:
    17 Nov17 November 08:13

    Denver is an odd choice, and after BA will introduce a 747 in that route from the end of March, including First (for sale), instead of the 777 (no F for sale even when a 4 class was rostered).

  • squills says:
    17 Nov17 November 08:39

    But BA wouldn’t downgrade terminals on key routes without a good reason…

  • David BS says:
    17 Nov17 November 08:58

    1) Sad Denver moving to T3 – does anyone know if Avis is as close to Terminal 3 as they are in Terminal 5?

    2) If not what is likely to be closest car hire options?

    3) Do I understand first will likely be old first on the Denver route from March 2015?

    Thanks if anyone can assist.

  • flyforfun says:
    17 Nov17 November 15:09

    Just curious, but why isn’t T5 big enough for all BA’s flights? Couldn’t they free up the gates and bus the Domestic and Benelux flights?

    • Col A-B says:
      18 Nov18 November 09:47

      Why isn’t it big enough? Because they didn’t plan for it to host all their flights. Astounding.

  • Aviator says:
    20 Nov20 November 13:15

    The route/terminal switches have happened for two of reasons:

    – T1 closing in June of next year for redevelopment as part of LHR Q6 plan for the airport (the airport will eventually resemble a toast rack configuration)
    – The need to create capacity in T5 for future growth. This future growth is likely to come on higher revenue making flights than those moved to T3
    – T2 opened created space in T3 with the departing Star airlines.
    – T3 is being developed by Heathrow Airport Limited – expect to see a new facade, and more automation, and a new flight connections centre.

    The aircraft types flying out of T3 will be kept as minimal as possible to standardize engineering/cargo/equipment needs in this location – it’s a long way from T5….

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