Lack of new routes at Cork airport

SpaceTime

Carnacalla wrote: »

How ruthlessly ignorant.
According to Google maps, Limerick city centre is 24mins from Shannon airport.

Cork city centre is 17mins from Cork airport.

That information above single handedly undermines all of your post.

Shannon has a motorway to it, unlike cork which is a pain to get to if your travelling from anywhere north of it. I'd say Shannon is MORE accessible than Cork Airport.

This making up fake facts is really not helping the Cork situation.

Cork Airport is basically on the edge of the city. Location wise it's similar to Dublin Airport - very close into the city.

It'd take about 5 to 8 minutes to get to it from the end of the South Link at the Elyssian. It's as accessible as Cork City is. It sits just off the N40 South ring which is basically a motorway and has 120kmh sections. Its definitely not in anyway difficult to access.

You can access it via the M8 and spend about 10 minutes skirting the N40 South ring or access it via N25.

Shannon isn't far from Limerick though about 26km. It's also linked by the motorway network Arguing it's far away from Limerick City is nonsense.

Cork City has a much higher population hinterland though. That's just simple fact.
Poor marketing of the airport is leading to that hinterland population looking further afield for flights and bringing inbound traffic to other airports. Fundamentally that's the problem.

JCX BXC

SpaceTime wrote: »

Cork Airport is basically on the edge of the city. It'd take about 5 to 8 minutes to get to it from the end of the South Link at the Elyssian. It's as accessible as Cork City is.

You can access it via the M8 and spend about 10 minutes skirting the N40 South ring or access it via N25.

Shannon isn't far from Limerick though about 26km. It's also linked by the M7. Arguing it's far away from Limerick City is nonsense.

Cork City has a much higher population hinterland though. That's just simple fact.

I've been to Cork Airport a few times and the traffic can be a slowing factor.

My main point was that that poster above tried to compare the airport distance of Shannon to Hahn, which is just plain ignorant.

Cork has a larger population.

Shannon has a smaller immediate population, but has a larger catchment area due to the ease of getting there and the unusual lack of an Airport in Galway.

Overall, I think the airports are eventually bound to even out around the same, with Cork maybe landing the top position, but I'd imagine that both airports will out grow each other a few times in the very long term.

stevielenihan

Plus Cork airport don't have US routes like Shannon does. Shannon is very important to the country. Dublin is crap in my opinion.

SpaceTime

stevielenihan wrote: »

Plus Cork airport don't have US routes like Shannon does. Shannon is very important to the country. Dublin is crap in my opinion.

Dublin isn't crap in most other people's opinion. It's by far the most used airport in Ireland. Shannon's transatlantic connectivity is a good counterbalance to keep prices down though.

beer enigma

Lads,

The Mods are getting pretty fed up with this thread as it's turning into nothing but petty arguments and non stop reports of each other's posts.

Can I just remind people that under Boards rules, you can comment about a post, but not personally about another poster.

I'm personally of the opinion that the thread title has been exhausted but I'll let it run for a bit longer in the hope that someone has something useful to contribute, otherwise I'll close it off.

Thanks

keithclancy

Carnacalla wrote: »

How ruthlessly ignorant.
According to Google maps, Limerick city centre is 24mins from Shannon airport.

Cork city centre is 17mins from Cork airport.

That information above single handedly undermines all of your post.

Shannon has a motorway to it, unlike cork which is a pain to get to if your travelling from anywhere north of it. I'd say Shannon is MORE accessible than Cork Airport.

This making up fake facts is really not helping the Cork situation.


Extra info:
*Hahn is 1hr 23mins from Frankfurt city centre

*Dublin Airport is 23mins from Dublin city centre

*Knock is 1hr 30mins from Galway city centre

*Shannon is 1hr 10mins from Galway City centre

*Dublin airport is 1hr 49mins from Waterford city centre

*Cork airport is 1hr 45mins from Waterford city centre

*Cork airport is 1hr 45mins from Tralee

*Shannon is 1hr 41mins from Tralee

Read that and you will find that Shannon is not the rural shack you are trying to make it sound like.

