Originally Posted by
pamann
Agree. Plus Stansted features key domestic routes such as BFS, GLA & EDI. Southend is pretty much pure leisure. Certainly interesting times ahead. I think all airports will take a battering of some degree. Might make them more pleasant with fewer people using them. Southend’s USP may just become redundant.
Stansted would go as a base before Southend. A lot of outsiders don’t appreciate Southend’s value to the locals, and remember there are a lot of them and they have money. Plus no matter what people say it is a London airport. It’s ease and convenience makes it a sort of budget City, true in the couple of years to come STN’s (and LGW, LTN) terminal might be much less congested but that doesn’t end the long walk or bus from the car, the long walk through the terminal, the transit. Certainly until Ryanair showed up all evidence was yields at Southend on the core routes were very good, mostly fares were higher than equivalents out of LGW/LTN/STN. The operation limits haven’t been a particular issue, I mean this will be the 9th year of operation and they’re still around.
Most of STN’s domestics are operated by aircraft based elsewhere anyway.