Diversifying An Airport

By Chris Smith - February 2014
(submitted to Airliner World during early 2014, but not taken up - thanks to Ian Ellington and Stuart Reid for providing photos)

Durham Tees Valley Airport, situated in the heart of North East England, is about to embark on a journey which will see the airport diversify away from charter passenger flights as part of a major new master plan taking the airport up to the year 2020 and beyond...

Introduction

Durham Tees Valley Airport has had its fair share of bad luck over the last eight years, losing over two thirds of its business since 2006 for a variety of reasons.  Ask the airlines and they’ll blame high load factors but poor yields, ask the staff and they’ll blame poor management, ask the public and they’ll blame a lingering conspiracy theory suggesting the owners – who are by trade Property Developers – only desire the land the airport lies on.  The truth is it’s a mixture of a variety of different reasons, factor in the poor economy and global recession and suddenly you find yourself in a near-impossible trading environment.  Airport owners Peel Holdings Plc realise change is necessary and are about to embark on a journey which will see the airport diversify away from charter passenger flights as part of a major new master plan taking the airport up to the year 2020 and beyond...

The terminal building at Durham Tees Valley Airport (photo © Stuart Reid)

Background

Following the departure of the Royal Air Force in 1964, the site was purchased by the former Cleveland County Council who invested £340,000 converting it into a civilian airport, known as Teesside Airport.  The first flight – with Mercury Airlines to Manchester – took place in April the same year.  A further £1.3m was spent building a passenger terminal, which was opened by Princess Margaretha of Sweden in 1966.

Over the years, the airport built up a small, but strong network of scheduled routes, including the first flight to London Heathrow, which took place in November 1969 with British Midland, ending only in March 2009 after almost 40 years.  In April 1987, the airport followed the lead set by several other UK airports and added ‘International’ to its name.

During the 1990s, the airport benefited from the holiday boom, developing a significant year-round charter programme, with Britannia Airways sending aircraft as large as the Boeing 767 on some of their many flights, and Airtours International based a summer-seasonal Airbus A320 from 1994 right through to the mid-2000s, Britannia, who were by this point known as Thomsonfly, eventually took over with a resident Boeing 737-800.

Casair were based at the then Teesside International Airport during the 1980s (photo © Ian Ellington)

Fall From Grace

It was the low-cost boom that would eventually put the airport on the map, but also lead to its eventual downfall.  During the early 2000s, the airport dismissed low cost carriers as a flash-in-the-pan, when the airport did embrace the concept, they attracted bmibaby.  The low cost carriers kept on coming, FlyGlobespan and Wizz Air launched services to Tenerife South and Warsaw respectively and Ryanair built on their successful Dublin service with new links to Rome Ciampino, Barcelona Girona and Alicante and bmibaby would later add a second based Boeing 737-300.  The airport was on a high, with over 900,000 passengers recorded during 2006, it looked impossible not to break the major 1 million milestone the following year.  But the airport had gone from one extreme to the other, whereas initially they’d refused to entertain LCCs, now they couldn’t see past them and it was all about to go horribly wrong.

bmibaby christened one of their Durham Tees Valley based Boeing 737s "baby of the north" (photo © Stuart Reid)

The low cost operators put enough pressure on Thomsonfly for them to pull their based aircraft, although they continued serving the airport from alternative bases.  The biggest blow came in late summer 2006, when completely out of the blue bmibaby announced they would be leaving by early November despite having only just introduced a second based aircraft.  The official line was despite nearly always full loads the yields weren’t high enough, but over the years several different versions have been told, one of which suggested the airline tried to broker an even better deal with the airport than the one they already had, and the airport wouldn’t or couldn’t oblige.  It was also bmibaby who in 2004 requested the airport change its name from Teesside International to Durham Tees Valley, a move which is still unpopular today and the old name still gets used by many.  Peel would later go on to successfully sue the airline for breach of contract, receiving £12m in compensation.  The airport was quick to replace the carrier, with FlyGlobespan almost immediately announcing a two aircraft operation; however they only lasted just under two years before leaving to focus on their core Scottish market in late 2008.  Over the next two years, bmi British Midland, Wizz Air and Ryanair all left, with Eastern Airways cutting services to Bristol, Brussels and Southampton.  Despite all this, Eastern still have a British Aerospace Jetstream 41 aircraft based, operating a 4x weekday service to Aberdeen, servicing the oil and gas industry.  Also strongly behind the airport are KLM, who connect the north-east to the entire globe using their 3x daily flights to Amsterdam Schiphol.