Have you actually driven these routes yourself ?

Cork is Motorway the whole way and then Dual Carriageway via the Jack Lynch Tunnel then a short two lane N road up the hill.

The roads south of everything from Cahir to Tralee up to Shannon are Awful.

The problem with Hahn isn't the travel time, its the frequency and the fluctuation in travel time to the Airport.

Germans would only take Hahn or Weeze because its a super cheap flight, but its not really convenient.

JCX BXC

keithclancy wrote: »

Have you actually driven these routes yourself ?

Cork is Motorway the whole way and then Dual Carriageway via the Jack Lynch Tunnel then a short two lane N road up the hill.

The roads south of everything from Cahir to Tralee up to Shannon are Awful.

The problem with Hahn isn't the travel time, its the frequency and the fluctuation in travel time to the Airport.

Germans would only take Hahn or Weeze because its a super cheap flight, but its not really convenient.

I have driven all them routes bar Tralee to Cork.
The roads from Waterford to Cahir are in fact better IMO, its worse the other side of it.

There is a far larger fluctuations times travelling to Cork. The traffic can be painful on the south side of the city trying to get to the airport.
No motorway bar the little ring road around cork, unlike Shannon with a uncongested motorway all the way to Dublin and half way to Galway.

As for bus links, Cork doesnt have great ones of these either.

How is cork any bit better than Shannon for access.

keithclancy

Carnacalla wrote: »

I have driven all them routes bar Tralee to Cork.
The roads from Waterford to Cahir are in fact better IMO, its worse the other side of it.

There is a far larger fluctuations times travelling to Cork. The traffic can be painful on the south side of the city trying to get to the airport.
No motorway bar the little ring road around cork, unlike Shannon with a uncongested motorway all the way to Dublin and half way to Galway.

As for bus links, Cork doesnt have great ones of these either.

How is cork any bit better than Shannon for access.

I don't know any German or Dutch Colleagues that have used Shannon Airport when visiting Ireland, nor have I ever heard of them going to visit Limerick.

Also the population of Limerick is half of Cork City and from a Tourist perspective its not very popular.

For me I never have a problem travelling to Cork Airport unless its during rush hour, although this also happens in Dublin on the M50 and when traveling to Shannon it can happen wherever you are leaving to get to Shannon.

When flying from Cork tourists can spend their last night in the City and then get a 10-15 minute taxi ride to the Airport, with Shannon there is not really anywhere within 10-15 minutes taxi ride that's very interesting.

You seem to have some sort of emotional attachment to Shannon judging by your reaction, I'm just telling it like it is from the perspective of a person living abroad visiting Ireland.

I've use Schiphol, Eindhoven, Maastricht, Weeze, Dusseldorf, Cologne.

The only situation I'd consider Shannon Airport would be if it was super cheap, the flight was late in the evening and the car rental was less than 15 euros per day.

JCX BXC

You are trying to argue something with completely wrong information. I will make no further comment bar none of your comments are relevant.

keithclancy

Carnacalla wrote: »

You are trying to argue something with completely wrong information. I will make no further comment bar none of your comments are relevant.

Ok, In any case I'll stick with commuting via Cork and Dublin unless I have something to do in Limerick before my journey.

I guess I've been doing it wrong all this time.

SpaceTime

To be quite honest these comments about Cork airport's location are starting to get absolutely ridiculous.

1) The South Ring N40 isn't a "little ring road". It's one of the busiest and most heavily invested pieces of urban HQDC (built to motorway specs) in Ireland and is pretty much the Cork counterpart to the M50. It's full 6-lane in places and has a 120km/h speed limit over part of its route.

2) Neither Cork nor Shannon are directly connected to Dublin by uncongested motorway.
Cork Airport's off the N40, which is Cork's Southern Ring which is in turn connected to the M8 via the Jack Lynch Tunnel and is of course subjected to Cork City's rush hour traffic.

