IAD to BER -- delayed launch, EWR-BER now operating
 

My June flight from IAD to Berlin direct on United (a newly announced route) now has me going through Newark. Did United abandon this direct route already?

When in June? Looks bookable daily starting last week in March (no service the last Sunday in March)

sorry, meant may 23. United website only showing me the one stopper.

Looks like the start date has been pushed from March to May 26. So much for Scott Kirby's confident TATL outlook. :rolleyes:

wonderful. Without announcement either. Wonder if they scuttled their other “big” announcements that accompanied this one last year.

Odd still shiwing in EF's Timetable but not EF Flight availability nor united.com

When the situation changes, plans change. Not a lot has been static in the airline world recently

Airlines rarely announce cuts, came across this a couple days ago but IAD-BER was not included

Yes, EWR-BER still appears to be on the schedule

so IAD BER is definitely pushed back without the announcement.

Not sure what announcement you were expecting, you got the notice of the schedule change. Airlines rarely make press releases for this kind of change and even if they did you would probably never see it.

I wouldn't be too positive that IAD-BER will start anytime soon.
Business travel is still down and BER is still very low-yield.

Yeah nonstop options from the US have always been limited.

My guess is that UA will focus on BER-EWR to rebuild any nonstop flights to the US. And UA will watch and see how the yields will develop.
UA cannot sustain this route with just tourists and VFR. Business travel must pick up.
I know many Berliners who are not in the mood to fly longhaul at the moment - too much hazzle with tests, too much bad surprises in the last 2 years (the Biden+Trump Travel Ban), too much drama with airlines (letting pax hang out for dry).

BER-IAD in my eyes is just a bridge too far at the moment. LH has failed in operating that route in 2001 (TXL-IAD). Government traffic won't sustain that route, as well.
Combined with Covid and changed travel patterns, I wonder why that route (BER-IAD) was announced at all.

My guess is that BER-IAD won't be happening in 2022.

Ugh. If I were the original poster, I'd be tempted to take a train up to Newark and board there, if that could be done without penalty.

I had been booked for the inaugural nonstop IAD-BER (with miles) for May 6. Unfortunately, I was also rebooked via EWR when they canceled the flight.

I recall that it had an odd note, when it showed up in award searches, that it was subject to approval by the authorities or something like that. In hindsight, since it showed up as saver award space for 60K or something and I was only looking at it as the first leg of a connection on to Brussels, I should have booked it as saver and maybe gotten it then switched to the IAD-BRU direct when it fell through. (Instead, I booked KLM and AF saver awards with connections.)

I thought he was referring to Summer?

He was referring to summer. April and May are not summer. IAD to Berlin is a go

My September direct flights just got cancelled, so I think these are dying............now the question is next steps. They rebooked me to leave at 12:45 through EWR (as opposed to direct at 17:45), which will cost me a day of vacation and a long layover. Of course, I could let it ride and not accept the change and use that if our trip plans change between now and September.

When they make a change and put you on a suggested replacement, how much do fares affect the options they will let you move to? Oddly they moved me to what is currently one of the most expensive options, apparently to have me arrive around the same time. If I wait it out, will they likely limit my replacement options if fares go way up?

I was looking at TATL flights ex-IAD just a few days ago for mid-September and the BER flight was coming up as a connection.

I always thought the absence of an IAD-BER direct was odd just because they are two major capitals.

on a paid ticket they should be able to easily re-route you via FRA/MUC/ZRH to BER. Just call.

Going over for the marathon? I am as well but didn't book flights yet (simply because I don't know where I'll be based come September). Surprised to see IAD-BER can't sustain a non-stop flight.

Due to the schedule change and adding a stop you can get a full refund of your ticket or just wait until later to make a change to a "better" schedule for you. Revenue ticket or not you have very goof flexibility to make whatever change you want. They'll let you route through just about anywhere that has a seat for sale and is within reason (don't ask to route IAD-PEK-BER type of thing - but IAD-ORD/EWR/FRA/MUC/LHR/LIS-BER would work). With the schedule constantly in flux and September being 6 months away I would probably wait for a few months as more flights are likely to be dropped.

-RM

They might have just trimmed the operating season of this flight to end in mid-September rather than late September or early October (I forget when the previous scheduled end date was).

