At Last!!!!!!
banewboi,
The debate you provide is a very good one and I'm pleased to see a crew member looking at the facts instead of rumors.
We had a talk with a very senior management and to be honest they said exactly what your saying, they were not expecting the open skies to go ahead as soon as what it did and to be honest what we know today could change tommorow.
It's an interesting point about the slots and how many there is but maybe the open skies has saved Lgw in a way because Ba will not want to have a big carrier at Lgw doing rival routes at very low fares (because of cost base).
Lgw has spent alot of money in order to save alot of money (15million) ie: training recruitment and to be honest the base is the best I've seen it anyway.
Another thing to remember about t5 is it's not another runaway it's a terminal and this in itself does not create slots, yes it's bought some off bmi but I think Ba was panicking when the agreement was reached and wanted to make sure it had a even bigger share of market.
The next six months i'm sure will be very interesting and a lot of change and with that comes alot of rumors, but it's a case of wait and see really and at the end of the day if we were not used to change we would be in the worst business ever.
Thanks for your constructive look on the situation.