Having a short runway does not always mean you will have an unsuccessful and non expanding airport, take where I work at BRS, It's got a very short runway not to mention the infamous hump in the middle of it and an awful approach (if on RWY 09), the weather record is genrally crap infact the RAF used to use it for bad weather practise landings back in the day, rubbish road networks and no rail network, yet compared to other airports that handle similar pax figures like NCL and EMA, BRS handles more, ok you are limited to the length of flight you can do and what equipment you can use, but, nobody gave CO a hope in hell of doing well out of BRS to NYC but now the load factor is constantly around 85% and the route is generally popular with both tourists and business, look at the expansion in pax numbers and a/c movements in recent years, in just 5 years BRS has gone from handling 1.5 million to 5.2 million with nearly 6 million expected by the end of this year, so I think its fair to say that yes a short runway may restrict long haul growth but I dont think its a major excuse for an airport not expanding. As CO have proved US operators will use 757s to the UK for small runways and so too probably would AA or US, Theres already rumours of a 2nd NYC service and a possible BOS service from BRS.
You just need an excellent marketing team to land the deal, and I think going on previous years its fair to say BRS has one of the best in Europe!
In recent years they've landed the CO deal, got large expansion from BA,FCA,XLA,KM and new schedule carriers such as Air Southwest and Eastern, and also become EZY's busiest base outside of London with 25 destinations
With the new aircraft being produced nowadays such as the B787 it wont be long until airports such as LPL and BRS whos runways are short will start to see long haul services, I have been told by sources that FCA have pretty much promised a 787 to BRS and the number crunchers have said destinations such as MLE/CUN/SFB/MBJ will be no probs direct from BRS, FCA are already swapping from 2 based 321s to poss 3 x 757s by next summer so that they will already have boeing crews there and that they can start doing longish routes such as SSH/BJL(which are already operated by other carriers from BRS)asap.
So the future can look good for these airports as long as you have a marketing team that know what they're doing and airlines that listen and take a chance!
But then again from an objective point of view, is BRS an exception to the rule?
