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Quote:

Originally Posted by SFUVancouver (Post 7516847)

All official signage in YVR is tri-lingual: English, French, and simplified Chinese.

I could have sworn I saw Japanese and Korean on the signs in YVR as well. Am I not remembering correctly?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Marshal (Post 7516175)

Any experiences with Luftansa: food quality, aircraft quality/vintage. I have never used them going to Europe before, just one tiny fllight within Germany a few years back. I assume they are pretty good.

Also, Frankfurt Airport: how easy to figure out and get around in? Not having use Luftansa, I haven't gone through FRA.

I have managed to book almost everything with them - the booking was very smooth given this is a very last minute and a bit complex.

YVR-FRA-ZRH
3 days Zurich/surroundings, meetings + side trip to CERN
ZRH-VIE
4 days Vienna, meetings, visiting family
VIE-TRS (Austrian Airlines)
1 day Trieste, squeezing two work days into one
TRS-PRG (Austrian Airlines)
2 days Parague, meetings
PRG-VIE
1 day Viena, meetings
VIE-MUC
1 day Munich, site visits and meetings
MUC-FRA-YVR

This was supposed to be a two destination, 3 day trip, in two weeks. But the stars started to align or fall into place, or its black magic, but we have coordinated 4 or 5 site visits, with 3 different client groups. And the travel options also aligned to make this somewhat smooth. It took my main office assistant 3 days to work it all out with her magic: a smooth relay of flights, drives, hotels, meetings and site trips and construction meetings. We also had to build in a fair bit of flexibility, and wow, did the expense start to climb then . . . airlines, car rentals, and hotels just love it when you move outside the box. They are so happy, as if I was actually shoveling gold into their sac. And boy, do they ever become deferential.

I am actually on one of the Lufthansa flights out of Vancouver tomorrow. And picked it over LHR or Paris.

I don't ever talk about this stuff (work specifics) but it was a pretty cool feat to me, and it kind of fits with the crazy travel reports of late.

Now do I 'want' to do this? Overall, no. The work will accomplish much and make life good upon returning, we'll see if I can keep it all straight. Some of it will be pretty cool (some of the site visits), visiting my son in Vienna, getting an insiders tour of Cern. It should be good: but from hear it looks like 50 flights, 50 transfers, 50 road trips, 1,000 meetings, 50 hotels, 5 days and a couple cool things . . . all exaggerations, but from home that's what I see ahead. I am used to grouping projects together into single trips, but, for me, this is nuts.

Lufthansa is German. There is a certain, utilitarian and reserved nature to their operation. If you are in to Star Trek think of an airline run by Vulcans. That is actually good. Strong focus on getting people where they need to be on time. Creature comforts are pretty good. You realise Swiss Airlines and Austrian Airlines are owned by Lufthansa. They interline well and generally connections go well. If things get delayed they have usually figured out how to fix the problem before you even ask.

FRA is a very well organised airport and things run smoothly the vast majority of the time. MUC is better than FRA in that it is a newer terminal and basically a single building for all things Star Alliance. The non-star airlines are in a separate building. I would much prefer transiting in Germany or Switzerland over LHR.

Zurich and Geneva (where CERN) is quite expensive cities. IF you locations are close to a train station I would pass on the rental car and just do trains but that's me.

I am usually only hitting one or two cities these days on a Europe trip. About 10 years ago I would averaging one European trip every second month to visit supplier. Usually meeting during the day and try to catch the evening flight to the next city. After a trip like that you generally need a vacation that does not involve any air travel.

Have fun it is a great part of the world to be in. If you get to go down into the CERN Tunnels they are impressive. The entire cite is impressive.

Report from the Toronto Board of Trade regarding airport growth in the region.

I'm intrigued to see so much interest in Peterborough for expansion, considering it does not have a control tower or FSS station.

https://www.bot.com/Portals/0/Images...mit_Report.pdf

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Chemist (Post 7516118)

They've also got Japanese and Korean on them as well. But fuck the large number of non-English speaking Asian tourists passing through YVR, right? :rolleyes:

Would seeing English on signs in an airport in China piss you off as well?

Well-said. :tup:

Don't know if these were posted, but YUL stats for June:

Domestic +10.4%
International +3.9%
Transborder +4.4%

Overall +6.6%

+4.8% for the 2nd quarter of 2016

YUL is at 7,867,912, +4.9% YTD

New check-in hall at Halifax airport, with a much higher ceiling than before:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped...ck-in_hall.jpg

(source: me via Wikipedia)

Before renovations:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped..._Airport_9.jpg

(source)

here's something I've notice at Saskatoon's YXE John G Diefenbaker International Airport that i've never seen in an other Canadian city before..

https://c1.staticflickr.com/9/8006/2...43e38fbe_o.png

Washrooms doubling as tornado storm shelters is ubiquitous in American MidWestern airports but I've never seen in any other Canadian city besides Saskatoon before..

