GrahamK -depends what you mean by 'feasible'. If you mean flights are not feasible because there isn't the demand to sustain them, then the answer is no. That particular point has been raised consistently in the thread, but in the case of any doubt, refer to section 5.4.3 of the Government's consultation paper on The Future Development of Air Transport in the United Kingdom (North of England) which states:
"There is substantial leakage of passengers from Yorkshire and the Humber to airports in other parts of the North of England, particularly Manchester and the South East. Although 53% of domestic passengers from Yorkshire and the Humber flew from Leeds Bradford, only 15% of international scheduled and 12% of international charter passengers did so"
So if the 60,000 charter passengers a month at Leeds is just 12% of the total, then the total volume of charter passengers generated in Yorkshire and Humberside is about 500,000 per month. From other sources, a crude breakdown of where these passengers actually are flying in or out of is:
60,000 - Leeds
40,000 - Humberside
300,000 - Manchester
60,000 - East Mids
40,000 - Other (South East, BHX, MME/NCL)
If you mean feasible in the sense, of profitability from the tour operator perspective, then that is more a valid point. It is acknowledged that it suits the tour operators to serve the bulk of the Yorks market from MAN (and there will no doubt be some of the 300,000 that are choosing MAN because it is more convenient or is cheaper). This is accepted, but equally most people believe that LBA (esp. given its 100% public ownership) should / could be doing more to claw back passengers from MAN. The recent comments by TUI (ironically enough from Bill Savage, ex MD of LBA) that regional airports should be doing more to lower charges to charter airlines are I think particularly valid in this debate.
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