jacko,
thanks for flight instruction, i shouldnt need recurrent this year :~)
you are basing your numbers on a 6 hour trans-atlantic flight. i am not sure if you are aware of this or not but there are other routes besides JFK-LHR. some thans atlantic flights are 8,9, even 12 hours. so obviously the time savings are quite benificial on thise longer sectors.
as far as losing out to airbus on the VLA, only time will tell. but boeing spent relative peanuts researching the idea, contrary to your earlier statement. but selling 500 airplanes (i know AB says 250 but the bankers and investors say 500) will be a challenge. even if they do, it will probably take the better part of 20 years just to break even. in the mean time, they will have precious little capitol to develope new ideas, which is what you are slamming boeing for.
this gets to my 2 points that i was trying to get across when i joined this dicussion. the first is boeing is damned if they do and damned if they dont. the second point was that it is not "revolutionary" enough for you guys. what is more "revolutionary" ; this new offering from boeing or the A320 (which all europeans point to as the great leap forward in aviation)?
when i asked for ideas for what boeing should do next, no one had any answers (except for a sub-orbital hypersonic a/c that is impossible to operate economically with todays technology).
i do agree that if they had done it right, they could have had a real SST operational by now that actually makes money. JUST JOKING! i love the concorde. the concorde and the L1011 are what made me want to become a pilot.