But Cologne is Germany's fourth largest city and not a more or less provincial city like FMO, GRQ, RNS, MST etc. Add to that Bonn and other larger cities for which CGN is closer than DUS and we are looking at a big catchment area that currently has no access to London with a legacy carrier and no link to a "smallish" London airport like LCY or SEN. All there is in Cologne is three low-costers going to LGW (U2), LHR (4U) and STN (FR/4U).
I don't see the problem of some additional capacity to SEN, particularly as Germanwings has reduced capacity to STN that partly offsets the additional capacity Ryanair will provide.
Southend would have been attractive for all passengers who
- don't like to transit through a behemoth like LHR or LGW,
- have business to do east of central London,
- resent using Ryanair,
- have been waiting for a LCY link from CGN for a long time
I would not complain, however, if part of the bigger picture would be a new route from CGN to LCY looming by Flybe, given that their new CGN-BHX service appears to be doing rather nicely...
Must I mention that I am from the Cologne area and currently have to use DUS-LCY to cover my travel needs?