London City Airport gets approval to increase passenger numbers

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• Lumma says:

  21 Aug21 August 04:46

  Airlink fly to St Helena from Johannesburg. Interesting redemption opportunity perhaps

  • Joe says:

    21 Aug21 August 09:21

    This is what I thought too !

• patrick C says:

  21 Aug21 August 06:46

  I think the elizabeth line misses 1 trick as no LCY station was build. (The train passes right below it). The extra journey time to abbey wood would have been négligeable.
  As for canary wharf as a business district I am not that convinced by the story of it’s demise. It will require some reconfiguration though by splitting some of the towers.
  Also most business travelers still prefer lcy as it is just so much more efficient. The main issue is that business travel has nit fully recovered and mext year leisure will be hit hard when the revenge tourism trend hits empty consumer wallets.
  The current LH / Swiss promo is a good illustration

  • daveinitalia says:

    21 Aug21 August 07:54

    For departing the Elizabeth line makes Heathrow so much more attractive. I loved landing at LCY I could be home in a taxi (when I lived in London) in under 20 mins and not much longer on the DLR but LCY extended far beyond its comfortable size for departures. Remember most of the gates were built when the largest aircraft that served it was the 50 seater Fokker 50. The extension is overdue, but is it a case of too little, too late? I don’t think LCY is as useful as it once was.

    • Lady London says:

      21 Aug21 August 12:48

      Plus it’s best to have the right sort of lounge pass that works in a few cafés there, as there’s no lounge.

  • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:

    21 Aug21 August 08:51

    Yes it passes under part of the airport but in a tunnel and on a curve – neither conducive to build a platform or for passengers to get on and off.

    The business case simply did not merit a station at the airport. LCY already has a very high public transport usage figure and a Lizzie line station wouldn’t have hugely increased that.

    The old Silvertown station site has been protected from development should it become economic to build a station in the future.

  • Andrew. says:

    21 Aug21 August 09:02

    If London City Airport had funded it, there would be have been a station there one way or another. As it is, Custom House is an easy, 20 minute walk away.

    • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:

      21 Aug21 August 11:34

      But they didn’t at the time. One of their recent chief execs kept offering £50m towards the cost of of a station at Silvertown

      TFL asked for a business case but none ever came.

      And the old Silvertown station is really the only possible site for a station as it’s on a straight piece of track and above ground – so doesn’t require expensive platform screen doors – and could be constructed without extensive closure of the line.

      The only reason there is a Lizzie Line station at Woolwich is because the developer of the homes on the site coughed up getting on for £150m to build the station box and they were organised enough to get it included in the Crossrail Bill that authorised the scheme before construction even began.

      As I’ve already written there simily isn’t the ecomonic case for a Lizzle Line station at LCY

  • BBbetter says:

    21 Aug21 August 09:03

    The business from Canary Wharf wouldn’t recover.
    After Brexit banks and financial services companies cannot sell in EU, so a drastic fall in demand since then.
    Also, a lot of Europeans who were living in London moved out due to both Brexit and Covid.

    • Rob says:

      21 Aug21 August 09:13

      If you look at the teeny tiny new HSBC HQ at St Pauls compared to the size of the tower, it tells you all you need to know.

      • AeT says:

        21 Aug21 August 09:58

        HSBC is (and has been for a long while) using a bit more than 1/2 of its leased GLA at 8 Canada Square (1.1m sqft) with the rest being sublet. The move to Panorama St Paul’s (556k sqft lease) isn’t actually that large of a cut.

        • Rob says:

          21 Aug21 August 10:06

          But it was full when built – obviously they haven’t dumped half of their people in the last year!

        • AeT says:

          21 Aug21 August 10:15

          Indeed – it’s been a slow trickle out since the GFC.

  • CJD says:

    21 Aug21 August 09:18

    The demise of Canary Wharf is perhaps over-stated, however business travel has definitely changed.

