YVR Airport & Sea Island Developments Discussion

[twoNeurons]

Originally Posted by Aroundtheworld

You're ignoring the fact that Westjet uses YYC as a hub and a lot of flights connect there that don't have to connect there. Those could easily happen at YVR or YEG. You should never piss off one of your best customers and YYC has done just that. I think there will be consequences.

Also, that shuttle system is a joke. Many of the airlines were apparently requesting a people mover be built. Perhaps more importantly, the baggage systems between the terminals won't be linked until 2019. This is more than just growing pains. It's poor planning, design and management.

Is the distance really that large? I was looking at Google maps and it looks like it's up to date. The longest distance I could find was 1.45km from one end to the other. Longest distance at YVR is 1.15km. Sure, it's not optimal, and Calgaronians aren't used to it, but it's not extreme, is it?

I don't know where WestJet is getting the 2km distance from?

[SpongeG]

the train shuttle thing only runs about 1/3 to half of that red line

[POCO]

So they built a big building that is inconvenient/time consuming to walk through. They also designed the gates with more limited seating so that people walk around and spend money. These sound like the realities of a large airport and a business. The baggage systems not linking up sounds kinda shitty though but I'm sure that the bags still make it to their destination.

I fly from YVR to YHZ with WestJet a fair amount. I hate connecting through YYZ, the gates usually cannot be further apart. Terminal 3 seems huge and lugging my kid and all our shit from one side of it to the other up and down elevators and through the tunnel is kind of exhausting. But I've learned to plan for this and I leave plenty of time for the connection to ensure were not rushed or over stressed and have some time to relax. Given the chance I'll always connect through YYC. It ends up saving about 30mins in the air and there's usually only a minimal walk.

Flying can be a stressful and frustrating experience but I think the vast majority of it can be mitigated by the traveler if they took more than 5 minutes to plan and think about how their spending thousands of dollars and flying in a miracle of modern engineering at over 30000 feet across huge distances. If they don't take the time to consider that the connection might not be seamless or that they can't be teleported from one gate to the other than that's on them. They also have to realize that you get what you pay for and if you want to fly like "the good old days" than you can as long as you pay "good old days" prices.

/rant

YYC will be fine. WestJet is just acting indignant to make the flying public think that the airport is the bad guy(like LMD mayors "fighting" against pipelines, they know it's meaningless and they and the province have ZERO say over it but it gets votes from gullible people) and to negotiate better deals with them in the future. WestJet will move flights to wherever the money demands it.

Can we get back to talking about mythical colourful tailed airplanes

[trofirhen]

Originally Posted by POCO

Can we get back to talking about mythical colourful tailed airplanes

Yeah!!!! Like that 'ground-breaking', 'game-changing' route coming to YVR !!!!

[zahav]

A couple minor schedule updates in the last few days.

-Aeromexico is going full double daily in the summer, after announcing going from 7 to 10 weekly starting in January. Route must be doing well. There will be an early morning and a late night departure.
-China Eastern has loaded their summer scheds formally now. 11 weekly non-stop to PVG, and 3 weekly non-stop to NKG (continuing on to KMG). The interesting thing is their choice of days. Rather than stagger so they have 2 daily flights, they are grouped together so there's several days with 3 flights, and then several with just 1 flight
-United has finally loaded back Newark and a 2nd daily Houston flight. United, of course, has about 2 million schedule updates before they are final, but glad to see these added back since you never know what will come back until it's actually there (esp after the cuts carriers made at YEG, YXE, etc)

[Johnny Aussie]

Originally Posted by zahav

A couple minor schedule updates in the last few days.

-Aeromexico is going full double daily in the summer, after announcing going from 7 to 10 weekly starting in January. Route must be doing well. There will be an early morning and a late night departure.
-China Eastern has loaded their summer scheds formally now. 11 weekly non-stop to PVG, and 3 weekly non-stop to NKG (continuing on to KMG). The interesting thing is their choice of days. Rather than stagger so they have 2 daily flights, they are grouped together so there's several days with 3 flights, and then several with just 1 flight
-United has finally loaded back Newark and a 2nd daily Houston flight. United, of course, has about 2 million schedule updates before they are final, but glad to see these added back since you never know what will come back until it's actually there (esp after the cuts carriers made at YEG, YXE, etc)

1) that's awesome. The relaxing of the visa requirement obviously having a positive impact. Add to that Interjet's most likely entry into the market along with CZ.... YVR-MEX will be a very busy route.

2) and on some days two flights will arrive within 5 minutes of each other. I'm
wondering if MU will upgauge any of its flights.

3) United notoriously has added EWR last. They do have a peculiar way of adding their schedules. They added EWR and IAD earlier than last year though.

Speaking of colourful tails only 3 more days until Beijing Capital starts their flights. Hainan has slapped a code share on the flight. Once Hong Kong Airlines starts next summer if these two park next to each other that will be a lot of red and yellow tail!

[excel]

United back to EWR is great news Together with AC's 787, this route has pretty good service. What equipment will they be using? A320?

[thenoflyzone]

Originally Posted by twoNeurons

Is the distance really that large? I was looking at Google maps and it looks like it's up to date. The longest distance I could find was 1.45km from one end to the other. Longest distance at YVR is 1.15km. Sure, it's not optimal, and Calgaronians aren't used to it, but it's not extreme, is it?

I don't know where WestJet is getting the 2km distance from?

I agree, it's not that bad. This whole thing about the new terminal at YYC is being blown out of proportion. It will be forgotten in a few months. WS is stupid, having voiced their displeasure with it. They are only hurting themselves in doing so.

YUL is 1.07 km from the tip of international jetty to the tip of the domestic one. It's 1.11 km from transborder to domestic. So same as YVR, and just a bit less than YYC. I don't see why the extra 300 meters of walking at YYC is too much. Just suck it up and walk, or take the damn YYC Link. End of story.

