YVR Airport & Sea Island Developments Discussion - Page 170

deasine · #**3381** Posted **Jan 17, 2011, 11:41 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Spork

Uh oh. Taking that same flight in about a month. :o

Just a word of warning, not that it's related the the flight incident, but due to the FA and GC Union-Management wars in Hong Kong, GCs here follow rules down to the wire now: handcarries not over 7kg, and luggage not over 23kg.

twoNeurons · #**3382** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 5:01 AM**

^^^previous^^^

Is it temporary?

Gordon · #**3383** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 6:09 AM**

A customer service clerk at YVR says that China Southern has not yet announced a start date for the YVR - CAN route.

The flights are available on China Southern's website www.csair.com\e but not on expedia.ca or travelocity.ca.

Yume-sama · #**3384** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 6:21 AM**

AC has supposedly "postponed" (maybe a nice word for canceled?) their YVR - HND flight commencement. A friend of mine was planning to book from HND - YVR round trip and was told of this "indefinite" postponement today on the phone with AC. My guess is due to the odd timing of flights the pre-bookings were very slow. Oddly, the flight still shows up on their website. Though, nearly the entire aircraft is empty for the first flight on March 3rd, whereas the YVR - NRT flight is completely booked, I'm assuming they moved people over to that flight.

trofirhen · #**3385** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 6:44 AM**

Boy ... if / when YVR gets a scheduled service to Paris, will it be to CDG or Orly? I'm losing sleep over it already.

xd_1771 · #**3386** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 6:58 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by zahav

Philippine Airlines will start flying its 777 extended range aircraft on some of its flights to YVR (the flights that don't go to Vegas). The capacity is much bigger than its current 340 service (370 seats vs. 264 on the 340). Will be a nice summer addition

Excellent. I've had nice views of the 773ER already while I was in Manila this winter break. The additional capacity over that weak 343 should prove very useful. I was hoping they'd do this

deasine · #**3387** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 8:20 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by twoNeurons

^^^previous^^^

Is it temporary?

It's going to be in effect until the management settles something with the union (or vice versa). Analyzing this situation though, it's going to take a long time because neither party seems to be willing to move. CX has had record profits last year and has given everyone pay increases. The Union wants to take this opportunity to fight for even more money and benefits.

Until then, handcarries are strictly 7 kg (excluding weight of laptop, which they'll kindly ask you to remove out of your handcarry when measuring), and regular luggages are 23 kg.

Quote:

Originally Posted by trofirhen

Boy ... if / when YVR gets a scheduled service to Paris, will it be to CDG or Orly? I'm losing sleep over it already.

Stop beating a dead horse. But anyways, answering that question, it will not be ORY. There are few airlines that fly there, no Star Alliance carriers, making ORY a final-destination airport as opposed to a transfer airport. Keep in mind, carriers generally only fly to the "smaller" of the main airports if it uses that airport as a main hub, or it needs to take off demand for another route. This is particularly one reason why AC is planning to fly to both NRT and HAN. NRT will act as more of a transfer hub, and HAN as a final destination airport.

Aside from the low demand on a YVR-CDG route, YVR serves few SkyTeam airlines (meaning it won't be a good hub for AF-KL to connect with DL), and CDG is not a Star Alliance hub either (competition from LHR and FRA). This is why AF flies to SEA and not YVR, because there are so many more connections with partner carrier DL (also keep in mind, SEA was once a hub for DL, only now has it been downgraded to a focus city). Even if WS joins SkyTeam, there are still not enough connections and not enough demand. Keep in mind, charter carrier Transat only flies direct to CDG seasonally, and it's only 1-2 times a week.

Johnny Aussie · #**3388** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 9:44 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gordon

A customer service clerk at YVR says that China Southern has not yet announced a start date for the YVR - CAN route.

No offence to the customer service clerk at YVR, but Chinese airlines are not known for being prompt with press releases when announcing new services. Therefore, not surprising, he or she does not know about it.

However, these flights are loaded in various GDS and effective 15 June 2011.

How soon 'til the next big announcement / new service?

