Yes Guern, a lot of it was politics, rather than economic common sence. Just like the whole airline (S.w.i.s.s.) as a matter of fact...
Could it be that Swiss had to cut a lot of profitable ex-Crossair routes so that they could then say that the remaining (ex-Crossair network) routes were losing money and (ex-Crossair) jobs could be slashed?
As a matter of fact, after a lot of 'loss making' ex-Crossair routes were cut and the ex-Crossair pilots fired, Swiss re-instated some of those routes again and operates them through a wetlease operators like Denim Air.
I know when the route was running that the Swiss Banks here in Guernsey, and many others in the finance industry didn't blink at paying £500+ if they had too in order to get their with the least hassle and time.
Exactly my point Guern! Like I said before, I find it hard to believe that this route was unprofitable in the S.w.i.s.s. network and I hope someone will fill the void. Perhaps the Q400 is too large (as Flightmapping pointed out) but maybe the older DHC 8-200's (FlyBE) or Saab 340's (Aurigny) will do the job quite nicely.