Additionally WS is opposing and asking the government to reject the AC / TS sale or to impose restrictions like requiring them to give up slots, not allowing AC / TS to use terminal 3 at YYZ, and not allowing Transat customers access Aeroplan etc.

The airports specifically mentioned about slots are LHR, AMS, and YYZ.

https://ca.travelpulse.com/news/airl...c2paw.facebook

I read about WS's appeal earlier this month. I find this quote funny:

lol. No it won't, at least not at LHR or AMS. TS doesn't even serve LHR and has limited summer seasonal slots at AMS (sub daily I believe, but not 100% sure). AC has a single daily slot pair at AMS. Hardly groundbreaking stuff.

WS is clearly trying to serve its own interests in the matter, at least in LHR and AMS. It won't work. They should be able to get some slots at YYZ though.

While I'm generally opposed to the AC/TS merger as it meaningfully reduces competition in a fair chunk of the country, Westjet is really asking for a lot.

I always thought Air Transat would have been a better buy for Westjet, personally. It would have shored them up in their weakest Canadian market (Quebec) and provided a discount carrier to shuttle people to the sun destinations during the winter. It would have even got Westjet some nice AMS slots - all the better to chase KLM out of the Alberta market with! You'd never integrate the two fully, but run them as separate airlines under the same corporate parent with a codeshare agreement.

Alas, AC beat them to the punch.

All objections will be in the commercial interest of the objector, otherwise what is the point.

I think it would be reasonable to require AC/TS to give up slots in London. But it should be up to AC/TS to decide if it is going to give up slots at Gatwick or Heathrow. AC would have no issue giving up Gatwick slots. They can always handle the TS customers that would have been going to London by using larger aircraft to Heathrow.

Not certain why AC/TS would want anything to do with Terminal 3. The would probably be happy to consolidate in T1.

Paris CDG is the airport WS should be focused on getting more slots in.

Agreed, on both accounts.

The fact that WS is irrelevant in Quebec - even before this merger happens - doesn't help their case. The AC/TS merger will hurt YUL passengers more than at any other airport in Canada.

I agree, but the objections need to make sense. They don't, at least not at LHR and AMS. Like you said, there is a case to be made about more access to CDG, but they don't mention that airport in the appeal, and they should have, as both AC and TS have a significant presence at CDG, and that is where competition will be affected the most in Europe.

I initially thought that with the vaccine rollouts starting last December, 2021 was going to be a far better year for our airports. Sadly, the way things have unfolded in the last couple of weeks (vaccine delays, testing requirements for inbound pax, and now this), tells me my initial assessment might have been wrong.

2021 might be even worse than 2020 for air travel, unfortunately. Hopefully I'm wrong and the dust will finally settle later this year, with most restrictions being lifted.

I'm curious about where would be the better long-term play for Westjet - CDG or AMS.

CDG has the advantage of being very tourist-heavy, so the planes are full in the back. It's a pain to transit though, which might hurt business passengers.

AMS is better to transit passengers and chasing KLM out of Alberta means those dollars are going into Westjet's pockets. However, there's somewhat less of a tourist draw.

AF and KLM have pretty big networks so that's a wash.

I didn't think CDG was congested enough that it was slot restricted? WS has been steadily rising its presence there with twice daily flights scheduled presently for S21. I imagine that's why it was omitted.

LHR can handle a max of around 540,000 movements/year, due to it's shortage of runways. AMS, even though it has plenty of runways, is artificially capped at 500,000 movements by the Dutch government. (I think the limit was raised to 540,000 sometime in 2020).

The only reason WS mentioned LHR and AMS is because both airports are maxed out in term of slots, and therefore it is near impossible for WS to penetrate either without investing a significant amount of money purchasing slots. (Needless to say, airlines need to be willing to sell slots in the first place, and the timing of the slots need to be favorable to the purchasing carrier's route/schedule). Anyhow, WS wants in to both, but can't. The AC/TS merger presents an opportunity for WS to sneak in the back door, of sorts, and steal some AC slots at either/both. It won't work.

CDG, even though it is a level 3 slot coordinated airport, same as LHR and AMS, still has room to grow, due to its 4 parallel runways. It handled 498,000 movements in 2019, and can easily increase that to 600,000+. (Just look at LAX, another airport with 4 parallel runways, which handled 691,000 movements in 2019)

WS already has service to CDG, and the airport has room to grow. So those are the main reasons why they didn't mention it in their appeal. They already serve it and can increase service fairly easily tomorrow if they wanted to, Their priority, however, is access to LHR/AMS. So you see, this has less to do with the AC/TS merger, and more to do with what WS wants.