I noticed those when I flew through there too. And was wondering if anywhere else in Canada has them. Anybody know?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Coldrsx (Post 7516250)

^CERN is awesome!

It certainly was. I got a behind the scenes tour with my son: a trip around the LHC tunnel (the size hits home); able to get up close to the LHC - makes aircraft look low tech; watched ALICE detection computers during a collision producing, well there's the downside: tons of waiting around and then pow, except if you cannot imagine heavy ions and plasmas, there's not that much to experience. The campus is bigger than I thought, and more crowded. Also got into a huge store room where old parts of the Large Electron–Positron Collider (LEP) are stored: able to touch & pick up most things that were small enough. Amazing stuff for 1980's.

Airplanes. Lufthansa was fine. I must be getting old, YVR-FRA almost killed me (I have never been able to sleep on a flight, even in 1st class). Interesting observation concerning FRA: the planes park, pull out and taxi a ridiculous speeds. Waiting for my connection to ZRH I was startled when an A380 went by right outside the window at 30 km/hr (surely slower, but it felt like it). Watching thereafter, more big planes kept going by at similar speeds. Crazy. I wonder if the 3 or 4 short control towers are dedicated to ground traffic. Zurich: On the way down it was interesting to see a high speed train traveling below us in the same direction - it took quite a while for us to eventually pull away and leave it behind; and, there's a giant Swiss Army knife painted onto a field under the approach. Next stop Vienna.

The Halifax renovation looks great.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Marshal (Post 7516175)

Any experiences with Luftansa: food quality, aircraft quality/vintage. I have never used them going to Europe before, just one tiny fllight within Germany a few years back. I assume they are pretty good.

Also, Frankfurt Airport: how easy to figure out and get around in? Not having use Luftansa, I haven't gone through FRA.

I have managed to book almost everything with them - the booking was very smooth given this is a very last minute and a bit complex.

YVR-FRA-ZRH
3 days Zurich/surroundings, meetings + side trip to CERN
ZRH-VIE
4 days Vienna, meetings, visiting family
VIE-TRS (Austrian Airlines)
1 day Trieste, squeezing two work days into one
TRS-PRG (Austrian Airlines)
2 days Parague, meetings
PRG-VIE
1 day Viena, meetings
VIE-MUC
1 day Munich, site visits and meetings
MUC-FRA-YVR

This was supposed to be a two destination, 3 day trip, in two weeks. But the stars started to align or fall into place, or its black magic, but we have coordinated 4 or 5 site visits, with 3 different client groups. And the travel options also aligned to make this somewhat smooth. It took my main office assistant 3 days to work it all out with her magic: a smooth relay of flights, drives, hotels, meetings and site trips and construction meetings. We also had to build in a fair bit of flexibility, and wow, did the expense start to climb then . . . airlines, car rentals, and hotels just love it when you move outside the box. They are so happy, as if I was actually shoveling gold into their sac. And boy, do they ever become deferential.

I don't ever talk about this stuff (work specifics) but it was a pretty cool feat to me, and it kind of fits with the crazy travel reports of late.

Now do I 'want' to do this? Overall, no. The work will accomplish much and make life good upon returning, we'll see if I can keep it all straight. Some of it will be pretty cool (some of the site visits), visiting my son in Vienna, getting an insiders tour of Cern. It should be good: but from hear it looks like 50 flights, 50 transfers, 50 road trips, 1,000 meetings, 50 hotels, 5 days and a couple cool things . . . all exaggerations, but from home that's what I see ahead. I am used to grouping projects together into single trips, but, for me, this is nuts.

Lufthansa is a great airline to fly! Decent food and drinks included in economy. I was last row a an A340 MUC-YUL a few years back and the flight attendent told me to help myself to the beer in the galley which was directly behind me. Perfect!!! FRA is not hard to get around at all i found and quite spacious given the amount of large aircraft there.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Marshal (Post 7519735)

That sounds fantastic. I had a bit of a behind the scenes in 1995.

Update from YVR on year-to-date traffic:

http://www.yvr.ca/en/media/news-rele...traffic-update

Year-Over-Year Passenger Growth Highlights: January – June, 2016

* 10.5 million passengers YTD, an 8.1% increase over the same period in 2015
* 13.7% increase in International traffic (Asia Pacific up 12.9%, Latin America up 20%, Europe up 12.9%)
* 7.6% increase in Domestic traffic
* 3.8% increase in Transborder (US) traffic

Amazing results, and lots more services and increases still to come, as well as the big summer travel seasons numbers, which don't hit until July and August :D

Quote:

Originally Posted by Marshal (Post 7516175)

Any experiences with Luftansa: food quality, aircraft quality/vintage. I have never used them going to Europe before, just one tiny fllight within Germany a few years back. I assume they are pretty good.