Johnny Aussie · #**3389** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 9:58 AM**

Sorry as I sound like a broken record, but here we go again....

Not a massive bump, but still not bad...

CX increasing its second daily flight to HKG (CX 839) to all 744 versus a mix of 744/343. Summer 2010 the flight was 3 weekly 744 and 4 weekly 343. Summer 2011 (up to today) was planned to be 4/wkly 744 and 3/wkly 343. Now all daily 744 effective end of March.

Increase is about 370 seats per week.

Gordon · #**3390** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 3:24 PM**

Accordong to Air Canada's Website the YVR HND service starts in March.

Yume-sama · #**3391** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 4:49 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gordon

Accordong to Air Canada's Website the YVR HND service starts in March.

Yeah, you just can't book it anymore mysteriously. There have been news reports in Japan about just how bad the new terminal at Haneda is. No places to eat, no trains, no buses, etc. nothing to kill time during those hours. The only hotel is the Tokyu in the ANA terminal, and the shuttle bus for that stops at 11 pm! You're pretty much trapped overnight unless you pay $200 for a taxi lol

teriyaki · #**3392** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 5:51 PM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yume-sama

Yeah, you just can't book it anymore mysteriously. There have been news reports in Japan about just how bad the new terminal at Haneda is. No places to eat, no trains, no buses, etc. nothing to kill time during those hours. The only hotel is the Tokyu in the ANA terminal, and the shuttle bus for that stops at 11 pm! You're pretty much trapped overnight unless you pay $200 for a taxi lol

Also found news reports saying how massively popular the new terminal is, even becoming a travelling destination itself for the locals.

A surprising name recently has joined the pantheon of popular Tokyo tourist spots--Haneda Airport's international terminal.

Since the international terminal opened in October, it has been inundated with visitors who came to the airport not for flights but to stroll the terminal itself. The sightseers outnumber genuine air passengers by more than 2-to-1 on weekends and holidays, according to the airport...

http://www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/T110111004700.htm

Gordon · #**3393** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 6:08 PM**

It looks like they are accepting reservations, I've only gone as far as the page that requests personal information but it does seem that is possible to complete a reservation.

Yume-sama · #**3394** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 7:59 PM**

I'm sure it's a nice terminal, but the majority of the timeslots for international travel are far too inconvenient except for local residents of Tokyo who are willing to drive. Which is probably why the flights are empty to HND and fully booked to NRT on the same day. Anyways, we will see but Air Canada would not let him book by phone for HND - YVR for March 4th.

I'm also not surprised the terminal is more popular as a tourist destination than a paying customer destination. Japan has a huge population of spotters and enough people to become obsessed with anything, there's a museum for literally everything in Tokyo, from toilets to dentistry.

Gordon · #**3395** Posted **Jan 20, 2011, 9:04 PM**

Air Canada does'nt seem to have and e mail address for reservations or general inquireies which seems rather strange.

If they do cancel HND what are the chances of addindg a 2nd flight Narita with a decent landing slot?

satishreddy · #**3396** Posted **Jan 21, 2011, 12:54 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yume-sama

AC has supposedly "postponed" (maybe a nice word for canceled?) their YVR - HND flight commencement. A friend of mine was planning to book from HND - YVR round trip and was told of this "indefinite" postponement today on the phone with AC. My guess is due to the odd timing of flights the pre-bookings were very slow. Oddly, the flight still shows up on their website. Though, nearly the entire aircraft is empty for the first flight on March 3rd, whereas the YVR - NRT flight is completely booked, I'm assuming they moved people over to that flight.

After seeing your message, I tried some dummy bookings. I made all the way to the page just before having to buy a ticket. The flights to HND seem to be in the system. As you say, there appear to be many empty seats. One interesting/curious fact: it costs $2700 on Tango Plus (the lowest class) one way before taxes, surcharges, etc for a trip between YVR and HND. The flight between YVR and NRT is less than $500 for the day I looked. Why is there such a price difference? Is there truly a sufficient market that is willing to pay so much to fly to HND?

