British Airways lounge at Manchester Airport will not re-open – report

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• Gareth says:

  13 Mar13 March 11:14

  I spent 20 years flying out of Manchester, from late 70s to early 2000s,
  2 or 3 times a week. I remember the first BA , lounge landside in terminal 1 when you had to pay to join Exec club and no airmiles/avios. When terminal 3 and this lounge opened was really up-to-date. I rated it along with the best BA had to offer. In those days you could fly to most of Europe from Manchester, with 5 flights a day to Paris, Amsterdam annd Brussels and about 6 long haul destinations on BA, the lounge was a full circle. Remember when they halved the size of thelounge. Now you can only fly to London, it must be a waste of what once was a great lounge. Yes BA has long been London airways.

• Stagger Lee says:

  13 Mar13 March 11:45

  I concur with the general consensus. I loved this lounge. Spacious, always somewhere to sit, great views and excellent toilets.

  Always a pleasure to start a holiday here. I just wish BA actually flew overseas from up north. Works saved me having to go through Heathrow all the time.

• BJ says:

  13 Mar13 March 12:28

  I think you’re all missing the key point … BA wants to ditch Manchester period, and will eventually do so.

  • Ian says:

    13 Mar13 March 12:42

    @BJ, I think it’s you that’s missing the point. BA only fly to LHR from Manchester. Nowhere else. It’s a regional feeder into their long haul network. I think the chances of them ditching the NW England/North Wales market entirely are precisely zero.

    • BJ says:

      13 Mar13 March 13:34

      Don’t think so, much better places for them to use the LHR slots than MAN. Fast rail and polititcs will have an impact in the coming decade but management priorities could change too so who knows. My guess remains there will be none or a maximum 3 or 4 daily rotations a decade from now.

  • Anna says:

    13 Mar13 March 13:08

    I’m hoping the fact that they recently re-instated the LGW shuttle (albeit only one per day) suggests otherwise!

    • Cabal of rabid baboons says:

      13 Mar13 March 13:55

      Whilst speaking to Youfirst yesterday the lady said Manchester-Gatwick was finishing as well?

      • Rob says:

        13 Mar13 March 14:10

        Never launched! Now pushed back to October.

  • TimM says:

    13 Mar13 March 13:56

    I agree with Ian. Manchester airport serves a population greater than Greater London. If BA ‘ditched’ Manchester Airport, they would have the ‘British’ stripped from them, ‘period’ or “full stop” as we say in English.

    In 10 years, I very much doubt BA will exist under its current ownership. It will have been renationalised, again, with a mandate to serve the flying needs of the UK population – and strictly carbon neutral. With depopulation of the cities, Heathrow may have gone by then too and replaced with something on the HS2 line instead.

  • Tim says:

    13 Mar13 March 14:46

    Does nobody understand why BA’s 320 operation exists in the first place? It’s not because they really love to fly to every possible airport for the sake of it. They connect people across Europe to their long haul network at LHR. For as long as people live in Manchester and they want to connect to a long haul network, there will be flights. End of.

    • BJ says:

      13 Mar13 March 17:05

      They can take the train, same as Birmingham folks. If I could get from Edinburgh to LHR by train in 3h then I’d take the train over the domestic connection flight. Politics not passenger number might yet be the key to MAN connections.

      • David says:

        13 Mar13 March 18:40

        So how long does it take to train from Heathrow airport to Manchester airport then? I presume at least three trains, but perhaps it can be done on two.

      • Chrisasaurus says:

        13 Mar13 March 19:13

        If you can buy a through ticket, perhaps.

      • Tim says:

        14 Mar14 March 07:21

        As someone who frequents the MAN LHR shuttle, I can assure you, nobody is replacing their connecting short haul flight with 3-4hrs of trains with bags, or setting off the night before to catch their early morning long haul flight from LHR, any time soon. MAN is very reachable to a huge northern audience, and will continue to be a popular way to begin a journey that is often cheaper when starting from MAN than LHR.

        Politics changing the route? I’m not sure. The government has no vested interest in a competitive reliable train network unlike the french, and would be making a huge shift to shut down a massive freight network that previously brought in 7 A320s a day to MAN alone.

  • Lady London says:

    13 Mar13 March 17:08

    Clear

• Prince Charles says:

  13 Mar13 March 12:42

  Really hope BA move to the new expanded terminal 2 at MAN and have not only an improved OW lounge but also decent security lines and proper baggage carousel for the LHR flights.
  A big percentage of passengers on the LHR-MAN flight have connected from long-haul routes and will most likely have checked-in luggage. There are usually 100+ people standing around the smallest baggage carousel in the world!

  • Cheshire Pete says:

    13 Mar13 March 16:11

    Lol! Too true!

  • Doc says:

    13 Mar13 March 16:32

    Yep. Been there many times waiting for our bags and it always takes a minimum of 30-40 minutes at least every time and our bags exclusively come out last since the “Priority” tags on BA means you get your luggage last at MAN.

    • Anna says:

      13 Mar13 March 19:19

      Indeed, and as an occasional treat they sometimes leave a piece of your luggage (or a pram, once) at LHR which you don’t find out till everyone else has collected theirs!

  • Lord Doncaster says:

    13 Mar13 March 18:21

    Indeed. Manchester is an absolute hole of an airport though…

• Sam says:

  13 Mar13 March 13:24

  Effectively all other oneworld airlines are in Terminal 1 which means that this lounge has long been exclusively to BA only, with no possible revenue being made from the oneworld airline member access. Won’t be surprised if BA ends up cancelling lounge services in all UK domestic routes, with most of the users are only members sitting in UK traveller and not cash customers in Club.

• Alan T says:

  13 Mar13 March 15:24

  As BA have no BHX presence, I quite like flying from MAN to connect at LHR. Had some great J and F deals from there, compared to straight LHR, plus the extra 80 TPs in CE round trip.

  Will miss that lounge and the staff, next trip in Sept…hopefully?

• James says:

  13 Mar13 March 18:11

  Is it confirmed there will be a OW lounge in T2 or it’s still TBC?

  • Rob says:

    13 Mar13 March 22:28

    Still TBC

• Anna says:

  13 Mar13 March 19:18

  What happened to that premier lounge set-up at Manchester where you got driven to your plane, has it become another victim of the pandemic?

  • Doug M says:

    13 Mar13 March 19:49

    Mentioned in a few of the comments today. PremiAir, see comments page 1.

    • Anna says:

      13 Mar13 March 21:22

      Thanks, revisited!

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