Elsewhere on the airfield, Durham Tees Flight Training have recently purchased another on-site flying school, St George Flight Training to become the largest flight training school in the north-east, in a further expansion, they’ve recently purchased a CZAW PS-28 SportCruiser, due for delivery in the Spring at which point they’ll become the north of England Flight and Distribution Centre for the type.  A new operator to recently move in is IAS Medical, operating a Beech 200 King Air and until recently a Piper PA-34 Seneca on medical flights.  Aircraft salvage firm Sycamore Aviation continue to be busy, just finishing work on an ex-LOT Polish Airlines Boeing 767-300ER and have also recently received two ex-UTair Ukraine ATR-42s for recycling.  Cobham Aviation Services operate five based Dassault Falcon 20 aircraft in the military training role alongside the RAF, although another Cobham subsidiary, Cobham Flight Inspection, operating twin-prop aircraft, have recently moved out to their main Bournemouth base to reduce costs.  The Great North Air Ambulance and Cleveland Police Air Support Unit both base Helicopters on-site.  Serco have one of the largest and well respected aviation fire training facilities in Europe on the airport - the International Fire Training Centre.

Sycamore Aviation offer aircraft 'end-of-life' services (photo © Chris Smith)

Cobham Aviation Services base five Dassault Falcon 20 aircraft at Durham Tees Valley (photo © Chris Smith)

Turning The Airport Around

To stem losses, the airport followed the example set by Blackpool, Newquay and Norwich airports and introduced a departure fee during November 2010, known as the Passenger Facility Fee.  The £6 fee was badly received by both the press and public, although the subsequent 15% drop in annual passenger figures was less than many had anticipated.  The fee was also one reason for Ryanair axing their only remaining service to Alicante – who notoriously hate such expenses.

Durham Tees Valley has always trailed behind it’s larger north-east neighbour, Newcastle International Airport, now more so than ever, but DTVA is arguably better located, situated perfectly to serve the Newcastle, Sunderland, Darlington, Durham and Middlesbrough areas as well as North Yorkshire and boasting a larger catchment area than it’s rival in both the one and two hour travel time, with some 7.12 million people in the latter bracket compared to Newcastle’s 4.2 million.

The Master Plan

Peel have doggedly pursued new airlines and business, as well as trying to build up ancillary services such as executive aviation, general aviation and aircraft recycling, so that if they ever did build passenger services back up, they had something to fall back on should they ever lose it again.  One firm Peel chased was Thomson Airways, who were still as loyal as ever with seasonal flights, in fact, they’d just announced another to Ibiza for summer 2014, but there was one problem.  Two charter flights per week for six months of the year is not profitable, as the staffing levels and other associated services required to handle these two charter flights were triple that of the scheduled routes to Aberdeen and Amsterdam by Eastern Airways and KLM, but these staffing levels and services had to be maintained 24 hours a day, seven days a week – all for about three or four hours worth of flights per week for just six months of the year.  This led to the airport losing a three figure sum per passenger on charter flights!  It’s no secret that the airport is losing just shy of £4m per year, and no matter how deep the owners pockets may be, no business can justify sustaining a loss and something had to give, so in October 2013, the decision was made to axe all charter flights with the exception of a seasonal Flybe service to Jersey which survived thanks to the smaller aircraft size – an Embraer 175.  Annual Christian pilgrimage charter flights to Lourdes are looking doubtful, as are regular military troop flights.  The cutting of charter flights came as part of a wider master plan for the airport, which will take the airport up to the year 2020 and beyond.