Yume-sama · #**3397** Posted **Jan 21, 2011, 1:12 AM**

They seem to *only* let you book Tango Plus, and yeah, the prices are about $6000 round trip.

Seems to me the flights only technically still exist, and haven't been taken out of their database, rather put a price nobody would pay.

They seem to have moved everyone over to the NRT flight, which is booked 100%. I'm sure we'll hear something soon.

Johnny Aussie · #**3398** Posted **Jan 21, 2011, 1:27 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by Yume-sama

They seem to *only* let you book Tango Plus, and yeah, the prices are about $6000 round trip.

Seems to me the flights only technically still exist, and haven't been taken out of their database, rather put a price nobody would pay.

They seem to have moved everyone over to the NRT flight, which is booked 100%. I'm sure we'll hear something soon.

Strange.

However, if you look into (say) April or May, all booking classes are available. So perhaps the flight is getting postponed into April?

If the route does get canned, it certainly won't be the first time a route is stopped even before it is started.

Perhaps a second NRT retimed to a more decent schedule would work.

Or perhaps rejig the capacity to China (say a second PVG or a new YVR-PVG-CAN(hmmm?) to compete with the new CZ service) as other carriers to China are really going for it!

trofirhen · #**3399** Posted **Jan 21, 2011, 3:10 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by deasine

Stop beating a dead horse. But anyways, answering that question, it will not be ORY. There are few airlines that fly there, no Star Alliance carriers, making ORY a final-destination airport as opposed to a transfer airport. Keep in mind, carriers generally only fly to the "smaller" of the main airports if it uses that airport as a main hub, or it needs to take off demand for another route. This is particularly one reason why AC is planning to fly to both NRT and HAN. NRT will act as more of a transfer hub, and HAN as a final destination airport.

Aside from the low demand on a YVR-CDG route, YVR serves few SkyTeam airlines (meaning it won't be a good hub for AF-KL to connect with DL), and CDG is not a Star Alliance hub either (competition from LHR and FRA). This is why AF flies to SEA and not YVR, because there are so many more connections with partner carrier DL (also keep in mind, SEA was once a hub for DL, only now has it been downgraded to a focus city). Even if WS joins SkyTeam, there are still not enough connections and not enough demand. Keep in mind, charter carrier Transat only flies direct to CDG seasonally, and it's only 1-2 times a week.

Thank you for the timely reprimand, Deasine.
In fact, I wasn't beating a dead horse, since I know folks are sick of my Paris rantings.
I was just adding a touch of cynicism to the page.
However ... you did provide me with a lot of useful insight, and I thank you for that. Nevertheless, what I cannot understand is why Air France flies to smaller cities like Cincinnati and Salt Lake City? It must have to do with connections. Oh ... and as you know Korean Air is a Skyteam Airline, but of course, doesn't have the volume of the Star Alliance group that seems to dominate YVR.

Johnny Aussie · #**3400** Posted **Jan 21, 2011, 3:41 AM**

Quote:

Originally Posted by trofirhen

Thank you for the timely reprimand, Deasine.
In fact, I wasn't beating a dead horse, since I know folks are sick of my Paris rantings.
I was just adding a touch of cynicism to the page.
However ... you did provide me with a lot of useful insight, and I thank you for that. Nevertheless, what I cannot understand is why Air France flies to smaller cities like Cincinnati and Salt Lake City? It must have to do with connections. Oh ... and as you know Korean Air is a Skyteam Airline, but of course, doesn't have the volume of the Star Alliance group that seems to dominate YVR.

CVG (sort of still is for now) and SLC are big hubs for DL hence the SkyTeam connection.

However, out of SEA, there is really not much DL activity to other than their US hubs which pretty much are all covered by numeours CDG flights anyway... other DL flights out of SEA are other European (well.. AMS) and Asian flights (NRT, PEK and KIX).

I don't recall DL every having a hub at SEA. PDX definitely did though when it used to run its Asian network out of there many years ago...

As for YVR skyteam will be limited to KL, KE, DL, the upcoming CZ and perhaps AM if that happens too.