Shannon is connected to the M7 via the N18 which is effectively Limerick City's ring road. So, if you want to get to Dublin, you're also facing slight delays via Limerick's suburban traffic at peak times.

Both airports are actually exceptionally well connected by road for their size.

The biggest congestion risk for both airports when accessing via Dublin is actually the M50 and N7 Naas Road.

Accessing either Cork or Limerick from Dublin by road, assuming you're not hitting Dublin or Cork/Limerick rush hours is about 2:15 to Limerick and about 2:30 to Cork. Distance wise from Dublin they're very similar.
Both cities are connected by full motorway and actually share the same motorway until after Portlaoise.

Also, Cork airport's connected via a bus connection to Kent Station which is only about 15-20 mins away and linked to Dublin, the Midlands and Kerry and both airports have access to a lot of long distance busses via Cork or Limerick.

Shannon is catching more passengers because it's marketed itself to cheaper airlines and doesn't have a big debt burden to service and has complete independence to market itself as it sees fit.

Cork doesn't, hence the growing figures in one and the sliding figures in the other.

Also bear in mind though that a couple of extra flights into Cork and a couple of lost flights to Shannon could very quickly reverse the statistics and that Cork has had strong passenger numbers for quite a long time without any of the incentives that Shannon has had and without things like counting US troops being transhipped as passengers.

I'm not slagging off Shannon, I'm just saying Cork's hamstrung by its political and administrative situation, not by its location or its transit network.

I just don't get this whole "OMG Cork's collapsed and will have to be shut down" mentality.
It still has more passengers than Shannon and it has historically had a lot more than Shannon, so I think it's simply a matter of marketing it more aggressively and getting airlines back in.

The worst that we could possibly do is just appease Ryanair and start a state-incentised price war between ORK and SNN. That'd be a disaster for both airports and the whole region as it'd just run the two of them into the ground.

SpaceTime

Also, I'm not sure how Google Maps defines "Cork City" as a centre point but Cork Airport's about as close to the city centre as you can get:

https://www.google.ie/maps/dir/St.+Patricks+Quay/Cork+Airport,+Kinsale+Road,+Cork/@51.8732751,-8.5144401,13z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m13!4m12!1m5!1m1!1s0x4844900ef62fe5f7:0x5403592695a33978!2m2!1d-8.468067!2d51.900812!1m5!1m1!1s0x48448fafbf85db05:0xa48d32b2615271d4!2m2!1d-8.492792!2d51.844927

Patrick's Bridge to Cork Airport : 13 minutes by car or 24 minutes by bus.

Taxi from Kent Station Cork (Train) to Cork Airport: €12.60 to €18.00
Distance 9.2 km
No traffic (13 min)
Heavy traffic (24 min)

Taxi from Colbert Station, Limerick to Shannon Airport €32.40 to €43.60
Distance 25.2 km
No traffic (27 min)
Heavy traffic (50 min)

Source: http://www.transportforireland.ie/taxi/taxi-fare-estimator/

I decided to pick Dundrum Shopping Centre as a reasonable departure destination and typical kind of distance out for suburban Dublin.

to Cork Airport
2 h 31 min
264 km

To Shannon Airport:
2 h 13 min
229 km

From West Dublin, let's say Rathcoole:

Shannon:
1 h 57 min
207 km
1 h 53 min without traffic

Cork Airport:
2 h 14 min
242 km
2 h 09 min without traffic

They're both EXTREMELY reachable from Dublin and West Dublin / Leinster if you're anywhere near the M7 which actually gives them a huge catchment if you've got attractive flights.

If you're overnighting, Cork's probably significantly better as it's got a lot more hotel and dining options than Limerick due to the layout and proximity of the city to the airport.

Distance and transport wise, they're both very accessible and I think Cork's just doing a poor job of highlighting how accessible it is from much of the midlands and West Leinster.

JCX BXC

Guess what I just heard on Clare FM?

An ad for Cork Airport! Well played cork.