The new route is still on the website for May 26 but the flight is now gone for booking on that day and random days I searched in June too

https://www.united.com/en-us/new-routes

Feels like it is gone. Thanks for the advice, I am going to hit a cruise and a little taste of Oktoberfest (I know not official since not in Bavaria, but still closer than USA)....but with cruises cancelling/ changing daily sounds like I should wait until closer to move to more optimal routing in case I need to cancel and use this to get a full refund.

Auto rebooked BER-IAD-SAN to BER-EWR-IAD-SAN for a June trip. Looks to be gone as part of the trimming (due to fuel costs?). BER-EWR is Y0 for several days probably until Revenue Management updates.

I'll rebook BER-EWR-SAN but the online change is bombing out...

Our July LAX-IAD-BER got changed to LAX-EWR-BER...

Which is actually not as great for us since there are no CPU on LAX-EWR...

OK, I stand corrected. The route is gone for the entire summer. Maybe Scott and team should've thought more carefully about this one before rolling out all the fanfare.

I mean who knew last October when it was announced that there would be a major conflict in Eastern Europe and fuel prices skyrocketing up.

I’m sure if they knew back then what todays conditions were going to be like they never would have announced it. Silly them for not having that good of a crystal ball. .

The airlines themselves say that overall TATL demand hasn't been impacted by the conflict, and I don't see a reason why this route in particular would be more affected by it than other routes.

This feels like a business-oriented route connecting two important capitals. Sure, tourists go to Berlin, but I think they were aiming for the high yields that business traffic brings. They could definitely have foreseen that international business traffic would still be relatively weak this summer.

I suspect the further east you go, the greater the impact. Note PRG wad dropped also but increases for LHR. And if a prolonged conflict, hard to see how it will not damping demand.

And other then a marketing play -- the captial to captial play, IMO, is a weak reason. Business travel is more EWR/NYC, ORD, SFO, ... based and the EWR-BER works well for that.

The current environment creates more of a problem for *A than it does for OW and ST. The biggest real destinations in Europe are London, Paris, and Rome which are major strongholds for OW and ST. By contrast, *A is more of a business oriented alliance with some huge hubs such as FRA, MUC, and IST. Only Munich and Istanbul would be considered real destinations but are 2nd tier for Europe. It's a great network for business travel but not nearly as much for leisure travel. Consequently, 2022 Europe travel won't be as kind to UA as it likely will be for DL and AA.

I wonder how many of the 2022 summer routes end up sticking around in full. Feels like maybe taking shots at the dart board wasn’t the greatest idea (as some of the routes seemed to be).

PRG and BER may have made sense when UA had excess widebodies and the bulk of demand was leisure, but the fact is that neither PRG nor BER sees anywhere near the business demand of LHR or even FRA.

We can use Service Suspensions for new Spring / Summer 2022 Routes to track this

Not IAD, but BER-EWR United Airlines Operates Berlin Brandenburg's 1st Ever US Flight (simpleflying.com)

Finally! I'm on it next week.

Berlin is one of my favorite German cities (even before reunification) but I never thought of it as being a "business center" that would justify flights from multiple USA gateways. Don't forget that the German Aviation Authority (Luftfahrt Bundesamt-LBA?) has a large office at IAD itself -- in the warehouse area where Fed Ex etc. is located. If you want to do that kind of business, you don't even need to go to Germany. Unless they closed that office recently.

Anyone flown new flight out of BER?
 

Greetings,
As UA has just commenced the first USA-bound flight from BER, wondering if anyone has done this and any tips. There is a LH lounge near gate B20, which is Schengen level, definitely curious as to how much time needed to access non-Schengen level for departure/how convenient passport control to it. Will be doing this flight in a few days. TIA.

I can’t answer, but please report back on your experience when you’re back!👍

I remember the TXL-situation were the lounge was even before security. I left the lounge 1 houre before the flight to EWR.

yeah, but this new airport is a totally different situation.

Being IAD-based, I was thrilled (and a bit surprised) when they announced IAD-BER but I have to agree. The only other major driver for demand on that route could be government, but even then I wouldn't see it as significant (not to mention that the GSA city pair contract for IAD-BER is currently with Delta through the end of FY22, so most of those folks would've been flying KLM or AF even with the new route).