So no more LCY-AMS ?

 

Nowhere has that been stated, or even suggested. The plan is that all flights will continue but they will be run commercially by WX rather than as franchises for AF (except for those routes stated to be run as franchises for A5).

 

This news is not a surprise (in the pipe of decision for a couple of years).

Still a sad news.

I personally like very much City Jet for the quality of the staff (really international, very professional and attentive). And very convenient to me to reach LCY.

 

I am quite fond of CityJet too, even if I don't fly frequently with them (only when going to LCY, in fact).

 

And if WX and/or AF significantly reduce their LCY capacities or even disappear from some routes there is a chance that carriers like BA Cityflyer will fill the gap, which wouldn't be bad.

 

+1
An A318 is way too big now for this route. I was clearly thinking like you about an AF flight operated by HOP. CRJ700 or E145 or ATR, depending which type is qualified for operations in LCY.

 

I very much enjoyed flying Cityjet from LCY when I was living in London (actually, my preference for flying from LCY is what made me choose the name cityflyer).
I haven't flown Cityjet for a while as I am not based in London anymore, but I will miss them as part of what AF had to offer.

 

LCY-AMS is a bit of a special one. I don't know if it is still the case but when WX took it over from KL, it was still formally considered as 'operated by KL cityhopper with WX plane and crew' whatever that was supposed to mean. I have no clue if the labelling has now finally changed (it certainly was like that several years) but if so, my guess is that KLC will simply retake the route on its own metal.

 

Quite the same for me: GVA was a really useful route, and I seem to remember Strasbourg being useful too. Wasn't GVA operated by a FlyBaboo plane for a while? (FlyBaboo got taken over by Darwin Airline).

 

I'm not too sure to be honest: I think that BA are currently flying what they want to fly out of LCY and most of the WX routes seem like losers to me. I could imagine a few being salvaged like LCY-DUB and the Scottish routes or I could imagine some to be cannibalised (like AB/Niki taking over the Muenster route) but beyond that I wouldn't have too much hope...

 

Concerning the failure of the operation at LCY, I always wondered how long it would last to have AF flight numbers on domestic flights between Edinburgh and London and places as offbeat as Dundee. It never seems to take off, does it, when a foreign operator has flights wholly outwith their own country. Didn't British Midland operate flights between Cologne-Bonn and Rome once in the distant past? And didn't BA operate flights between Rome and Athens in the not so distant past? The only airlines which seem to have mastered it are easyJet and Ryanair.

 

I am not sure it is a "foreign" operator issue per se as simply one of being a new entrant in a market which is dominated by another carrier. Look at Air UK and bmi: they struggled to compete with BA and had to seek the backing of stronger, foreign airlines (KL and LH respectively) and eventually still had to cave in. Ditto with Deutsche BA, TAT, Air Libert�, Braathens, etc...

You really need to be able to offer something genuinely different to succeed and that is why the LCCs managed it whereas the legacy carriers did not. In addition to Easyjet and Ryanair, Wizzair also established themselves outside their original base. AB also have a base in PMI. That said, the LCC market too is becoming more difficult as the opportunities are not as wide as before and FR and U2 have become increasingly dominant on that segment.
EI tried to establish themselves at LGW with their semi-LCC product and failed. We will have to see how Norwegian fare at LGW but the London LCC market is very competitive and is a rather tough nut to crack. Vueling have also established a base in FLR although it is still too early to judge how it is performing.

I have no recollection of either. bmi (at any rate bmi regional) flew some seriously odd routes (LBA-LIL or ABZ-GRQ anyone? ) but I do not recall any that did not have at least one end in the UK.

 

ABZ-GRQ was not such a strange route when you consider that Groningen sits on Europe's largest natural gas field, which is exploited by Shell who also have a huge presence in Aberdeen.

 

Fair point in principle.
I note, though, that the route received subsidies from the Scottish Executive every single year, which is rather interesting for a route which is supposed to serve the needs of the oil industry and also appears to be among the thinnest routes supported by said Exec (other routes with less pax include ABZ-SYY, INV-LBA, LSI-STN, DND-BHD)

To give a sense of proportion, ABZ-AMS typically carries in the region of 280 to 300K pax per annum. ABZ-GRQ carried at the height of its 'popularity' circa 11K pax per annum. More recently, it was more in the region of 3 to 4K pax per annum.
Groningen is about 2hrs by train from AMS with a frequency of every 1/2 hr.
All in all, I remain unconvinced by the business case for the route (setting aside public subsidies) nor by the case for the Scottish taxpayer to subsidise the air transport needs of the oil industry.

 

That's the issue. Out of all the HOP aircraft only the ATR and the E170-195 are authorized to land at LCY. Do they still have E135s in the fleet? They can also go there. They no longer have the F70 which was also allowed. CRJ700 and E145 cannot operate from LCY as far as I know.