    The pandemic proved that a lot of meetings can be done virtually, and a lot of corporations will look to improve their environmental credentials by encouraging staff to travel by train rather than fly, particularly domestically. My employer is on a big drive internally to reduce the amount of flights taken by staff between London and Edinburgh.

    • Nick says:

      21 Aug21 August 10:32

      LCY had the opportunity to fund a Crossrail station but declined to do so (they didn’t actually want the line built at all so a bit of spite might have been involved…) If that decision is coming back to bite them then it’s their own fault.

      • Dubious says:

        21 Aug21 August 14:07

        Is LCY under the same ownership now as it was when CrossRail was being planned?
        I’m not sure of the facts but there was a change some time in the past that may have been around that period.

    • Dubious says:

      21 Aug21 August 14:08

      Do the buildings there suffer from any of these energy upgrade requirements? I’ve heard these have impacted some thoughts on demolition & rebuild rather than upgrading.

    • BBbetter says:

      21 Aug21 August 15:22

      Canary wharf as it was pre-2016 is never coming back. Banks might be replaced with other companies over long term, but those high paying jobs are gone.
      Contributing factors are both brexit and covid, the latter expedited the WFH trend and the need for more spacious homes.
      Who wants to live at the tiny flats in CW? Single or couple with no kids, maybe.

  • Lumma says:

    21 Aug21 August 13:55

    The best way to get to LCY these days is to go to Woolwich on the Elizabeth line and then get the DLR back to the airport. I’d even do this from canary wharf

    • RS says:

      24 Aug24 August 07:55

      Just go straight to the LCY from Canary Wharf! Take DLR to Poplar and then change to the Woolwich Arsenal…

• Richie says:

  21 Aug21 August 07:47

  The extra three LCY flights between 6.30 and 7am must be on quieter planes, BACF’s E190s are not quieter, it’ll be interesting to see if they bother to acquire any quieter A221s or E190-2s.

  • Rhys says:

    21 Aug21 August 08:05

    Who wants to invest in the fleet when you can’t fly it on Saturdays and midweek business travel hasn’t recovered?

    • dsm says:

      21 Aug21 August 10:13

      Much of the fleet is 35 years old and the newer planes seat more people and more fuel efficient so putting aside the upfront costs if BA even had 3 modern aircraft and used in the first 30 mins of operation they could fit in two outbound departures and then follow their strategy of using these planes at Southampton/Edinburgh and the extra capacity and increased fuel efficiency would make all these flights more economical in the long run. I think if LCY can also get it’s expansion plans back off the ground with the addition of some lounges then I think there’s a good long term investment there given Heathrow expansion seems to be pretty much stalled for the foreseeable. This must be in their vision of wanting to increase the passenger cap.

      • Sean says:

        21 Aug21 August 15:04

        BA’s E190 fleet is nowhere near 35 years old. They started being delivered in 2010.

    • AeT says:

      21 Aug21 August 10:20

      Given the ongoing refurbishment of BA’s E190s, it seems like they’ll be flying for a long while still, and I don’t think LCY’s number of stands can handle any more BA aircraft based there. Sounds like other carriers will have to do the early morning flying honors.

      BTW sat in one of the new seats a couple of weeks ago on a flight back from BER. They are about as comfy as a park bench – padding is minimal and hard as a rock (FA said they may soften up with time). All seats but the exit row have a cell phone (tablet?) holder installed on the seat in front. Overall, a literal PITA but OK for a short flight.

  • Nick says:

    21 Aug21 August 10:34

    Surely the airport will just ‘ask’ other airlines to move their 7am flights to 6.55 and give the vacated slot to BACF for overall growth?

• Jenny says:

  21 Aug21 August 08:00

  Is it possible to book OneWorld flights via BA that are not routes BA fly? For example, I couldn’t see how to book Miami to Montego Bay on AA?

  • Rob says:

    21 Aug21 August 08:08

    Not for cash, only for miles.

    • Jenny says:

      21 Aug21 August 16:51

      Yes, I meant miles. I must be missing something. I’ll have another look tonight.

