BA pulls out of Cardiff and Leeds-Bradford

British Airways is cutting 21 domestic and European services from the UK and launching flights from London City Airport, as part of a move to “simplify and strengthen” its UK regional operation.

BA CitiExpress plans to withdraw altogther from Cardiff and Leeds-Bradford airports from the end of March 2003. Services being withdrawn include Cardiff to Brussels, Aberdeen, Belfast, Jersey, and Paris, and from Leeds-Bradford to Dublin, Aberdeen, Bristol, Southampton, Isle of Man, and Gatwick.

BA is also cutting routes from Newcastle to Aberdeen, Birmingham, Dublin, and Southampton, from Belfast to Aberdeen and Isle of Man, from Southampton to Aberdeen, Dublin, and Isle of Man, and from Aberdeen to Bristol.

Three services to Frankfurt, Glasgow and Paris Charles de Gaulle will launch from London City in April 2003. The flights will be operated by CitiExpress, a wholly owned subsidiary of BA.

BA said the flights are aimed at the European and domestic business markets.

The London City routes will be operated by RJ100 aircraft. In a move to rationalise its fleet, BA has signed an agreement to sell its 12 29-seater Jetstream 41s and an engineering hangar at Glasgow to the Humberside-based Eastern Airways. A statement from BA said: “This will be the first part of an accelerated strategy to move to an all jet regional operation”. BA said it is also transferring some employees to Eastern.

Eastern Airways, which is independently owned, is filling some of the gaps left by BA by launching six new routes from Leeds Bradford to Aberdeen, Southampton and Isle of Man, and from Newcastle to Birmingham, Aberdeen, and Southampton.

As part of its domestic overhaul BA is also launching three new services from Manchester, which it will announce in the New Year.

BA general manager UK business, David Evans said: “One of the key challenges in achieving a more efficient business is in reducing the number of different types of aircraft we have in our fleet. Accelerating our move to an all jet fleet will help improve our operational and financial performance in the coming years”.

The changes are all part of BA’s streamlining initiative “Regional Future Size and Shape”. CitiExpress was formed in March 2002 from a combination of BA subsidiaries, British Regional Airlines and Brymon. Over the past nine months it has also combined with Manx Airlines, and BA said it expects to integrate Regional with CitiExpress early in the New Year.