[nname]

Originally Posted by zahav

-China Eastern has loaded their summer scheds formally now. 11 weekly non-stop to PVG, and 3 weekly non-stop to NKG (continuing on to KMG). The interesting thing is their choice of days. Rather than stagger so they have 2 daily flights, they are grouped together so there's several days with 3 flights, and then several with just 1 flight

Maybe they need to schedule it this way to be able to swap planes at YVR. Bizarrely, the plane for KMG-NKG-YVR is actually based in Shanghai instead of their Yunnan (based in KMG) or Jiangsu (based in NKG) divisions. Right now, the plane have to get to/from Shanghai via some random upgauge... Last time it was KMG-PVG-KIX with a plane swap at PVG.

Originally Posted by Johnny Aussie

1) that's awesome. The relaxing of the visa requirement obviously having a positive impact. Add to that Interjet's most likely entry into the market along with CZ.... YVR-MEX will be a very busy route.

With the recent issue with SSJs, not sure if there is any change in their plan, as they are seriously short of planes now...

[jmt18325]

Originally Posted by thenoflyzone

I agree, it's not that bad. This whole thing about the new terminal at YYC is being blown out of proportion. It will be forgotten in a few months. WS is stupid, having voiced their displeasure with it. They are only hurting themselves in doing so.

YUL is 1.07 km from the tip of international jetty to the tip of the domestic one. It's 1.11 km from transborder to domestic. So same as YVR, and just a bit less than YYC. I don't see why the extra 300 meters of walking at YYC is too much. Just suck it up and walk, or take the damn YYC Link. End of story.

Finally.

To hear some others tell it, this is literally the end of the world.

[trofirhen]

Originally Posted by Johnny Aussie

... that's awesome. The relaxing of the visa requirement obviously having a positive impact. Add to that Interjet's most likely entry into the market along with CZ.... YVR-MEX will be a very busy route.

When / if do you think we'll get Guadalajara and / or Monterrey?

[Johnny Aussie]

Originally Posted by trofirhen

When / if do you think we'll get Guadalajara and / or Monterrey?

I would assume they will establish YYZ and YVR to MEX first and then add MTY and GDL later once MEX is strong enough. MEX is by far the largest non sun destination market from YVR. Certainly the largest for Mexican originating passengers.

[Johnny Aussie]

Originally Posted by jmt18325

Finally.

To hear some others tell it, this is literally the end of the world.

Following the following threads the common theme seems to be:

YVR - new carriers and new routes and the upcoming expansion announcement
YYC - pages and pages of complaint after complaint (same thing repeated over and over)
YEG - always whinging and complaining about Calgary
Canada - should be relabelled YUL with a side of YYT.

[jmt18325]

I really wish there was more YYZ talk here. People at Urban Toronto just don't care enough about YYZ to give me much info.

[SpongeG]

the link doesn't take you from domestic to international at calgary, you have to get off not too far from the c area and hoof it to a small set of doors to get into the international side

a few moving sidewalks would help out those areas

[nname]

China Airlines will run their last B744 to YVR on July 31st, and A359 service will commence in August according to airlineroute.

Interestingly it was exact same date as BR's original plan to phase out the 744 (which had since been moved forward to late-June)

[Gordon]

Is YVR not in t progress of building better. Connecting infrastructure between the pier A/ b area and the inrtnational terminal?

[jollyburger]

“Through our walkways, we manage to keep the walking down to 1,000 feet. We do anticipate, as we grow, that more people will have limited mobility, more elderly people, so could have golf cart type transports that look like more like a train.”

http://www.richmond-news.com/news/weekly...vr-is-growin-up-and-growin-out-1.2360359

And this:

The Expedited Transfer Facility Package 2 project at Vancouver International Airport is a continuous corridor connecting the domestic terminal building to the international terminal building, expediting international passengers to their next international flight or to customs.

Constructing the new 183-meter corridor and bridge sounds pretty straightforward until you consider its location—the area directly in front of the pre-board screening and passenger exit areas, which see an average of 900,000 passengers monthly. Add in a few rules: no hoarding, nightshift work only, and no crane access.

http://www.pcl.com/Projects-that-Inspire/Pages/YVR-Expedited-Transfer-Facility-Package-2.aspx

[mezzanine]

^YYC link-type golf carts seem like a bad idea. Looking at comments here and on flyertalk:

- they quickly get swamped if a widebody alights
-if you add baggage and other airport staff using it, it greatly limits thru-put for passengers.
- there is a physical limit to the number of carts you can use on the dedicated track.
-walking is almost comparable wrt to speed if you are used to intl airports elsewhere if you are a not a senior or a family with young kids, especially if you have to wait for a cart.
-even YYC link seems to be a compromise added on at the last minute for WS's benefit due to the distance of their gates in domestic to intl.

YVR should stick with moving walkways (even a people mover train, but moving walkways can probably do the job at YVR). Both can be automated and have far greater capacity and reliability.

[mezzanine]

22 million here we come! in 2017 will we see another 2 million in annual growth?

Vancouver's International Airport is booming, with a predicted total of 22 million passengers passing through its security gates in 2016, breaking all previous traffic records.

That's nearly two million more than in 2015, when the airport saw 20.3 million passengers come through.

The total number of holiday travellers has not yet been tallied, said Vancouver Airport media relations representative Terry Chou.

But the average seen during the peak Christmas period beginning Dec. 19 and ending Dec. 31 is predicted to be about 70,000 passengers.

Top holiday destinations include Calgary, Toronto, Hawaii, Mexico, Southern California and the Asia-Pacific region.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/yvr-airport-traffic-22-million-1.3914259