Belfast was launched with a poor choice of routes and terrible publicity so it's no surprise that it started off poorly. Geneva, Budapest and Nice all failed early on and were quickly dropped but Amsterdam continued suffering awful loads and more bad decisions were made when Barcelona changed schedule which saw it's load factor drop.
Aer Lingus did make some positive changes though, Lanzarote, Munich and Milan were added taking the base in a new direction followed by a new Barcelona schedule which now ties in the cruise departures possibly down to a deal with a cruise company and Tenerife has been added while the long underperforming Amsterdam is dropped.
So it isn't all bad news for Belfast and with the recent changes things are looking better than they did this time last year.
Here are some loads up until October 2008:
Faro - 75%
Malaga - 70%
Rome - 63%
Barcelona - 60%
Heathrow - 60%
I'm sure Lanzarote falls in the high 70s with Munich and Milan not too far behind so looking at those, I don't think it's really fair to say that LHR is the only reasonably performing route.
I wish Aer Lingus all the best at Gatwick, it's a brave move but they won't get anywhere by playing things safe.