You want to know how Walter Mitty things are in Thanet? For years just about everyone in a position of authority has proclaimed that the airport will regenerate the area. Many of them seem to have genuinely believed the guff they were spouting. In truth the airport has cost the taxpayer millions. The EUjet fiasco left thousands stranded abroad, many of whom had to pay through the nose to get home. What you have is a situation where everyone whose been elected says that the airport is a good thing, but in reality it has just been a financial millstone. I know this site is frequented by people who earn their living from aviation, but you can't justify keeping an airport going with public subsidies.
It isn't just the airport they do it with. They wanted to build an art gallery in the sea, off Margate. The unwashed masses protested. "It will get washed away", they said. The great and the good pressed ahead. They weren't going to listen to silly little people, even if those people were being asked to pay for the folly. Last year they erected a test structure in the sea off Margate. It was washed away within 24 hours. The project was shelved. Unfortunately, by the time they shelved it they'd already spent 7 million pounds of taxpayers' money.
I'm all for business which makes commercial sense and has a real prospect of giving the area a lift. But what we have here is a situation where the political elite is using taxpayers' money to promote schemes that aren't viable. Manston's commercial history is one of over-optimism and failures. Rising oil prices, interest rates and vigorous competition will ensure that this continues.