Heathrow and tourism

luckat

Do those eejits in government not realise that they're destroying the tourist industry by letting Aer Lingus export the Heathrow slots?

Most American tourists, and most European tourists, don't want to see Dublin.

They want to see the West of Ireland, and they want to see London. So they fly into Heathrow and go tootling around seeing London's cutesy union jack icons - the Tower, the Changing of the Guard, Westminster.

Then they tootle back to Heathrow, now familiar to them, and they get on the plane to Shannon, and tootle around the west of Ireland.

They don't want to go to some other mingy little airport.

How did we re-elect this crowd of dolts?

AlmightyCushion

luckat wrote:

Do those eejits in government not realise that they're destroying the tourist industry by letting Aer Lingus export the Heathrow slots?

Aer Lingus is a private company that the government owns shares in. The government can't stop them doing anything.

latenia

I suggest that you go to the website of Irish Tourism and get some facts and statistics of what the most popular destination for tourists is then come back here and withdraw your entire post, preferably calling yourself a dolt as you do so.

aequinoctium

they'll end up doing it

latenia

I'm changing my avatar-too many Newmans around now.

JCDUB

Aer Lingus is a private enterprise whose number one priority is to make money for it's shareholders.

If that means abandoning a certain route in favour of a more profitable one then so be it.

Willie O'Dea and his cronies have some neck to try and hold them to ransom and demand that they don't abandon Shannon.

If all these "Captains of Industry" in the Shannon area are so concerned let them get off their arse and entice another airline into Shannon.

BTW I know the government are shareholders in Aer Lingus but they are not majority holders, so they have to put up and shut up like everybody else.

5starpool

What a stupid post. If the whole region falls apart due to one route from an airport being cancelled then it wasn't very well planned in the first place. Also, most Americans I have talked to about visiting Ireland go to Dublin first, and if you want to see how many Europena tourists there are here you should visit sometime yourself. Anyways, knock is more West of Ireland than Shannon.

connundrum

luckat wrote:

Most American tourists, and most European tourists, don't want to see Dublin.

Where are your statistics to bad up this claim.

Silly post :cool:

cheeky_guy

The OP is right, removing the Heathrow link will cause HUGE damage to tourism in the West of Ireland. Of course the majority of tourists come to see the West, the 'Old' ireland where problady a lot of their ansestors fled from during famine times. The majority of tourists bypass Dublin as it is hardly anything, but an urban sprawl barely resembling Ireland's culture and history.
Michael O'Leary from Ryanair has already offered the government a way of resolving the issue by merging their decesion but yet the government still does nothing

latenia

Can we please stop the uninformed nonsense here. Dublin is by some margin the most popular destination for tourists.

Slow Motion

Airfungus are going ? So long and don't let the door hit you on the ar$e on the way out you overpriced, jumped up, semi-state mentality, up your own ar$es bunch of rip off muppets ! Welcome in Cityjet / Aer Arran etc.

luckat

No statistics, just conversations with tourists.

Yes, Aer Lingus is now a private company; in its desire to privatise every state-owned utility, the FF government gave away a valuable enterprise.

jjbrien

This could be a blessing in discise for Shannon they might get a better airline in to do the Shannon to LHR route like BMI. I would much rather go on BMI than aer lingus.

jester77

I'm sure if the West is as popular as some people are claiming then other airlines will be jumping at the chance to add it to their routes. Nothing to get too worried about!

themole

jester77 wrote:

I'm sure if the West is as popular as some people are claiming then other airlines will be jumping at the chance to add it to their routes. Nothing to get too worried about!

Agreed.

Afaik, most tourists coming from england go to dublin, then might visit galway, cork or else where. There is very little advantage to flying into shannon. If there was more people would use the route and it would hence make more money for aerlingus and they would not be dropping it.

People are just complaining because they are "loosing" something they once had. Not that they had any entitlement to it in the first place. Aerlingus are a commercial company and they need to make money the days of state subsidies are over and good riddance.

Btw, you can use ryanair to get from shannon to/from the other three london airports, most of which have bus links with heathrow. Maybe a llittle more hastle, but not a huge deal.

Alternatively you can fly aerarann from london to galway.

RandolphEsq

I wouldve that that most Americans fly to Dublin, see the city, then get a bus to the west and other parts of the country. How important is Shannon airport anyway?

00112984

luckat wrote:

No statistics, just conversations with tourists.

Are you in the Shannon area and basing this on conversations with tourists you've met in that area?
If so, your "facts" may be a little skewed.

