Originally Posted by
Frayed_Yak
If the plan was to rebuild an arrivals lounge 4 years from now, then they might as well just concede closure of the lounge as a cost savings measure. It's hard to imagine CX couldn't come up with a plausible interim solution with their influence in government and the airport authority, if they really wanted to.
Meanwhile, for me, the arrivals lounge closure is one more thing to consider when deciding whether to choose CX. On my routes (Europe, SE Asia, North America, Japan and Australia), there is a lot of choice with OW.
I agree with your first paragraph. But the second one strikes me as dramatic. I don't think many folks logically could call that dumpy arrivals lounge a deal breaker, if we are valuing it in dollars and cents it can't be worth more than a few bucks to me. I mean come on if QR and CX are the same price to Europe or MH to SE Asia, you're telling me you'd chose the other one with a multi hour connection (minimum) due to the lack of The Arrival?
And The Arrival wasn't killed last year. It was killed many years before, as CX poured on capacity and especially longhaul morning arrivals, plus seriously loosened the entry criteria to all J pax and OW elites. The food was never good and neither was the lounging space....to me, the showers were the value. At open back in 2008 or whenever, you could get a shower quickly. By 2013 onwards, the wait was routinely 30-90 minutes in the morning. It was rendered nearly useless to me, and at least for the other guys who work with me, I feel pretty confident saying for them too. It has been nearly useless for a while. So I guess I'm not praising CX here, and I totally agree with your first paragraph that they clearly aren't very bothered, but really that lounge has been pretty hopeless for quite some time.