Also, Frankfurt Airport: how easy to figure out and get around in? Not having use Luftansa, I haven't gone through FRA.

I have managed to book almost everything with them - the booking was very smooth given this is a very last minute and a bit complex.

YVR-FRA-ZRH
3 days Zurich/surroundings, meetings + side trip to CERN
ZRH-VIE
4 days Vienna, meetings, visiting family
VIE-TRS (Austrian Airlines)
1 day Trieste, squeezing two work days into one
TRS-PRG (Austrian Airlines)
2 days Parague, meetings
PRG-VIE
1 day Viena, meetings
VIE-MUC
1 day Munich, site visits and meetings
MUC-FRA-YVR

This was supposed to be a two destination, 3 day trip, in two weeks. But the stars started to align or fall into place, or its black magic, but we have coordinated 4 or 5 site visits, with 3 different client groups. And the travel options also aligned to make this somewhat smooth. It took my main office assistant 3 days to work it all out with her magic: a smooth relay of flights, drives, hotels, meetings and site trips and construction meetings. We also had to build in a fair bit of flexibility, and wow, did the expense start to climb then . . . airlines, car rentals, and hotels just love it when you move outside the box. They are so happy, as if I was actually shoveling gold into their sac. And boy, do they ever become deferential.

I don't ever talk about this stuff (work specifics) but it was a pretty cool feat to me, and it kind of fits with the crazy travel reports of late.

Now do I 'want' to do this? Overall, no. The work will accomplish much and make life good upon returning, we'll see if I can keep it all straight. Some of it will be pretty cool (some of the site visits), visiting my son in Vienna, getting an insiders tour of Cern. It should be good: but from hear it looks like 50 flights, 50 transfers, 50 road trips, 1,000 meetings, 50 hotels, 5 days and a couple cool things . . . all exaggerations, but from home that's what I see ahead. I am used to grouping projects together into single trips, but, for me, this is nuts.

Frankfurt is a big terminal(s). It can easily take 45 minutes to get off the International flight and over to the connecting flight. I've had several trips through the airport where International flight lands on one side and domestic is on the other side probably loading off the tarmac. Be prepared for long walk, customs, elevator, broken travelators, bus ride out to far end to the tarmac. If you have 2 hour layover no problem, one hour layover get on your horse.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jawagord (Post 7522034)

Bang on. I had plenty of time but had a 20+ minute walk to transfer. Everything was good except signage: the direction signage didn't give a continuous feed (told to turn left for my gate, then no sign 'saying' to continue straight). Easy enough but if I wasn't good with directions it could have been confusing/unconfirming at a few points. But generally all was good + watching planes taxi at those speeds, 20 m from the window, would have made a crappy airport worth one trip.

Lufthansa was fine, not much different than AC though.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Marshal (Post 7522174)

If you want confusing (or much rather, complete lack of) signage, try LAX. Got off the plane from PVG, was supposed to take a connecting flight to SFO. Got dumped out of the international area to find absolutely NO signage pointing me to where I needed to go, which was in another terminal. Not even an information desk where I could ask where to go. Absolutely ridiculous, and pathetic for such a major airport.

Quote:

Originally Posted by The Chemist (Post 7522197)

Agree. For me, LAX, Heathrow and both of Tokyo's can be puzzling. When exhausted, following signage can be a challenge . . . though a bit of prep before makes any of them pretty easy.

Had to fly to Bratislava a couple of days ago: simple basic little airport for a city of ~600,000.

Some good news from YVR

Quote:

Vancouver International Airport planning major terminal expansion after record growth

Quote:

Canada’s second busiest and largest airport is poised to experience another consecutive record breaking year for the number of passengers that travel through the airport. Vancouver International Airport (YVR) clocked 10.5 million passengers during the first half of 2016 from January to 2016, representing an 8.5% increase over the same period last year.

This comprises of a 13.7% increase in international traffic, 7.6% increase in domestic traffic, and a 3.8% increase in transborder traffic to and from the United States.

By the end of the year, the airport projects that it will see 21.3 million passengers – one million more passengers than the previous year.

Most of the growth can be attributed to the decision by a number of airlines to introduce new frequent, non-stop services to the airport in 2015 and during the first two quarters of this year. This includes new major WestJet services to London and Hamilton in Ontario and London, UK as well as Air Canada’s new services to Brisbane, Chicago, Dublin, San Diego, and San Jose.

More services are to be added throughout the latter half of the year. Just last week, Xiamen Airlines launched a new three times weekly service to Xiamen, China, and Air Canada plans to start a three times weekly service to Delhi, India beginning on October 20.