Terry

How about someone links to some actual facts/ statistics.
I couldn't be bothered doing it myself, as I have little interest in this topic.

therecklessone

Slow Motion wrote:

Airfungus are going ? So long and don't let the door hit you on the ar$e on the way out you overpriced, jumped up, semi-state mentality, up your own ar$es bunch of rip off muppets ! Welcome in Cityjet / Aer Arran etc.

Last time Aer Arann operated out of Shannon they were far from welcomed.

themole

Here are some figures:

Traffic between Shannon airport and the UK in 2005 1,162,42 passengers

Traffic between Dublin airport and the UK in 2005 8.2 million passengers

Fratton Fred

luckat wrote:

Do those eejits in government not realise that they're destroying the tourist industry by letting Aer Lingus export the Heathrow slots?
Most American tourists, and most European tourists, don't want to see Dublin.
They want to see the West of Ireland, and they want to see London. So they fly into Heathrow and go tootling around seeing London's cutesy union jack icons - the Tower, the Changing of the Guard, Westminster.
Then they tootle back to Heathrow, now familiar to them, and they get on the plane to Shannon, and tootle around the west of Ireland.
They don't want to go to some other mingy little airport.
How did we re-elect this crowd of dolts?

that's hilarious.

There are four airports in London, you can still fly to Shannon from Luton, Gatwick and Stanstead. Apart from Dublin, most people I know that have visited Ireland have gone to Cork. I believe you can buy "Irish Soil", "100% Irish Shamrock" (made in China) and cutesy Leprechauns in those places anyway.

jjbrien

Isnt cork airport only an hours drive away. Cork and Dublin I always though should have been the biggest airports in the county.Cork airport had to take a back seat to Shannon for years until Aer Rianta was split. Shannon is only good for people who want to visit Limerick and Clare. Galway ariport should be upgraded for to allow bigger aircraft in. Also knock is beginning to get transactlantic traffic.

Collie D

luckat wrote:

No statistics, just conversations with tourists.

All 7.7 million of them?

http://www.cso.ie/studentscorner/StudentsCornerTourismInformation.html

cheeky_guy wrote:

The majority of tourists bypass Dublin as it is hardly anything, but an urban sprawl barely resembling Ireland's culture and history.

I would have thought that Dublin was just as rich in history (if not more) than any other part of the country :rolleyes:

themole

Fratton Fred wrote:

that's hilarious.

There are four airports in London, you can still fly to Shannon from Luton, Gatwick and Stanstead. Apart from Dublin, most people I know that have visited Ireland have gone to Cork. I believe you can buy "Irish Soil", "100% Irish Shamrock" (made in China) and cutesy Leprechauns in those places anyway.

Agreed.
Like in most countries people still want to see the capital, dublin. Hence they fly in there and then head else where.

astrofool

They can easily use Gatwick or Stansted instead. No one uses a certain airport because they're used to it, in fact, if you've ever had to go through Heathrow, then you'd know to avoid it like the plague.

Fact is, Shannon is a byproduct of a long gone era where planes had limited range, and it's always going to need to be propped up in the long term. A far better plan would be for it to be a regional airport, with Cork, Dublin and Belfast as the main three for this country. Things such as limiting the size of Dublin's runway so heavy freight has to go to Shannon should be a thing of the past.

themole

jjbrien wrote:

Isnt cork airport only an hours drive away. Cork and Dublin I always though should have been the biggest airports in the county.Cork airport had to take a back seat to Shannon for years until Aer Rianta was split. Shannon is only good for people who want to visit Limerick and Clare. Galway ariport should be upgraded for to allow bigger aircraft in. Also knock is beginning to get transactlantic traffic.

Indeed.

Here are some figures for cork, with 2.729 million passengers in 2005 its not far behind shannon.

And if wikipedia can be trusted.

Shannon Airport (IATA: SNN, ICAO: EINN), or Aerfort na Sionna in Irish. Approx 3.7 million passengers travelled through Shannon in 2006, making it the second busiest in Ireland by passenger movements (after Dublin), although discounting transit passengers it is only the third busiest (after Cork).

themole

Just thought i would clarify something, i'm from Galway now living in Dublin, and I so still think the west is the best

Having said that shannon should not be propped up. It should give way to galway and cork airports which are closer to the larger regions of people.

jester77

People should be moaning at Aer Lingus anyway, they are just out to make a profit. It's the government that should get the brunt of this. Why is there no high speed rail links in Ireland like most other Western countries. If you had a TGV or ICE link then this would be a non issue. You'd get your metro from the airport to heuston, should take less than 10 mins and then you'd get your train to Limerick or Galway which would only take 30-40 mins. That's where the real problem is!

tampopo

This is true...

jester77 wrote:

. It's the government that should get the brunt of this.

