YVR Airport & Sea Island Developments Discussion

[moosejaw]

Originally Posted by trofirhen

A route development person at YVR said we would probably, if anything, get Lima. The airport (ranked as the best in S.A.) is constantly growing, and is the northwest "gateway" to that continent. Sounds logical to me. I cannot see São Paulo, or anything in Brazil or Argentina from YVR.

Neither can I....
Amazing CPAir use to fly to Buenos Aires route (through Lima) when i was a kid

[moosejaw]

Originally Posted by Klazu

I would think MIA and YVR/SEA being on the opposite corners of the continent, they would be way too far apart to be competitors in this space. IAH might be a bigger competitor for our corner and MIA is perhaps more competing with the likes of YYZ?

Logistically yes, but they are united by a common entitiy....business. Miami has the second largest Brazilian exp at community in the USA. Many Brazilian companies have Hong Kong and Chinese ties. Brazil has a newly created MIDDLE CLASS....they can finance cars and property now. As stated above Miami is aggressively marketing in Asia. They know they have to work to get the business and are courting the chinese airlines. YVR somewhat seems overconfident they will get the transit business due to the fact the city has a significant Chinese population. Miami doesn't even have one DIM SUM restaurant. LOL!

Originally Posted by Klazu

Are there even many direct flights to Asia from MIA? Ain't that Miami starting to be too far for most of the planes to reach from many parts of the Asia?

There are none sir. The only closest flight to HK would be from Dallas. With the new ER class 787 they can make it on paper from MIA to HK (barely), but i dont think they have tried a test flight yet.

Originally Posted by Klazu

I know Miami has great South America connections and that is thanks to the city being the Latin America immigration gateway.

That is due to the fact MIA being the HQ for Pan AM and also a hub for American Airlines. As mentioned above LAN has a huge presence here and is the largest airline in South America. Out of MIA American Airlines flies direct to 12 brazilian cities. And thats just American Airlines. Most Latins settle here for the same reason Asians settle in Vancouver. Familiarity and Family/Business Connections

Love your pictures of my hometown btw KLAZ ...Keep it up!

[SFUVancouver]

Originally Posted by casper

An airline like Copa Airlines to Panama city may be a viable option. Not certain if a 737 can make it Vancouver from Panama City without significant penalties. Smaller aircraft that is easier to fill, Star Alliance, onward connections to Brazil.

A direct YVR-PTY (Panama City's Tocumen International Airport) flight is 6,021km according to the Great Circle Mapper and that puts it in range of the 737-700 and -700ER variants of the 'Next Generation' (current generation) Boeing 737 fleet. However, you sure aren't moving very many bodies in that configuration: between 130 and 150, approximately.

For that kind of distance I would imagine that an older Boeing 767-200 or -300 or an Airbus A310 or a more modern A330-300 would be the more likely equipment that would be used. With that said, the new 737Max family will all be able to manage 6,000km, including the 737Max-900 that will carry between 180 and 220 passengers, changing entirely the economics of such a route with a small aircraft, not to mention the improved fuel efficiency afforded by better engines and aircraft weight reductions.

For Airbus, the A319-100, LR & CJ versions all have the legs to get you from Vancouver to Panama City and have a capacity similar to the Boeing 737-700 jets. The A320-200 with "sharklet" wing tips could just make it, but I doubt such a flight would be allowed with so little margin for error. The full family of A320Neo jets will have the ability to fly that route with far higher passenger capacity than the A319.

[moosejaw]

By the way off-topic but i was able to compare 2012 SEA TAC international PAX (3.2m/year) compared to 2012 YVR International PAX (8.5m/year). YVR beats it by a considerably wide margin. I found these stats on both Port of Seattle Website and VAA websites.

[Johnny Aussie]

Originally Posted by moosejaw

By the way off-topic but i was able to compare 2012 SEA TAC international PAX (3.2m/year) compared to 2012 YVR International PAX (8.5m/year). YVR beats it by a considerably wide margin. I found these stats on both Port of Seattle Website and VAA websites.

