SOUTHEND - 3 The new beginning

[Expressflight]

LTNman

I have monitored the fare levels on LON-BFS-LON regularly since the SEN route started and the differential whereby SEN was much cheaper initially than STN, LTN or LGW has started to decrease in the past couple of months. I tend to choose dates 7 days ahead and a glance at travel on the 24 or 25 August shows much less differential than the figures you quoted for travel next Monday - correct as those are. Quite what that tells us I'm not quite sure to be honest!

The first BFS departures to LGW, STN and LTN are all before 0700, so I wonder if easyJet actually place some value on having an 0840 departure to LON in the shape of the SEN service. Generally the LON-BFS-LON traffic will be business biased so the build up of any new route is likely to be slower in that case and I would be surprised if easyJet are unhappy with a 73% load factor for SEN-BFS in July.

I agree with the point you make in your other post to the effect that some routes will work better than others and it takes time to see which are which. I would say the jury is still out on BFS and the winter traffic levels will probably give us the answer.

Your point about the lack of a early train from Liverpool Street is certainly true and I haven't heard recently of any progress in resolving that problem. Apparently Network Rail are very reluctant to open up the line any earlier and it may perhaps need Stobarts to use any political influence they may have to break the stalemate.