True about Heathrow being a hell hole. I hope and aim never to pass through it again, either going via Paris or Amsterdam or using Gatwick if visiting London (though I hear the Gatwick Express train service is gone or going soon).

Slow Motion

therecklessone wrote:

Last time Aer Arann operated out of Shannon they were far from welcomed.

Why ? What happened ?

therecklessone

Slow Motion wrote:

Why ? What happened ?

They launched a Dublin-Shannon service last year but got feck all business so cancelled it.

Slow Motion

therecklessone wrote:

They launched a Dublin-Shannon service last year but got feck all business so cancelled it.

I see, surely a Shannon - Heathrow would be a different kettle of fish ! Anyway the point I was making was that there are plenty of potential alternatives out there and that people are getting a bit too worked up over this !

ScumLord

From my talks with American backpackers, Amsterdam is the place to fly into not London or Dublin or Shannon. As far as I was aware Shannon is a cargo airport more so than a passenger airport and was designed specifically for transporting cargo.

I have never really flew into or out of Shannon I'd always go to Knock or Dublin.

Your right about people not wanting to go to Dublin but that's only from experience. Dublin doesn't live up to the expectations people have of Ireland it's just any other European capitol now.

I don't think this move will affect me atall but I don't like to see our national airline abandon it's roots but that's the nature of the game I suppose.

Slow Motion

ScumLord wrote:

I don't like to see our national airline abandon it's roots but that's the nature of the game I suppose.

But this is the thing really, it's not the national airline any more the muppets in government saw to that, it's now just another big money private organisation and as such is going where the money is. I have to laugh at the two facedness (may not be a real word) of idiots like Willie O'Dea who was part of the party who saw it's privatisation now giving out when it acts the way a private company should ! To all those enraged Shannonites (may not be a real word either) stop your bleating and move on for fcuks sake and just get another airline in who want to be there !

astrofool

I think everyone forgets the days of the huge losses being made by Aer Lingus and having to be propped up by tax payers. It can be far better operated in private hands, and it means that decisions such as Shannon are made for business rather than political reasons.

Look at what happened to swissair, KLM, is happening to Al Italia. All the American government has done by propping up United et al is bow to the unions and all their inefficiencies, costing the taxpayer in terms of services and their money.

Terry

This is a very good business decision.
They should drop the "Aer" part and replace it with "Cunning".

pvt. joker

latenia wrote:

I suggest that you go to the website of Irish Tourism and get some facts and statistics of what the most popular destination for tourists is then come back here and withdraw your entire post, preferably calling yourself a dolt as you do so.

I've flown to Ireland twice for a total of about 3 weeks and have flown into Shannon both times and never made it further than Clare/Galway except one excursion to Offaly of all places. If i want to see a big city i can do that here

pvt. joker

ScumLord wrote:

From my talks with American backpackers, Amsterdam is the place to fly into not London or Dublin or Shannon. As far as I was aware Shannon is a cargo airport more so than a passenger airport and was designed specifically for transporting cargo.

I still found it cheaper (offseason) to fly into shannon first. It was only $300 round trip from JFK (NYC) to Shannon and that included taxes/fees. Then from there it was About $100 roundtrip to anywhere else in europe via ryain air

themole

pvt. joker wrote:

I still found it cheaper (offseason) to fly into shannon first. It was only $300 round trip from JFK (NYC) to Shannon and that included taxes/fees. Then from there it was About $100 roundtrip to anywhere else in europe via ryain air

So, the aerlingus flight from shannon to heathrow was of no use to you then?

Thats what we have been saying. Ryanair alreay goes to the other three london airports, so no loss.

Flying into shannon from the us is a completely different situation and it has a lot of passengers from both New York and Boston.

mikemac

Well if taxpayers own 25% of this airline and the airline then takes a decison that will increase their profit then it seems like good news
We might get a dividend or maybe we won't have to pump cash in for expanding the fleet.

And if there is huge demand for a Shannon-Heathrow service then surely someone else will take over (yes, I know they need Heathrow slots first)

Time to Shannon to start working at marketing themselves. Maybe they should aim to one of the best airports in Europe at cargo flights.

luckat

Losing! Losing! Not loosing! Loosing is letting something loose. Why can't Irish people spell?

I absolutely and completely agree that Ireland's transport is a disaster. Ever since Todd Andrews dismantled the railways and sold the rails to Germany, the transport system has been going downhill. Of *course* we should have a decent TGV linking Dublin, Galway, Limerick, Athlone, Cork, Derry, Belfast, Waterford, Killarney - at the very least.

But it seems so bats to me that the main tourist and industry link to the west of Ireland should be dismantled for what is obviously a 'peace dividend'. Sure, give Belfast one of the Heathrow slots from the West - but not the whole lot!