Funny you mentioned SEA TAC's stats. It reminded me to have a look myself. Some very revealing statistics! I have to say I was very shocked to see that their Asia pax stats are showing what they are showing! Despite all the new Delta flights I actually couldn't believe:

June was down 1.6%
July was down 3.5%
August was down 0.9%
September was up only 1.5%
YTD through Sept up only 2.5%

And in June, July and August Delta's increase was less than United's decrease and UA only had the route to NRT. That should say something. YVR is up 12% YTD through Sept to almost 2.2 million. (SEA at 1.15 million so about half).

Even traffic to Canada is growing faster.

Now Europe growth on the other hand... good growth... but being very strongly led by BA not DL. But YVR still way ahead with over 1,055,000 YTD compared to SEA at 772,000.

*******

And BLI pax traffic is down over 7% for the 12 months ended July 2014. BLI has been on a consistently downward trend for at least the last 10 months or so.

http://www.transtats.bts.gov/airport...&carrier=FACTS

[Klazu]

Originally Posted by moosejaw

Love your pictures of my hometown btw KLAZU ...Keep it up!

Thanks! And thank you also for all the background on business in Miami. I have yet to visit the South East corner of United States and Florida, so I don't know much about Miami, except that it is a Alpha- city which is very good. Mainly one hears about the tourism side of Florida and not the business side of things, which seems to be strong as well.

Personally I would be very interested to visit the likes of Panama, Ecuador, Peru and Chile, so I am really looking forward to any future flights to that direction.

[moosejaw]

Here's an interesting fact. I realized if Seattle didn't have a lot of international travellers than what cities on the west coast did? So naturally I looked up San Francisco

YVR PAX numbers are not far off of SFO PAX numbers
San Francisco numbers for 2013 are only 600k more than Vancouver's at 9.6million

[Hot Rod]

puts it into prospective, doesn't it?

[Denscity]

Wow Vancouver is heading for 10M International passengers per year which will be 50% of total passengers!!

[trofirhen]

Do the International pax numbers also include Transborder, or do they not?

[deasine]

Originally Posted by SFUVancouver

http://www.vancouversun.com/Business...953/story.html

The larger role of WS in YVR may be an interesting development if it occurs. Recent moves suggest that if WS increases capacity, AC will follow suit. Meanwhile, we are also watching the development of a LCC that will may lead to more capacity changes, albeit this will be arguably small relative to WS should they make YVR a hub.

But I like to caution the sustainability of this growth as it may lead to increases in capacity in the immediate term, but in the medium term, there will ultimately be a decrease in capacity from its peak if there is not enough traffic. We see duopolistic rivalry in Australia between QF and VA which lead to huge increases in capacity and frequency especially between SYD, MEL, and PER. But ultimately now, both airlines have dialed back the capacity increases as it has led to unsustainable competition. As an airport authority, while its excellent to receive additional flights, but its also their responsibility to manage and maintain the growth. It will be an upcoming challenge for the airport authority to manage this, especially when there are many many factors beyond the airport authority's control.

[ACT7]

Yes, they do. It's still an apples to apples comparison though because US airports count transborder as international - as it should be. That can have a HUGE impact on the numbers. For example, YYZ has the second highest international pax count in NA behind JFK if you include transborder. Excluding transborder, it's the fourth highest.

So, with that being said, I think the conversation is invariably about the significance of the airport as a port of entry into North America. In that case, YVR handles about 4.2 MM non-transborder international pax. Compared to YUL, which handles closer to 5.3 MM, YVR fares pretty well. And YVR is still pretty far ahead of SEA with respect to non-transborder international pax.