A birds eye view of what the airport could look like years from now from the airports Master Plan (photo © DTVA / Peel Airports)

The airport is now pursuing additional scheduled routes, a difficult task given the current industry climate.  The terminal building will be reduced in size, with 40% due to be mothballed.  The airport are also looking at non-passenger aviation, existing on-site companies Cobham, Serco, and Sycamore are all featured heavily in the master plan.  In addition, new companies are being sought after, with a new fixed wing operator in talks to start-up operations.  The master plan itself has been received with mixed reviews, primarily due to bad press reporting which focused on a housing development which makes up only a small percentage of the plan and is on land unsuitable for aviation use.  In the eyes of the press and public, building houses on the site confirms the conspiracy theory that suggests Peel only want the land and not the airport, what they fail to realise is the vast majority of UK airports either already have, or are in the process of building residential and industrial developments to supplement the airport income, as these days commercial aviation on it’s own rarely delivers a profit.  Furthermore, if Peel did want the land, it’s worth a lot more to them with a successful and active transportation hub in the middle of it.

The master plan, released in November 2013, has just finished a consultation programme, the airport will now take onboard the comments and suggestions provided by the public and businesses before releasing a final draft around March.  In the weeks and months following this, the airport intends to rebuild confidence in both the local population, but more importantly, with the airlines. The airport have found during the consultation process the business community have welcomed and backed the plan unanimously, whereas the general public have been more critical until they’ve taken the time to listen and understand the plan, at which point they’ve begun to feel a lot more positive about it.

The plan will see the airport sell off land to the north of the current site for housing development, with the money raised from the sale – under the terms of a ‘section 106’ agreement which means the airport has a legal obligation to reinvest the finance gained back into the airport – being used to erect new hangars either side of the current terminal building.  Locals have raised concerns about aircraft noise and houses not mixing, but during their research for the master plan, the airport learned most aircraft noise is concentrated to the areas that lie at either end of a runway, and the planned hangars have been positioned in such a way that they will act as a sound barrier to the new housing estate, but should any new residents still complain, it will come down to the fact the airport was there first.  There are plans to accommodate a number of shops and retail outlets within the terminal building in the hope that they may form a mini ‘town centre’ for the new housing estate as well as the existing villages.  The first of any new hangars built are rumoured to be for Weston Aviation who are General Aviation handling agents.  Weston have grown executive traffic visiting the airport substantially over recent years and now barely a day goes by without one or more private jet movements, but currently there is no hangarage available for larger GA aircraft.

Weston Aviation handle visiting private and executive aircraft (photo © Chris Smith)

The Future

In the longer term, further construction on the north side will see industrial units erected and potentially further hangars subject to the demand for the initial ones.  A rail freight siding could be constructed to help attract growth in air cargo movements and there is an option to build a passenger rail station closer to the terminal than the existing one, that would also be well positioned to serve the local villages.  There is also a substantial development planned on 250 acres of spare land south of the runway.  In recent years, many developments have been planned on the south-side with none reaching fruition, and as such there is scepticism about this aspect of the plan.  Peel have indicated the south side development is reliant on external investment and they are unlikely to fund it themselves, they have already had two bids to the Government’s Regional Growth Fund for £5.9m and £4.65m respectively turned down which would have been used to construct access roads to the site as well as installing utilities such as gas and electric.  A third bid for the spring will be reviewed should the Government decide to launch a third round of the RGF.

The future is not so much about commercial flights as it is about non-passenger aviation, Weston Aviation may have grown executive traffic substantially, but airports of Durham Tees Valley’s size usually have a cache of resident private jet/prop aircraft and operators, and this is the type of business the airport will now pursue.  Given the airports ideal location just off the north-east coast, oil rig helicopters could be another possibility.  Just a few short years from now, Durham Tees Valley certainly has the potential to become the busiest it’s ever been – perhaps not in the eyes of the public who will continue to wonder where the Airbus and Boeings are taking them off on their holidays – but certainly from other areas.


Airport Background

The airport began life in 1941 as an RAF Station, known as RAF Middleton-St-George, though it’s a common misconception the base was originally christened RAF Goosepool, which was the names of the two farms the base was built on.

The airfield was built as a Bomber Command Station and the first flight was by an Armstrong Whitworth Whitley which arrived from RAF Dishforth on April 9th, 1941.  The first squadron to arrive was No. 78 with Whitleys, joined by No.76 in June 1941 with Handley Page Halifaxes.

