Calgary International Airport II

[MrBigStuff]

It would be interesting to know which engines are fitted to this particular aircraft.
My interest in this gets the better of me on this.

Originally Posted by MrBigStuff

It would be interesting to know which engines are fitted to this particular aircraft.
My interest in this gets the better of me on this.

GE CF6-80C2B6 on this and the other 3 incoming.

[Riise]

Originally Posted by Cage

BNN is confusing WS an AC. Both have announced LGW but only AC has confirmed the Canadian side, which is YYZ starting May 2016. was will likely announce there TrasmAt destinations and schedule in late September.

I think someone needs to call BNN out on Twitter.

[SubwayRev]

Originally Posted by Bigtime

Fellow avgeeks, looking at booking a trip over Spring break 2016. Should I purchase now or wait a little longer? Any guesses on if the fares will change much?

YYC-PTY (obviously with stops along the way since no non-stop exists).

Don't know about the fares, but I was in PTY last year and loved it! Great city!

[Cage]

Originally Posted by Riise

I think someone needs to call BNN out on Twitter.

In my experience with the national media, trying to correct them is just a waste for time. Local media is just the opposite, they are generally very responsive through twitter.

Originally Posted by Bigtime

Fellow avgeeks, looking at booking a trip over Spring break 2016. Should I purchase now or wait a little longer? Any guesses on if the fares will change much?

YYC-PTY (obviously with stops along the way since no non-stop exists).

My recommendation is to hold off for now. The price for YYC-PTY is the same for near last minute travel as it is for March 2016; this suggests the booking curve has yet to kick in. The booking curve is a chart representation of airfares over a specific time period with x Axis being time (departure date on the right side of the graph) and Y axis being price. It is best represented by a horizontal banana. There are two types of banana booking curves.
(1)First type is where the top of the banana is to the left. This type has a steep drop early in the booking process followed by a slow rise as the airplane fills up with pax. YYC-LAS is like this. 90 days out the price drops dramatically and then slowly increases as the plane fills out.
(2) Second type is the opposite, slow price decreases at the start of the booking curve followed by a steep rise as time passes and closer to the departure date. YYC-YYZ is like this. Slow decrease in price until about 21 days before departure, then a sharp rise in price to get max dollars out of the business traffic.

I suspect that for YYC-PTY travel in March 2016 we are before the start of the booking curve (i.e. before seat sales).

Schedule changes are another risk to booking this far out. For YYC-PTY the options are:
- AC through YYZ
- UA through IAH
- AA through DFW

AC flights operate 3 times per week, are the cheapest option, and have longest travel distance and time. The biggest problem, AC flights have an overnight in YYZ.

UA flights operate daily, are the second cheapest option, and have viable travel and connection times. The problem here is that UA is highly susceptible to make changes to routes and equipment until about 90 days before departure. Additionally only the UA 6:30am or the AC 8:30am departures connect to IAH-PTY. If YYC-IAH is doing as bad as rumored, I highly suspect that AC and UA will coordinate frequencies to better match demand.

AA flights are nice from travel time and connection perspective, but are $300 more than AC/UA. Also, if AA gets scared due to lower business traffic demand from Oil, a change to the early morning YYC-DFW flight would be disastrous.

[Bigtime]

Thanks Cage, the UA option really is the best for us travelling with the kids and all. Two 4 hour'ish flights and we are there same day, same goes for the way back. Will monitor over the next few months before jumping on it.

Doing some dummy bookings on Air Canada there was an option that took us to Toronto, then Bogota Columbia, and then fly Avianca to PTY. If we had no kids or I was travelling solo, I would have avgeeked out on that one.

[Bokimon]

Yeah normally the 3 week rule for most travel is mentioned as the absolute latest in which to make a booking with reasonable fare cost.
I use yycdeals.com website and fb page so whenever there are some major price drops due to various competition and promotions that goes on, I book based on that and yes, I have seen Panama for sale as well, and usually I post it on my fb group to advertise any large fare drops.
Though the catch could be connections and layover hassle to save a few hundred dollars.

[Bigtime]

With the kids we want to avoid the layover/overnight hassles, and would pay a little more for ease on that front.

[lubicon]

My buddy was hoping to get a sneak peak of the new 767 for me yesterday but apparently after the public showing they have pretty much locked it down and are going balls out to get it ready for service. Bummer. He had a date with her this morning however.

[YYCspotter]

http://www.yyc.com/en-us/media/factsfigures/passengerstatistics.aspx

Overall: +5.1%
Domestic: +5.2%
Transborder: +5.0%
International: +4.5%

By far the best month of the year so far for growth!

[MrBigStuff]

Originally Posted by Acey

GE CF6-80C2B6 on this and the other 3 incoming.

Awesome!! Thanks for the info!!!
This is one I hope to ride in - one day SOON!!!