JCX BXC

In regards your comments above, I've decided not to comment on them as in fairness this the cork thread and rather exaggerated remarks should be expected.

keithclancy

Carnacalla wrote: »

In regards your comments above, I've decided not to comment on them as in fairness this the cork thread and rather exaggerated remarks should be expected.

Assuming everyone on the thread was from Cork.

highlydebased

Carnacalla wrote: »

Guess what I just heard on Clare FM?

An ad for Cork Airport! Well played cork.

Hardly a surprise when Shannon ads are widespread in Cork, though it just comes across as them being at each other to be honest

snotboogie

SpaceTime wrote: »

The worst that we could possibly do is just appease Ryanair and start a state-incentised price war between ORK and SNN. That'd be a disaster for both airports and the whole region as it'd just run the two of them into the ground.

Great post but the alternative seems to be letting Shannon undercut Cork and running Cork airport into the ground. The two should be allowed to compete fairly, which would include allowing Cork to extend the runway, giving it US pre-clearance and separating it from the DAA.

On another note, I've always wondered why there are no flights from Ireland to the Far East? If we can sustain two flights a day to Dubai and another two to Abu Dhabi, I find it hard to believe that we could support one flight a week to Hong Kong or Singapore.

kub

corkonion wrote: »

DAA chairman designate Pádraig Ó Ríordáin told an Oireachtas Transport Committee that the southern hub was now in danger of being overtaken as Ireland’s second-busiest airport, and said it is a ”world-class product” that was faced with the “challenging situation” of terminally-declining traffic figures.,
He revealed passenger numbers last year fell nearly 5% to 2.1 million. That figure is about 15% down on the 2.43 million passengers who used the airport in 2010.
In contrast, Shannon Airport’s total passenger numbers last year grew 17% to 1.64 million.
Ó Ríordáin said much of the drop had come because Ryanair had re-routed many of its eastern European flights to Shannon, which was made independent of the DAA in 2013.
Traffic at Cork has continued to decline despite the fact that airport charges at Cork have not increased in more than 10 years and are highly competitive when compared to Cork’s peers in Britain and central Europe,” he said.

Just to sum that up so, The Chairman of The Dublin Airport Authority has just said that they as an organisation, are failing Cork Airport.

JCX BXC

I find it interesting that Cork seem more focused on Shannon, while Shannon is focused on Dublin. I think both airport should more or less get together to try and get the passengers to stop going to Dublin rather than fighting between eachother.

Mr O Riordan seems to be blaming Shannon a little more than is fair, especially making up incorrect statements about Shannon getting free rents which it isn't. He is all about getting the two airports fighting so that Dublin won't lose any passengers.

Leinster passengers need to know that Dublin is not their only option. There is Cork and Shannon not too far away and despite their recent downfalls they still have quite a few routes, cork having a lot of the Hub access and European routes and Shannon having the Transatlantic traffic with a lesser European side (for now).

I think we have started focusing on the wrong things, but the points I have said above will probably not work until Cork gets independence or at lease more power from the DAA. If you think they will let Cork try and steal a few passengers from DUB in its current state you are mistaken.

Edit: Also, I notice Mr O'Riordan making a big deal as of late of the fact that charges haven't risen in 10 years! Should this mean that rises are in the pipeline?

kub

Carnacalla wrote: »

I find it interesting that Cork seem more focused on Shannon, while Shannon is focused on Dublin. I think both airport should more or less get together to try and get the passengers to stop going to Dublin rather than fighting between eachother.

Mr O Riordan seems to be blaming Shannon a little more than is fair, especially making up incorrect statements about Shannon getting free rents which it isn't. He is all about getting the two airports fighting so that Dublin won't lose any passengers.

Leinster passengers need to know that Dublin is not their only option. There is Cork and Shannon not too far away and despite their recent downfalls they still have quite a few routes, cork having a lot of the Hub access and European routes and Shannon having the Transatlantic traffic with a lesser European side (for now).

I think we have started focusing on the wrong things, but the points I have said above will probably not work until Cork gets independence or at lease more power from the DAA. If you think they will let Cork try and steal a few passengers from DUB in its current state you are mistaken.

