Night Flights are for Freight

Parsons Brinckerhoff (PB) put Manston’s request in the context of increasing demand for aviation services, particularly in the south-east of England:

[p3] … the demand for aviation services is set to dramatically increase in the next 20 years. The conclusion is therefore that better use needs to be made of the existing facilities.

The obvious solution would be for Manston to use its daytime capacity, but this never gets a mention.

The PB report says Manston wants night flights for freight:

[p4] … the ability to operate at night will be a crucial factor in attracting a regular air freight service provider which will improve the financial viability of the airport in the short-term.

The PB report says Manston's forecasts in its Master Plan are unrealistic:

[p4] … despite the forecasts only being two years old, the airport is not achieving the level of forecast passenger growth

The PB report says short-term passenger growth would come from carriers based at other airports, which would not need a night flight facility:

[p5] Therefore, in the short term we do not believe that the airport can justify a night flying quota system to support passenger growth. 

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Next installment: Manston’s in the wrong place 

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Location, Location, Location

It's refreshing to see an independent review of Manston's present and future prospects that doesn't shy away from stating the obvious - a successful passenger airport needs plenty of passengers within a convenient distance, and a successful freight airport needs plenty of customers within a profitable distance.

The Parsons Brinckerhoff (PB) report says Manston airport is in the wrong place:

[p5] Given the geographic location of Manston it is unlikely that carriers would show much interest for inbound traffic from key European city links – we would argue this would only be relevant if Manston was strategically placed near to a large city or a region with a large catchment area.

Heathrow has queues of carriers wanting to use the airport, so they can afford to pick and choose who they let in. Over the short to medium term, Heathrow airport will carry less freight and more passenger traffic, as passengers are more profitable. This will displace freight traffic to other UK airports.

The PB report says York Aviation is wrong when it says that Manston is "ideally geographically located" to benefit from this displaced freight traffic.

[p5] Stansted, and Gatwick to a lesser degree, have significant capacity to accept additional freight volumes and are strategically better located close to motorways and major conurbations.  For this reason we would disagree with York’s contention that “It is for the relocation of these services that MIA is ideally geographically located”.  MIA, whilst only 50 minutes from the M25 at Junction 2, is not strategically positioned for freight to be dispatched anywhere other than the far South East of England.

On p15 of their report, York Aviation claim that a night time ban prevents Manston from accepting freight traffic from much of the rest of the world (based on an arbitrary departure time of 2300).

The PB report says Manston is only excluded from 9% of the scheduled air freight market...

[p6] … we do not believe that this provides a compelling argument for significant economic benefit to the region as a result of the introduction of a night flying quota system.

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Next installment: Jobs

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Man moves house, Manston issues press release

This seems to be another fine example of PR puffery in action. It appears that Mr McQuarrie was already "Group Manager Freight Development for both airports" - so it's unclear what he'll be doing that wasn't already in his job description. The only bit of news appears to be that is moving house from Scotland to Margate. Rather poignantly, he is another employee who tries to play up Manston's lack of business as an advantage: "no congestion".

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Manston Airport’s ability to attract freight operators has been given a boost with the appointment of an experienced freight development manager - Allan McQuarrie, 46, joined Infratil in 2007 and until recently, has been based at their airport in Prestwick, Glasgow.

Having moved to Margate, Allan will now be based at Manston, Kent, full time, concentrating on encouraging cargo operators to use the airport for chartered and scheduled flights. Allan McQuarrie, Group Manager Freight Development for both airports, said:

“I see a huge future for Manston which was part of my reason for moving here. Many freight carriers are looking for an airport that is near to London and Manston has some key selling points that are difficult to rival. There is no congestion so there will never be a situation where an aircraft is circling for an hour. Our dedicated team on the ground can turn a 747 round in around 90 minutes with freight being loaded straight into a lorry rather than a warehouse to be moved at a later date – this can often add an extra day to a product’s shelf life. At some airports, including Heathrow and Gatwick, the turn around time can be up to four hours which is obviously less attractive for operators.”

Originally from Zimbabwe but UK-based since 1984, Allan has worked in air cargo since leaving school and has experience as a freight forwarder, as well as working for airlines such as Air UK and now airports.

“Having had experience in all areas of air cargo I have a very good idea of what the customer is looking for. Manston’s proximity to London with easy access to the UK’s motorway network is a huge selling point. Being based within easy reach of the Channel ports, and therefore Europe, is also an advantage.”

Manston’s Master Plan shows the airport handling 167,000 tonnes of freight by 2018. Recent independent research by York Aviation, a leading aviation consultancy, shows that these levels are achievable, provided a managed and limited Night-time Flying Policy is implemented as submitted to Thanet District Council recently.

Charles Buchanan, Chief Executive Officer of Manston, said:

“Our investment in Allan’s role is a very important one for the airport as its long term success depends on attracting airlines here. As well as researching prospective customers, he will attend trade shows around the world to speak to anyone that could make use of Manston and spreading the message of the economic potential of East Kent.”

onlykent 1st Dec 2011

In a nutshell: Manston

Manston a.k.a. Kent International Airport is an ex-RAF base in north-east Kent, just west of Ramsgate. It passed from the RAF to Wiggins, then PlaneStation, owners of EUJet (a budget passenger airline). EUJet went bust, and in August 2005 the administrators sold Manston to Infratil, a New Zealand-based multi-national infrastructure investor.