Additionally, WestJet plans to boost its existing routes with more frequent flights, adding 47 new weekly flights to the airport beginning in October 2016 on routes to Kelowna, Prince George, Toronto, Honolulu, Cancun, Cabo San Lucas, and Los Angeles. The airline’s direct seasonal service to Montreal will also be extended to the winter months.

“I would like to thank Air Canada, WestJet and our airline partners, who have contributed to a fantastic period of growth for our airport and our region,” said Craig Richmond, President and CEO of the Vancouver Airport Authority, in a statement. “Thanks to the ongoing support of our airline partners and the hard work of our team, which includes local tourism bodies, we are achieving our vision—to make YVR a world-class connecting hub.”

Last year, YVR saw a record 20.3 million passengers, representing a 4.9% increase over 2014’s cumulative figure of 19.4 million. The airport has seen record-breaking growth since 2013 when it recorded 17.9 million passengers, and it has a stated goal of reaching 25 million passengers by 2020.

YVR is expected to release an ambitious terminal building expansion plan to accommodate the projected growth next year as the facilities currently have a capacity for 25 million passengers.

A $400 million expansion to add 10 gates to the international terminal and old domestic piers could be completed by the end of the decade if the project is approved this year.

During a Vancouver Board of Trade presentation last year, Vancouver Airport Authority President and CEO Craig Richmond provided a glimpse of the options being considered for the bulk of the expansion work after 2020. It would consist of at least 20 more gates either as a massive new terminal building east of the existing transborder terminal, an extension of the existing piers, or an in-field terminal that is accessible to passengers by tunnel or shuttle.

“The numbers show we are well on the way towards reaching our ambitious goal of 25 million passengers by 2020,” Richmond told Daily Hive today. “As we approach that important milestone we are assessing terminal expansion options and we’ll have more specific information on that in early 2017.”
New and improved major YVR routes 2015/2016

March 15, 2015: Manila, Philippines and New York City, U.S.A. – Philippine Airlines adds four weekly flights to its route from Manila to NYC, with a stop in Vancouver.
March 29, 2015: Paris, France – Air France begins three times weekly non-stop flight service, with five times weekly schedules during the summer months.
May 1, 2015: Osaka, Japan – Air Canada Rouge begins five times weekly service to Kansai International Airport.
June 26, 2015: Kungming, China – China Eastern Airlines begins three times weekly flight service via Shanghai.
December 9, 2015: Mexico City, Mexico – Aeromexico to begin daily non-stop flight service.
January 1, 2016: Orlando International Airport – WestJet to begin twice weekly non-stop seasonal flight service.
January 20, 2016: Orlando-Sanford International Airport – National Airlines to begin two times weekly seasonal flight service.
February 15, 2016: Cancun, Mexico – Air Canada to begin weekly, non-stop seasonal service.
May 1, 2016: London Heathrow Airport – British Airways to use an AirBus A380 superjumbo jet for its existing daily non-stop London Heathrow Airport service. The A380 will only be used during the summer months.
May 6, 2016: London Gatwick Airport – WestJet to begin six times weekly non-stop flight service.
May 9, 2016: Norman Y. Mineta San Jose International Airport – Air Canada to begin twice daily, non-stop service to San Jose.
June 1, 2016: Brisbane, Australia – Air Canada to begin daily non-stop flight service.
June 2, 2016: San Diego International Airport – Air Canada to begin daily, non-stop seasonal service.
June 4, 2016: Chicago O’Hare International Airport – Air Canada to begin daily, non-stop service.
June 10, 2016: Dublin Airport – Air Canada to begin seasonal non-stop flight service.
June 29, 2016: London, Ontario – WestJet to begin four times weekly non-stop seasonal flight service.
June 29, 2016: Halifax, Nova Scotia – WestJet to begin four times weekly non-stop seasonal flight service.
June 30, 2016: Hamilton, Ontario – WestJet to begin three times weekly non-stop seasonal flight service.
July 25, 2016: Xiamen, China – Xiamen Airlines to begin three times weekly non-stop flight service.
October 20, 2016: Delhi, India – Air Canada to begin three times weekly non-stop flight service.

http://dailyhive.com/vancouver/vanco...inal-expansion

2015 Canadian Airport Cargo Stats

Cargo Stats for 2015

Tonnes of cargo and % change from 2014:

1 YYZ 367,983 up 3.1%
2 YVR 238,096 up 9.6%
3 YHM 110,797 up 24.5%
4 YYC 83,154 down 2.8%
5 YUL 79,800 up 4.0%
6 YMX 70,185 up 9.4%
7 YWG 65,878 up 7.6%
8 YQM 28,986 up 36.3%
9 YEG 27,918 up 1.1%
10 YHZ 26,703 down 6.9%

http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/51-203-...0/t005-eng.htm

YHM and YQM had insane growth in 2015.

:previous:

Go YQM!!! :D

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