Edit: Also, I notice Mr O'Riordan making a big deal as of late of the fact that charges haven't risen in 10 years! Should this mean that rises are in the pipeline?

Some excellent points there, now which airport does it benefit most in this country if Cork was granted independence like Shannon and then the 2 airports go at one another with hammers and tongs and literally start paying the likes of Ryanair to operate to them? Thereby increasing the race to the bottom.

Correct Dublin.

snotboogie

kub wrote: »

Some excellent points there, now which airport does it benefit most in this country if Cork was granted independence like Shannon and then the 2 airports go at one another with hammers and tongs and literally start paying the likes of Ryanair to operate to them? Thereby increasing the race to the bottom.

Correct Dublin.

So the solution is keep the status quo and let Cork suffer to oblivion while Shannon outgrows it?
Dublin is by far the biggest city in the country and will always have the biggest airport. The idea that the DAA are afraid of competition from Cork Airport is ludicrous, you'd have to be offering flights at half the price and screaming it from the rooftops before the Dublin public would ever even consider going to Cork to take a flight. There might be some competition for the small population in South Leinster but it's nothing significant. Right now, the population in Cork are going to Shannon to get flights which should be operating out of Cork and that's the biggest problem for the airport. The DAA are saddling Cork because of the debt, not out of any fears of competition.

JCX BXC

Why should Dublin have 11x mor passengers than Cork? Its pretty obvious what's happening here, the DAA is strangling Cork in favour of Dublin. The DAA man Mr O'Riordan is certainly unhappy with Shannon leaving the DAA, that's obvious by his press release's.

Dublin's Metro population is 1.8million compared to Corks 0.4million, its a little under 5times bigger, yet the airport is 11 times bigger and increasing fast.

Those figures are too extreme for it to be a coincidence, it's pretty clear what's happening, the DAA strangeling Cork. Cork could easily hit 3.5million if they left the DAA.

snotboogie

Carnacalla wrote: »

Why should Dublin have 11x mor passengers than Cork? Its pretty obvious what's happening here, the DAA is strangling Cork in favour of Dublin. The DAA man Mr O'Riordan is certainly unhappy with Shannon leaving the DAA, that's obvious by his press release's.

Dublin's Metro population is 1.8million compared to Corks 0.4million, its a little under 5times bigger, yet the airport is 11 times bigger and increasing fast.

Those figures are too extreme for it to be a coincidence, it's pretty clear what's happening, the DAA strangeling Cork. Cork could easily hit 3.5million if they left the DAA.

It's because Dublin is in a more central location with better transport links and due to being larger has more flights to more locations.

The problem with Cork is you have an airport which gets every favour possible from the government (Transatlantic flights, US military traffic, US pre clearance, freedom from the DAA, a proper runway!! etc etc etc) right in it's backyard, while the government hamstrings Cork at every turn. The public outside of Cork is somewhere between apathetic and outright hostile to the very existence of the airport, so there is no appetite to change anything at the highest level.

JCX BXC

snotboogie wrote: »

It's because Dublin is in a more central location with better transport links and due to being larger has more flights to more locations.

The problem with Cork is you have an airport which gets every favour possible from the government (Transatlantic flights, US military traffic, US pre clearance, freedom from the DAA, a proper runway!! etc etc etc) right in it's backyard, while the government hamstrings Cork at every turn. The public outside of Cork is somewhere between apathetic and outright hostile to the very existence of the airport, so there is no appetite to change anything at the highest level.

That's laughable, Shannon has been hammered down the past few years. You realise that nothing is stopping transatlantic flights at Cork and nothing forcing them at Shannon. The airlines choose to serve Shannon.

snotboogie

Carnacalla wrote: »

That's laughable, Shannon has been hammered down the past few years. You realise that nothing is stopping transatlantic flights at Cork and nothing forcing them at Shannon. The airlines choose to serve Shannon.

