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Why your tax money is funding 11 obscure new UK flights (but five will earn Avios!)

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Back in the Autumn statement, the Government announced a £7m plan to fund 11 new regional air routes that will start during 2016

The Regional Air Connectivity Fund – which, you would think, is the sort of thing which would have been scrapped rather than created during a period of spending cuts – is blowing investing taxpayers money in 11 new air routes.

In my experience, airlines are not short of a willingness to give new routes a try using their own money.  After all, as long as they have the aircraft, the fixed costs involved in starting a route are not huge.

These are the 11 routes which you will be financing for the first three years of their life:

Dundee to Amsterdam (Flybe) 

Derry to Dublin (Citywings)

Carlisle to Belfast (Stobart Air)

Carlisle to Dublin (Stobart Air)

Carlisle to Southend (Stobart Air)

Norwich to Exeter (Flybe)

Norwich to Newcastle (Linksair)

Oxford to Edinburgh (Linksair)

Southampton to Lyon (Flybe, rationale being ….?!)

Southampton to Munich (Flybe, ditto)

Newquay to Leeds-Bradford (Flybe)

Oxford to Edinburgh, two incredibly poor cities, will obviously benefit hugely from this subsidised connection.  In terms of pure genius, however, Carlisle to Southend must be the winner:

Who is flying the route?  Stobart Air

Who owns Southend Airport?  Stobart Air

Who owns Carlisle Airport?  Stobart Air

Triples all round, as Private Eye would say. You can further details on the gov.uk website.

The vague relevance of this to HfP is, of course, that you will be able to earn and spend Avios points on Southampton to Lyon, Southampton to Munich, Norwich to Exeter, Dundee to Amsterdam and Newquay to Leeds-Bradford due to the tie-up between Avios and Flybe.

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Category

British Airways and Avios

Comments (86)

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

  • Simmo says:
    29 Jan29 January 06:41

    The OXF-EDI route has started and failed multiple times over the years! Still on my list to try though! The airport is only 4 miles away from me.

    Still, it has to one of the further airports away from its namesake?
    Oxford (London) airport!!! 60 miles!!!

  • Doug says:
    29 Jan29 January 07:27

    Rob you mock the Carlisle to Southend route, but when my football team suffers it’s inevitable relegation that could prove very handy!

  • Deb says:
    29 Jan29 January 07:52

    If you want to leave Newcastle for a holiday destination which isn’t about sitting on a sunbed getting drunk, you have to fly via Heathrow, thus increasing congestion there. So i’m all in favour of more regional flights, but i’m at a loss what links Newcastle and Norfolk….

    • Toby says:
      29 Jan29 January 08:27

      NCL is becoming a bit of a joke in my opinion despite the constant positive PR you read in the local press. With the exception of the emirates flight, options seem to be getting worse and worse. Flight times are terrible, prices on budget airlines for short haul destinations are comparable to long haul prices and far more expensive that comparable regional airports, sometimes triple the price. The united flight to new york is obscenely expensive. Sadly the demand up here to travel anywhere other than the package holiday destinations such as benidorm is extremely low. Rant over.

      • Rich says:
        29 Jan29 January 17:14

        I don’t know – I’ve seen some decent prices (<£400) on the EWR flight – including one which I drunkenly booked one Friday night for departure the next day! I would expect them to be costlier than MAN or LHR. I'm surprised UA returned for a second summer, and at increased frequency to boot. Hopefully they can extend to year-round service soon.

        I agree with the predominance of bucket and spade destinations though. It would be nice to have a couple of interesting destinations on the board, and perhaps another European hub.

      • Lumma says:
        1 Feb1 February 08:23

        I’ve been dragged into a stag party in Benidorm this summer (groan). I live in London so will be flying from down here but everyone else is flying from Newcastle. £300 return they’re paying for a low cost airline. I can’t believe they consider it even feasible for that kind of money.

        Especially when I’ve booked. LGW-MAD, MAD-ORD, JFK-DUS for under £120 & 54,000 avios with the Madrid – Chicago leg in business

  • Tilly71 says:
    29 Jan29 January 08:05

    In regards to Newquay and APD, why does Avios charge this still for GAT long haul connecting flights but BA Avios does not?