As far as YVR's ranking as a North American port of entry, by my count it would be about the 13th behind JFK, MIA, LAX, YYZ, ORD, IAH, ATL, SFO, DFW, IAD, EWR, and YUL. A pretty strong showing, in my opinion, considering the metro region is orders of magnitude smaller than all of these areas, with the exception of Montreal (still smaller of course, but only by about 1.5 times).

[Johnny Aussie]

Originally Posted by ACT7

As far as YVR's ranking as a North American port of entry, by my count it would be about the 13th behind JFK, MIA, LAX, YYZ, ORD, IAH, ATL, SFO, DFW, IAD, EWR, and YUL. A pretty strong showing, in my opinion, considering the metro region is orders of magnitude smaller than all of these areas, with the exception of Montreal (still smaller of course, but only by about 1.5 times).

I guess you would also have to take out Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean stats too to get "true" gateway to North America port of entry numbers. DFW and IAH would see a lot of Mexico for example. I reckon YVR would be a lot closer to YUL if we factored this in.

[ACT7]

Originally Posted by Johnny Aussie

I guess you would also have to take out Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean stats too to get "true" gateway to North America port of entry numbers. DFW and IAH would see a lot of Mexico for example. I reckon YVR would be a lot closer to YUL if we factored this in.

You're probably right about that. I wonder also how much MIA sees from Central America. Tonnes of traffic probably. I guess the line has to be drawn somewhere though.

Along the same lines, it does kind of bug me how European airports measure international traffic with no real borders anymore within the Eurozone. For example, flying from Frankfurt to Paris is, for all intents and purposes, a domestic flight in terms of processing passengers, yet I'm certain it's considered international for passenger count.

[Johnny Aussie]

Originally Posted by ACT7

You're probably right about that. I wonder also how much MIA sees from Central America. Tonnes of traffic probably. I guess the line has to be drawn somewhere though.

Along the same lines, it does kind of bug me how European airports measure international traffic with no real borders anymore within the Eurozone. For example, flying from Frankfurt to Paris is, for all intents and purposes, a domestic flight in terms of processing passengers, yet I'm certain it's considered international for passenger count.

It's really amazing the difference in levels of stats airports report. Some are very protective and don't give out any. Others just tell it all. I like YVR's breakdown of stats by region and by scheduled or charter. Also YVR gives pretty detailed numbers on movements, South Terminal passenger numbers, float planes and cargo etc... SEA goes further by showing breakdowns by regions and by airlines. Australian government statistics go further breaking down by airline, country and even load factor. I suppose commercially some airlines may not want these numbers made public for obvious reasons.

[Johnny Aussie]

Air China has just updated its scheds to YVR next summer.

The afternoon daily flight is being upgauged from a 332 to a 773. So a pretty big boost to capacity and first class is maintained on the route. The morning flight will remain a 332.
And as mentioned previously Air Canada maintains its daily 77W to PEK next summer as well.

Sched:

CA997 PEK1200 – 0800YVR 332 x136
CA998 YVR1000 – 1225+1PEK 332 x136

CA991 PEK1550 – 1150YVR 773 D
CA992 YVR1350 – 1615+1PEK 773 D

[Denscity]

Oh man we are sooo spoiled in Vancouver. YVR has so many flights to Asia. Something like 70 weekly??

[Johnny Aussie]

Originally Posted by Denscity

Oh man we are sooo spoiled in Vancouver. YVR has so many flights to Asia. Something like 70 weekly??

It's more like about 70 per week to just China. This includes HKG.

Summer scheds are around 70 per week to China with about 60 in the winter.

And it's not just frequency increases and new routes, but also upgauging to bigger and/or newer equipment. This is the case with my post above.

[Denscity]

Oh wow! And ya I did notice that your post was regarding a larger aircraft on an existing route. Which is also a positive move *thumbs up*.

[Johnny Aussie]

Originally Posted by Denscity

Oh wow! And ya I did notice that your post was regarding a larger aircraft on an existing route. Which is also a positive move *thumbs up*.

And it's rare for airlines to be adding F class to YVR these days.