Hence why it won't work, because it doesn't make sense for the EU to grant their request. Competition at LHR or AMS will not decrease in any significant way because of the AC/TS merger. It will decrease significantly at airports like CDG, FCO, VCE, BCN, NCE etc.

If anything, I'd argue that if WS gets AMS slots, and then later ties up with AF/KL in a joint venture, it will significantly decrease competition in/out of AMS, since KL is the leading carrier from AMS to Canada, and WS will only add to that. AC/TS are minuscule compared to KL out of AMS to Canada.

Sounds like the KLM announcement may have been premature as the airline is currently working with the government on getting an exception for its crew to continue long-haul operations. Apparently even the crew union was caught off guard by this announcement too.

https://vnconline.nl/actueel/media-l...t-op-klm-zaken

Flights are still open for booking as of now, so I guess we await further developments. Wouldn't want to be an employee at their contact centres right now.

Air Canada has loaded some new routes into the system coming soon, still need to be announced.

YUL-DEL 3/week effective Apr 18 (B789)
YUL-CAI 3/week effective Jun 17 (B789)

A quick check on AC timetable will confirm this.
https://www.aircanada.com/ca/en/aco/...schedules.html

Going after VFR traffic, which is the new gold standard of long haul flying it seems. CAI doesn’t surprise me. YUL-DEL does though. Didn’t think the market was big enough to support its own non stop. If it is priced correctly, they will be stealing traffic away from QR to India, that’s for sure.

Bingo there it is.
YUL-DOH going daily in Feb, this is no doubt the push back on YUL territory.

YUL is becoming a very complete hub for AC.

In addition to YKA-YXS, Central Mountain Air are suspending 2 other routes:

Route Changes

Between - Dates

Fort Nelson / Prince George - Suspended February 3 to earliest May 3
Kamloops / Prince George - Suspended February 3 to earliest April 5
Edmonton* / High Level - Suspended February 3 to earliest May 3
Vancouver / Kamloops - Starts April 5, 2x weekly

https://www.newswire.ca/news-release...896331295.html

Federal government provides back dated funding for essential air service to remote Northern Ontario airports.

https://stockhouse.com/news/press-re...rio-to-support

Sorry, VFR traffic? I don't think it means what I think it means in this context. I don't think they are flying at 12500' the whole way!

CDG can probably handle 700,000 movements. LAX (pre-COVID) isn't so much movement capped as it is gate capped, which in-turn caps movements...save for corporate jets.

YUL-DEL is very surprising. I'd say launching in April though is a pipe dream given the recent gutting of remaining services...unless AC want to lose boat loads of $. Not enough of the country will be vaccinated for by April...especially given the vaccine delivery delays.

YUL-CAI not so much given all the other North Africa traffic YUL has. But again, this would make more sense for summer 2022. Summer 2021's going to be a write-off.

VFR pax as in Visiting Friends and Relatives

LAX has a sizable chunk of it's movements as narrowbodies, moreso than CDG, due to the massive size of the US domestic market.

By contrast, CDG sees much more heavies than LAX. So 700,000 is doable, but not much more than that. Heavy aircraft need more time to takeoff and could also take longer to vacate the active runway after landing. Basically they occupy the runway a longer time, decreasing total aircraft movement capacity for the airport.

So even though I drew a parallel between the two airports - barring any gate issues - LAX should always be able to handle more movements than CDG, due to the number of heavy aircraft CDG sees. Turnaround times at the gate for narrowbodies is also much shorter, which helps with the movement numbers.

AI and AC haven't seemed to take their foot of the gas of all the other Canada-India non stop traffic at YYZ/YVR. The suspension of international flights to India is until January 31, 2021. Chances are India will extend that ban, and continue with the various travel bubble agreements it has. YUL-DEL might make sense in the short term in a travel bubble context, as the non stop is shielded from competition from outside carriers offering 1 stop service. Obvioulsy once the travel bubble is relaxed, the chances of this route staying decrease.

Right now, until January 31, 2021, QR cannot sell YUL-DOH-DEL.

https://www.india-briefing.com/news/...es-20683.html/

Assuming QR is allowed to sell YUL-DOH-DEL. Right now, until Jan 31, they aren't. Chances are the ban will be extended. Which helps AC on the route, and might be the only reason why they are launching YUL-DEL.

India has been extending the ban 1 month at a time.

KLM operated much of its long-haul routes as scheduled today despite the uncertainly. A person flying on KL677 AMS-YYC said the crew didn't even know if they would be working flights back or simply deadheading straight back to AMS even after they took off.

So far flights are still scheduled and bookable.