  • Chris1922 says:
    29 Jan29 January 08:27

    In what way is Edinburgh a “poor” city?! I’m speechless !! More anti region bias Rob

    • Raffles says:
      29 Jan29 January 08:32

      I think you missed the joke in that comment Chris! If the wealthy residents of Oxford and Edinburgh were not previously willing to pay to fly between the two cities, I think we should just assume it is not commercially viable, full stop.

      • Chris1922 says:
        29 Jan29 January 08:54

        Yup, didn’t pick up on sarcasm so didn’t get joke. Apologies Rob. I’m from Glasgow BTW, but as you know us regional folk can be a wee bit sensitive at times !

    • CV3V says:
      29 Jan29 January 08:39

      Sometimes sarcasm is hard to pick up in text, but calling Edinburgh and Oxford ‘poor’ is most definitely sarcasm! Although I would suggest Edinburgh council spends less on fireworks and more on (properly) fixing potholes.

  • Andreas says:
    29 Jan29 January 08:34

    And again no connections from Norwich to London

    • Brian says:
      29 Jan29 January 13:14

      Or from Oxford to London. Both Norwich and Oxford NEED air connections to London, so that we don’t have to take the 1-2 hour train journey..

    • signol says:
      29 Jan29 January 13:40

      Really? Crossrail will make Norwich-LHR a single change. And I’ve flown :HR-MAN-NWI in the past…

  • Jonathan Martin says:
    29 Jan29 January 08:52

    Curiously the gov.uk site refers to SOU-LYS & SOU-MUC receiving support and not SEN-LYS & SEN-MUC – but I tend to believe Rob more!!!!!

    • StuartJ says:
      29 Jan29 January 09:07

      It is Southampton not Southend. Southampton to Munich potentially makes sense given some of the businesses in the M3 corridor (eg SIEMENS). I will be using it unless the flight times are poor.

    • Rob says:
      29 Jan29 January 09:34

      Bugger. My mistake, sorry. Will fix.

      I wrote this 2 weeks ago and never re-checked it …..

  • nick says:
    29 Jan29 January 09:02

    Nothing there to add to Cardiff’s utterly miserable list of destinations. What a shame

    • harry says:
      29 Jan29 January 09:39

      They screwed up right royally, a few scant years ago Cardiff had twice as many destinations & traffic

      • Worzel says:
        29 Jan29 January 10:34

        CWL has been purchased(Government) for over the odds(it’s reported)- BRS Chief EO included in this view.

        CWL has struggled, whereas BRS has expanded and is looking to do so further. However there is a limit as to how far further BRS expansion can go-as it is in the middle of nowhere on the A38, 7 miles from Bristol(CWL is I think about 12 miles from Cardiff), with no rail link and clogged roads.

        http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/12123400/Bristol-Airport-named-most-expensive-airport-to-reach-in-Britain.html

        Bristol had a perfectly usable runway/airport at Filton(FZO) -M4/M5 within 4 miles, Bristol Parkway Railway Station within about 2 miles and city centre about 5 miles. Also ,British Aerospace and Rolls Royce on the doorstep. But it was scrapped!!

        Hopefully the “initiative” subject of this topic will just waste the 7million!!

        • Danksy says:
          29 Jan29 January 14:02

          Ditto, I drive past Filton airfield most days and morn the poor old concorde that’s sat there.

          • Worzel says:
            29 Jan29 January 17:49

            Danksy,
            I wonder how those who constructed and created the Severn Tunnel(completed in 1886, and still serving South Wales, London, the South West (via Bristol Parkway)) would view an unnecessary extension up to BRS?
            Shambles!

      • nick says:
        30 Jan30 January 14:20

        Agreed. I love that airport and it used to have some great flights, especially when bmi baby were there. The people running it seem incapable. Inexplicable that bristol is multiple times the size of cwl today.

This article is closed to new comments. Feel free to ask your question in the HfP forums.

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