• Peter says:

  21 Aug21 August 08:12

  As someone living right below the flight path, they should have banned flights before 8am and instead allowed Saturday flights, the early morning flights are the most disruptive and an A220 is not much quieter than a E190. Everyone hates early morning flights anyway.

  • John says:

    21 Aug21 August 09:07

    As someone who used to live below the flight path of LHR (and moved there partly because of the proximity) I would prefer more early morning flights.

• Richard h says:

  21 Aug21 August 08:13

  if British Airways built a club lounge at London City, that would tempt me away from Heathrow..

  • Tiger of ham says:

    21 Aug21 August 08:15

    Why ? The point of the airport is you wiz through it.

    • babyg_wc says:

      21 Aug21 August 09:46

      Im with Richard, i use LGW as the BA lounge their is excellent, i can get a few hours work done (which sadly is next to difficult in the LHR lounges), would switch to LCY if BA had a lounge setup similar to LGW.

      • Danny says:

        21 Aug21 August 11:07

        You’d be complaining of a swamped lounge if one ever did get installed at LCY. Simply far too many status passengers to make it viable for the airport’s size.

        Don’t really understand the love for BA’s Gatwick lounge. Perversely they have a lot of staff standing around looking for things to do in the afternoons and almost beg to take your half-finished food away.

        • Peter K says:

          21 Aug21 August 12:33

          I’ve found better food at BA’s Gatwick lounge than most 3rd party lounges and never struggled to find a comfortable seat. It’s always felt relaxing with lots of natural light, clean toilets and a separate children play area so less noise for the rest of us.

          Basically it’s relaxing and comfortable before a flight.

  • AeT says:

    21 Aug21 August 11:59

    As Rob has suggested previously, BA or PP may benefit from setting aside a small grab-and-go “shop” rather than a sit-down lounge. It solves the issue of not having any lounge access at LCY for BA status / premium passengers.

    It could also be a reasonably lucrative concept for a PP “lounge” given the markups on such items – a wrap, drink, and a dessert would likely add up to GBP 18, so it is a win-win – passengers get a lounge-substitute and the provider gets fat margins. The Movenpick Café in BER seems more than happy to sell you EUR 8 sandwiches and EUR 10 salads in a similar fashion. A decent chunk of its custom comes from PP cardholders.

    • Danny says:

      21 Aug21 August 15:49

      Doubt BA would be willing to fund it given how parsimonious they are.

• Geoggy says:

  21 Aug21 August 09:42

  Just tried to book some Avios flights on Qatar for next April on Jetblue.

  They are available on the Jetblue website for their own currency and cash, but can’t get them to appear on Qatar for cash or Avios?

  • Rob says:

    21 Aug21 August 09:55

    JetBlue makes EVERY seat available for points because they are revenue based. There is effectively a price cap which determines whether Qatar sees them.

    • Geoggy says:

      21 Aug21 August 10:18

      So for the specific flight I want, Avios is a no go if they are not coming up?

• AeT says:

  21 Aug21 August 10:32

  I wonder if the approved increase in passenger volume will mean the consortium which owns LCY will proceed with the planned GBP 500m pre-COVID expansion plans, which were paused at the onset of the pandemic. The current terminal cannot handle 6.5m passengers, let alone 9m (though Rob is probably right that as things stand that’s a moot point). Travelling through LCY feels pretty comfortable at present, but as far as I recall felt relatively cramped in 2019. I fly in an out of there once a month so have plenty of anecdotal evidence.

  • BA Flyer IHG Stayer says:

    21 Aug21 August 14:36

    The increased passenger numbers is only a part of the decision that was released the other day.

    It covers the entire expansion project from terminal to gates to other facilities.

    I put a link to it in the forum thread about it.

    • AET says:

      21 Aug21 August 15:03

      I saw the document. That said, I believe the terminal rebuild was already approved pre-COVID. It is a mater of economic rationale for the owners rather than permission by the government.

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