The runway at Cork can only accommodate 757's which aren't profitable enough to set up routes from. Cork is run by the DAA which won't extend the runway or campaign for transatlantic routes. How has Shannon been hammered?

JCX BXC

snotboogie wrote: »

The runway at Cork can only accommodate 757's which aren't profitable enough to set up routes from. Cork is run by the DAA which won't extend the runway or campaign for transatlantic routes. How has Shannon been hammered?

All Transatlantic routes at Shannon are on 757's bar one in the peak season? How is it not profitable, in fact I'd say if the runway could accommodate an AN225 it still would have little impact, any TATL route would be on a 757 anyway.

Shannon has been hammered, the DAA hardly gifted Shannon a 2.3million passenger decline?

snotboogie

Carnacalla wrote: »

All Transatlantic routes at Shannon are on 757's bar one in the peak season? How is it not profitable, in fact I'd say if the runway could accommodate an AN225 it still would have little impact, any TATL route would be on a 757 anyway.

Shannon has been hammered, the DAA hardly gifted Shannon a 2.3million passenger decline?

Air France/KLM, Delta and Aerlingus do routes to JFK and newark on A330's and that was just searching one date on skyscanner.

Anyway I was paraphrasing the head of the DAA:
"because of the length of the runway in Cork, there is only one aircraft that could actually fly to the east coast and that is a [Boeing] 757, which has 205 passengers, a relatively small plane. If you think about it, there are a whole load of immediate impediments from an airline’s point of view,” said Mr Ó Ríordáin.

He said the knock-on effect of the low capacity of the 757 could result in higher prices on a route that would only be in operation once or twice a week and serving a single destination.

He added that, from an airline’s perspective, such a service from Cork would merely be luring passengers from Shannon and Dublin"

http://www.irishexaminer.com/business/us-flights-from-cork-face-barriers-234132.html

As for Shannon being hammered? I can't think of a single region of the country that has gotten more benefits and investments over such a sustained period. Is there any other airport in the world plonked in such a small population base?

JCX BXC

snotboogie wrote: »

Air France/KLM, Delta and Aerlingus do routes to JFK and newark on A330's and that was just searching one date on skyscanner.

Not from Shannon.

Anyway I was paraphrasing the head of the DAA:
"because of the length of the runway in Cork, there is only one aircraft that could actually fly to the east coast and that is a [Boeing] 757, which has 205 passengers, a relatively small plane. If you think about it, there are a whole load of immediate impediments from an airline’s point of view,” said Mr Ó Ríordáin.

He said the knock-on effect of the low capacity of the 757 could result in higher prices on a route that would only be in operation once or twice a week and serving a single destination.

He added that, from an airline’s perspective, such a service from Cork would merely be luring passengers from Shannon and Dublin"

http://www.irishexaminer.com/business/us-flights-from-cork-face-barriers-234132.html

That's complete BS. If any carrier was to start TATL from cork, it would be a 757 and stay a 757 for a lonnng time. The only widebody aircraft operating a passenger service to Shannon this year will be an Aer Lingus 767 for June-August. The other 5 daily flights (in peak season) will be 757's.

If the 757 is such a high costing airplane, how come prices at Shannon are routinely cheaper than Dublin (to the USA)?

SpaceTime

The runway is only 7000ft and severely limited by the site.

Is there any long term possibility of extending the secondary runway East-west?

The original plan was to build Cork Airport on flat land between Cork and Midleton, most likely near Carrigtouhil but land prices and no concept that it might need a long runway pushed it up to its current site which is basically on a hill!

It would have been much better to have had the original proposed site but we're stuck with a poor decision now.

JCX BXC

snotboogie wrote: »

As for Shannon being hammered? I can't think of a single region of the country that has gotten more benefits and investments over such a sustained period. Is there any other airport in the world plonked in such a small population base?

The airports passengers more than halved. They dropped from 3.7million to 1.4million.

What benefits is the Shannon region getting besides the airport anyway? Antisocial housing estates? Tumbleweeds blowing down city centres?