[yyc_engineer]

WestJet 767 service pushed back to Sept. 16

At least that's the first day flights 655/658 are showing on westjet.com

[DarthMalgus]

Originally Posted by YYCspotter

http://www.yyc.com/en-us/media/factsfigures/passengerstatistics.aspx

Overall: +5.1%
Domestic: +5.2%
Transborder: +5.0%
International: +4.5%

By far the best month of the year so far for growth!

Considering the state of the economy, these are really positive numbers.

[suburbia]

Originally Posted by yyc_engineer

WestJet 767 service pushed back to Sept. 16

At least that's the first day flights 655/658 are showing on westjet.com

I'm traveling late september and have a 767 on a segment. hopefully it doesn't get pushed out any more else I'll be in trouble.

[Bigtime]

Originally Posted by suburbia

I'm traveling late september and have a 767 on a segment. hopefully it doesn't get pushed out any more else I'll be in trouble.

Well if it works out and you do get the 767 make sure to take lots of pictures and give us a trip report here!

[Johnny Aussie]

http://www.caa.co.uk/docs/80/airport_dat...015_Provisional_International_Routes.pdf

All YYC-UK routes showing an increase in passengers.

YYC-LHR up 15% (seems to have absorbed the additional AC flights quite well).
YYC-MAN up 9%
YYC-GLA up 4%
YYC-LGW up 1%

[Bigtime]

Can't wait to see the LGW numbers shoot up next year when WS starts flying the route...

[Cage]

With regard to August traffic statistics, I no longer believe YYC or other AB and SK airports will have growth. Hear are the coal mine canaries:

WestJet reported the following:

WestJet today announced August 2015 traffic results with a load factor of 84.6 per cent. Revenue passenger miles (RPMs), or traffic, increased 1.7 per cent year over year, and capacity, measured in available seat miles (ASMs), grew 7.3 per cent over the same period.

http://westjet2.mediaroom.com/index.php?s=43&item=1021

Air Canada reported the following:

F"I am extremely pleased to report strong traffic growth of 10.1 per cent for the month of August, a month during which we served 4.2 million customers, more than any month in Air Canada's 78-year history," said Calin Rovinescu, President and Chief Executive Officer. "Air Canada generated greater traffic in all markets resulting in a load factor of 89.6 per cent in line with last year's all-time record. These strong results demonstrate the effectiveness of our commercial strategy focusing on international growth. The impact of the economic slowdown in Western Canada is more than offset by strong demand in U.S. and overseas markets resulting in a 9.9 per cent traffic growth year-to-date compared to last year.

http://aircanada.mediaroom.com/index.php?s=43&item=916

With regard to AC and WS; AC generally flies people into the province (visitors) while WS takes care Alberta travelers. Further, AB/SK/northBC accounts for over 25% of WS business while less than 10% of AC business. These figures point to the current oil induced slow down is have a tremendous impact on WS but largely leaving AC unscathed.

The above traffic stats have me very worried for YYC.

If I was AC, i would immediately put YYC-PEK on the back burner, unless there was no alternative (e.g. AC got forced into accepting commercially viable slots at PEK).

If I was WS, I would shove as many 763s over to YYZ as possible. It is looking better for WS to fight it out with AC rouge and Transat at YYZ than it is to launch YYC/YEG to Europe services. Quote from a WS founding father: "Why do robbers rob banks? Cause that's where the money is!"

[yyc_engineer]

Originally Posted by Cage

If I was WS, I would shove as many 763s over to YYZ as possible. It is looking better for WS to fight it out with AC rouge and Transat at YYZ than it is to launch YYC/YEG to Europe services. Quote from a WS founding father: "Why do robbers rob banks? Cause that's where the money is!"

Why not YVR-Europe? or Domestic routes? I don't see the rush to launch YYC-Europe service next summer. They could make a killing sending them on YYC-YYZ and YVR-YYZ multiple rotations per day. These flights are always full and people pay way too much. My relatives shelled out almost $3000 for 4 economy tickets YYC-YYZ in August.

[Cage]

Originally Posted by yyc_engineer

Why not YVR-Europe?

Lack of network feed. 100+ flights per day from YYC, 50+ flights per day from YVR.

Much greater competition in YVR. While YYZ has more competition, YYZ also has much larger market.

YVR-Europe is slightly outside the 763ERW sweet spot for range and financial performance. Its doable but the trip costs are about equal compared to 333/777 with the larger aircraft having higher revenue potential. Less than 4800 miles favours the 763 where as greater than favours the 333/777

Originally Posted by yyc_engineer

Domestic routes?

Poor aircraft utilization. 763 to Europe gets 12-18 hours of utilization compared to 8-12 hours on North American ops.

763 on the domestic will flood market with cheap seats and depress yields on 2 of WS top 5 money making routes.

WS Plus cabin yields on the 763 will be cannibalized as people can pay for 737 WS Plus seat and then transfer to the 763 product. AC had the same problem with Premium Economy on the 777/787 for YVR-YYZ. Now Premium Economy is sold as Preferred seats for no price markup compared to Airbus preferred seat.