CBR Qantas Club & Business Lounge Swap Locations

[jamesatfish]

I haven’t seen mention of this anywhere, but over the weekend Qantas swapped the location of the Qantas Club and Business Lounge in Canberra.

For those who aren’t familiar, the former QC was the premium location, much bigger space with views over the airport runway and gates. The J Lounge was half the size with a scenic view of the car park.

The swap appears to have come with a furniture refresh, most of the chairs and tables look brand new.

I can only assume the breakdown of FF travellers through CBR skewed towards J and WP to justify needing the extra space for the Business Lounge, but even the staff member at the gate wondered how crowded the new QC will get with half the space.

Edit: They did “forget” to migrate the paper hand towels in the toilets, back to the air dryers or tissue situation again…

 

[Mattg]

In the past, a couple of times I’ve decided to go into the Qantas Club (now the business lounge location) as it had more space and much better views, even though I was entitled to access the Business lounge.

Interesting decision to swap the locations - makes sense, except that I think the new Qantas Club will get too crowded during peak times. The old J lounge/new Qantas Club is indeed a smaller space.

 

[qf17]

In the past, a couple of times I’ve decided to go into the Qantas Club (now the business lounge location) as it had more space and much better views, even though I was entitled to access the Business lounge.

Interesting decision to swap the locations - makes sense, except that I think the new Qantas Club will get too crowded during peak times. The old J lounge/new Qantas Club is indeed a smaller space.

Agree & often the food was the same too - I think the caveat is that on the weekends or non-sitting weeks when CBR is genuinely very quiet; QF often close the QC and push everyone into the J lounge anyway. So I can imagine that'll happen more regularly anyway.

 

[Horatio]

Agree & often the food was the same too - I think the caveat is that on the weekends or non-sitting weeks when CBR is genuinely very quiet; QF often close the QC and push everyone into the J lounge anyway. So I can imagine that'll happen more regularly anyway.

And that's happening today. Everyone has been moved into the J Lounge today, and it's still really quiet. We were a bit confused as we got to the entrance - we thought they'd mixed up their signage.

As well as the extra space, the amount of light in this lounge is the really big difference.

 

[Seat0B]

Oh I am happy about that as it will be very nice to have a runway view! But not thrilled with the paper towel situation....

 

[kookaburra75]

That is a surprise, and I'm certainly not a fan of this change. For the past few years, on weekends the QC was closed and you went into the Bus lounge - right up until last weekend when MrsK and I flew up the Noosa.

I'd guess that the old Bus lounge space is about a third the size of the old QC area. Swapping them over is going to get very ugly, very quickly, especially in the morning for the first flights out when both the old lounges were packed. Friday evenings are going to be manic. Do they send the overflow from the QC to the Bus lounge, or just say 'bad luck' to us with LTG/SG status, including the many public servants travelling out of Canberra? I don't think there's been a massive shift in the makeup of the traffic from Canberra. Virtually all of the flights out these days are in Dash8s, including to Hobart, Brisbane, and Melbourne, so I'd say the number of J seats available have fallen.

I'm thinking where are they going to put the kids' play area into the 'new' QC, as there's usually a few kids around, and their harried parents. Interesting times indeed.