The airport is mainly used for flying clubs, testing and training, and private planes. In 2008, less than 3% of the planes were freight or passenger flights. Infratil's growth plans for Manston are ambitious: 6 million passengers, ½ million tonnes of freight and 103,800 flights annually.

There is a "Section 106 Agreement" (S106) between Infratil and Thanet District Council (TDC) which describes what Infratil can, and can't, do at Manston. The scale of Infratil's planned growth is enough to require the S106 to be renegotiated. The existing S106 was drawn up in 2005, and needs to be renegotiated anyway as its 3 year lifespan has expired. There would be a statutory period of public consultation lasting 6 months. This consultation period has not started (as at: 20th June 2009).

Due to the nature of airports and air travel, many more people have a stake in this than just Infratil and TDC. East Kent residents under the flightpaths, particularly in Ramsgate, but also in the Wantsum villages, Herne Bay, Whitstable and Canterbury will all be affected to some degree. Environmental groups, transport lobbies, government bodies, wildlife groups and others all have an interest. The non-partisan KIA Consultative Committee provides a valuable forum for all the interested parties to meet and discuss.

A key issue for local residents is noise. Obviously, the nearer a plane is (in both distance and height) the louder the noise; and if everything else is particularly quiet (at night) it will sound louder anyway. Which is why flightpaths, plane heights, flight times and monitoring matter so much to so many, and keep appearing on this site.

TDC have a duty to do their best to regenerate and energise Thanet, which includes some of the most deprived areas of Kent. Infratil have spent £30m on Manston so far, and have yet to make their shareholders a profit. All the East Kent residents would welcome something that benefits them. We need to find a win-win-win solution.

This is not a small decision, and the consequences will affect tens of thousands of people for years, if not decades. It's worth taking the trouble to get this one right. And everyone needs to think in the short, medium and long term.

Infratil's flawed bid

Seppuku Lite

As I mentioned recently, before getting revolted by Infratil’s selfishness, the pile of poo they presented to TDC was the carefully considered best efforts of a wealthy, globe-spanning organisation aiming to win support from a strategic partner at a key point in the development of its European operations.

It is a public declaration of commercial weakness; of ongoing and increasing failure; of a flawed business model; of narrow short-termism and strategic poverty.

“All airports across the country are significantly affected by recession”; passengers, freight, airport investment and employment are all down. Like it says in the small print ‘the value of your investments can go down as well as up’. As Newton said ‘what goes up must come down’. As my Gran said ‘all good things must come to an end’. So deal with it.

Guys, having a fixed cost base is nothing special – everyone from the United Nations to my local ice cream van has a fixed cost base. Why bother mentioning it? It in no way entitles you to any special treatment or sympathy.

We all know Manston’s losing some £4 million per year, and that this is unsustainable, and will lead to closure. Top tip: DO NOT BLEAT about your company going down the toilet in a public document. It does not inspire confidence, and puts you in an appalling negotiating position in the event of anyone showing an interest in using your airport.

And what’s this about wanting to be “able to compete equally for new business as shown by the BAWC tender”? As if you couldn’t! At the time of the bid, Infratil had already successfully bounced TDC into giving the all-clear for night flights, and night flights didn’t seem to feature in BAWC’s decision-making process:

Jude Winstanley, BAWC's head of network and freighters, said: “After careful evaluation and taking into account a number of factors including the need to provide the best product for our customers, cost effectiveness, service quality and speed of connection, Stansted remains the most attractive long haul freighter base for BA World Cargo and our customers.” Air Cargo News, 13th March 2009

Manston lost out to Stansted on at least FOUR key considerations, and night flying wasn’t even mentioned. The competition was unequal only inasmuch as Manston was a crappier proposition for BAWC.

In an earlier post, I pointed out that Infratil made Manston’s under-usage a selling point: lack of congestion, competitively priced aircraft parking, etc. There are at least two major problems with this: first, idle is good vs busy is bad isn't a great starting point for a business model; second, when all the other recession-hit airports are less congested anyway, you suddenly lose your selling point.

Infratil are labouring under the impression that they are competing for low cost passenger and long haul freight with Gatwick and Stansted. (Duh! Heathrow, London City, Lydd and Southend: recession-hit airports, just like Manston, and all hungry for business. Manston’s business would do fine. Ignoring them won’t make them go away.) Infratil are trying to hit the big time in a high volume, commoditised market, setting off from well behind the starting line in the toughest market for decades. I wouldn't start from here, guys. Strategically, making a selling point of lack of custom, whilst aiming for a high volume, low margin market sector is a rather messy form of suicide.

Freight over-stated

Nosey, picky

Infratil's silver-tongued spinners at Maxim PR told the world that Manston currently handled "33,000 tonnes of freight" when they trumpeted Infrapenny's MasterPlan (8th Oct 2008).

Oops.

Looks like an over-active optimism gland, or a misty-eyed remembrance of times past, or possibly even a typo. The last time Manston handled that much freight in a 12 month period was October 2003-September 2004. The closest they've got recently was May 2007-April 2008 with 32,061 tonnes. According to the CAA's figures.

And for the sake of completeness, monthly:

"KIA is currently operating at a fraction of its potential and is not a sustainable business at current traffic levels." Matt Clarke, Chief Executive Infratil, 5th February 2009