Orange69

luckat wrote:

I absolutely and completely agree that Ireland's transport is a disaster. Ever since Todd Andrews dismantled the railways and sold the rails to Germany, the transport system has been going downhill. Of *course* we should have a decent TGV linking Dublin, Galway, Limerick, Athlone, Cork, Derry, Belfast, Waterford, Killarney - at the very least.

I agree.. We should just go to the French or German governments and basically admit that we as a nation cannot manage and organize our country and ask if they would take us on..Then take out all the TD's and councilors and have them shot!

The current government is an embarrassment, the wrong people in the wrong places with a level of incompetence that will go into the history books..

We as a nation need to completely change our value system.. instead of voting in the cute rogue who will get you the medical card/guy that the family knows, we need to start voting for educated people who can plan ahead and produce sustainable results for the country as a whole...

I thought the greens in government might make a difference but it seems they are more of the same sh*te.. They will be annihilated like the PD's if this farce continues for the next 4 years..

/rant

Terry

Orange69 wrote:

I agree.. We should just go to the French or German governments and basically admit that we as a nation cannot manage and organize our country and ask if they would take us on..Then take out all the TD's and councilors and have them shot!

The current government is an embarrassment, the wrong people in the wrong places with a level of incompetence that will go into the history books..

We as a nation need to completely change our value system.. instead of voting in the cute rogue who will get you the medical card/guy that the family knows, we need to start voting for educated people who can plan ahead and produce sustainable results for the country as a whole...

I thought the greens in government might make a difference but it seems they are more of the same sh*te.. They will be annihilated like the PD's if this farce continues for the next 4 years..

/rant

Have you actually tried changing things yourself?
It's all well and good calling for these changes on an internet forum, but actually doing something to change the status quo is a completely different thing.

Or else you could just moan about it and then leave the country. whatever suits you.

Orange69

Terry wrote:

Have you actually tried changing things yourself?
It's all well and good calling for these changes on an internet forum, but actually doing something to change the status quo is a completely different thing.

Or else you could just moan about it and then leave the country. whatever suits you.

I know what your saying but tbh i think its a lost cause.. The majority of people in this country don't want the hear the voice of reason.. The last election has proven that..

Collie D

Orange69 wrote:

I know what your saying but tbh i think its a lost cause.. The majority of people in this country don't want the hear the voice of reason.. The last election has proven that..

What is the voice of reason that us plebs don't understand?

Orange69

Collie D wrote:

What is the voice of reason that us plebs don't understand?

That the government are out of their league on every front..

This country needs:

A fast rail network between all the major cities carrying commuters/freight etc
Proper airports in Dublin/Cork/Limerick
Nuclear power
A complete dismantling and revision of the health service
Sustainable and intelligent city and town planning
To Get tough on crime and revise the legal system
A plan for moving away from oil dependence
etc..
etc..

To do all this we need help from the European union.

I can see this and im only a computer programmer.. The government
should have been working on this for the past 10 years.. but nothing..

A shambles of a transport network/health service.. complete oil dependence,
a half assed attempt at some wind farms.. and so on..

Terry

Orange69 wrote:

That the government are out of their league on every front..

This country needs:

A fast rail network between all the major cities carrying commuters/freight etc
Proper airports in Dublin/Cork/Limerick
Nuclear power
A complete dismantling and revision of the health service
Sustainable and intelligent city and town planning
To Get tough on crime and revise the legal system
A plan for moving away from oil dependence
etc..
etc..

To do all this we need help from the European union.

I can see this and im only a computer programmer.. The government
should have been working on this for the past 10 years.. but nothing..

A shambles of a transport network/health service.. complete oil dependence,
a half assed attempt at some wind farms.. and so on..

Do you honestly believe that the countries you plan to live in have all these things down to a T?

Collie D

And you think you are the only who sees this? The majority of the country don't want to believe the voice of reason is what you said I think? I'm sorry if it seems like I'm having a pop at you at every opportunity tonight but I just find it really difficult to agree with you.

Orange69

Terry wrote:

Do you honestly believe that the countries you plan to live in have all these things down to a T?

No but in terms of what i mentioned this country is only a couple of steps up from a bananna republic... after 15 years of economic boom..

Collie D.. c'mon I know i am not the only one who sees these, but clearly the government don't..

Terry

Ask anyone from the countries you listed above if their country is perfect and you will get a similar list to the one you presented about Ireland.

There is obviously no convincing you though, so off you go. Experience it for yourself.

stepbar

themole wrote:

Aerlingus are a commercial company and they need to make money the days of state subsidies are over and good riddance.

Shannon - Heathrow is a profitable route......