In 1943 the station was allocated to No. 6 Group of the Royal Canadian Air Force, who moved three squadrons in, No.s 419, 420 and 428 using Vickers Wellingtons, Halifaxes and Avro Lancasters.

Post-war, the RAF moved back in, with three training squadrons as well as squadrons using Gloster Javelin’s and Meteor’s, Hawker Hunter’s and the aircraft most often associated with the airfield during its military days, the English Electric Lightning.

The RAF moved out in 1964 and the site was purchased by Cleveland County Council.

Ownership

Having purchased the site from the Air Ministry in 1964, Cleveland County Council owned the airport solely until 1974 when Durham County Council took a stake.  1996 saw Cleveland County Council abolished, and the shares were divided up between a total of six local authorities; these being the respective councils of Darlington, Durham, Hartlepool, Middlesbrough, Redcar & Cleveland and Stockton-on-Tees.

In 2002, the councils felt they could no longer support the airports growth potential and a private investor was sought.  The successful candidate was Peel Holdings Plc, and through their Peel Airports subsidiary, they took on a 75% shareholding in the airport, with the remaining 25% staying with the six local authorities.

In 2010 Peel Holdings announced the sale of a 65% stake in their airports division to Canadian firm Vancouver Airport Services (now Vantage Airport Group).

Peel/VAS, under the terms of their original purchase agreement with the councils, served a dilution notice in December 2011, seeing their stake rise to 89%.  During the same month, they placed the airport into administration and began a sale process.  In February 2012, Peel Holdings Plc purchased the airport back from the Canadians under a new subsidiary, Peel Investments (DTVA) Ltd.

FoDTVA

On September 3rd, 2012, a volunteer support group named FoDTVA (“Friends of Durham Tees Valley Airport”) was launched.  Run by a committee of aviation enthusiasts and members of the public, with support from the airport management and owners, their aim is to promote, support and assist Durham Tees Valley Airport whenever and wherever possible.  They charge a £12.00 per year membership fee to cover the costs of running the group, with any excess being donated to on-site charity the Great North Air Ambulance.  The scheme is based on existing, established and similarly-named schemes at Peels other airports, Robin Hood Doncaster Sheffield and Liverpool John Lennon.

One of FoDTVAs first projects was to bring back an air show to the airport following a 24-year hiatus, but due to a loss of operational support, the show was cancelled.

Airport Statistics

Owners
Peel Investments (DTVA) Ltd (89%)
Local Authorities (11%)

Operator
Durham Tees Valley Airport Ltd

Serves
North East England
North Yorkshire

IATA:
MME

ICAO:
EGNV

Runways (active)
05/23, 7,516ft x 151ft (2,291m x 46m), asphalt surface, CAT I ILS

Runways (disused)
01/19, 3,300ft x 151ft (1,006m x 46m), asphalt surface
(later reduced to 2,428ft x 59ft (740m x 18m))
10/28, 4,200ft x 151ft (1,280m x 46m), asphalt surface

Position
54° 30.55’N, 001° 25.76’W

Elevation
120FT (36.5m)

Frequencies
Durham Tower: 119.800
Durham Radar: 118.850
Durham Director: 128.850 (when instructed)
Durham ATIS: 132.375
Servisair: 130.600
Weston Aviation: 129.700 (currently not in use)
Cobham: 122.350
Fire Service: 121.600

Website:
www.dtva.co.uk

Airlines
Eastern Airways – Aberdeen Int’l
Flybe – Jersey (summer only)
KLM Cityhopper – Amsterdam Schiphol

Operators
CamAir Freight Solutions
Cleveland Police Air Support Unit
Cobham Aviation Services
Durham Tees Flight Training
Great North Air Ambulance
IAS Medical
Serco IFTC
Sycamore Aviation
TNT Express (road freight only)
Weston Aviation

Traffic Statistics

 

No. of Passengers

Aircraft Movements

Cargo (tonnes)

2009

289,464

25,208

298

2010

224,673

20,756

0

2011

192,410

20,879

3

2012

164,826

17,938

0

2013

161,092

18,298

0

 


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