Going Loco -
Thankyou for your response. Starting over is fine by me.
Let me address your points in order:
"Your view is that the market as a whole will pay a premium for convenience."
No, this is actually not my view at all. I believe that the phrase I used in an earlier posting was: "Afew will [follow Ryanair to another airport] but many will not." This reflects my true opinion of the situation. I do not accept that there is a "one size fits all" answer; every travel decision made is unique to one customer's priorities. Some people will pay a premium for convenience, others will not. It is a diverse and free market of individuals out there, to generalize about the behaviour of the market as a whole is hazardous.
"Fly me from my local airport and I'll pick up the extra cost."
My own policy is to assess the cost of a journey in its entirety rather than the airfare element in isolation. Hence I factor in the cost of reaching the airport(s) competing for my booking (public transport fares / taxis / car parking etc), the value of time expended in so doing, and incidental costs such as hotel accommodation or meals away from home. In my case, a higher headline airfare from Manchester Airport often wins the day overall because my costs to reach there are low. For other customers this same calculation will influence their purchasing decision differently based on their own circumstances. They may live much closer to the alternative airport than I do; they may receive discounted travel on public transport; they may achieve a better deal on car parking. Again, every decision will be individual. No one size fits all.
"... in a defined market."
The concept of competing airports' catchment areas being a 'defined market' is one which I wholeheartedly reject. If you believe that it is possible to predict the booking patterns of air travelers based on a narrow set of criteria, prepare to be surprised. Again, we return to the point that each traveler's decision is made in response to his/her own priorities and circumstances. In reality, no airport has a defined catchment area. A single customer who may use Manchester for flights to Philadelphia may still choose Leeds-Bradford for a flight to Dublin. Neither decision is necessarily illogical. Another customer may choose a long road journey to Stansted if they source a particularly cheap deal befitting a stag-do (for example). Others will pay whatever it takes to fly from the airport nearby. Catchment areas require detailed study on a route-by-route basis if you wish to understand them more fully, and even then they are a moving target. The best one can hope for is to model the likely behaviour of the majority of a group which is deemed to comprise 'the market' for a particular service. But even then, what exactly constitutes 'the market'? Remember also that customers may actually be in the market for "a weekend away" rather than "a return airfare to Marseilles". Hence, when Ryanair's MAN-MRS offering is withdrawn, the selected alternative could actually be Manchester-Rome with Jet2. Complicated, eh? Mister Market is full of surprises!
"The market as a whole behaves differently"
The market as a whole is the sum of many individuals each making the purchasing decision which best suits them. If two or more alternatives are competing for the customers' business, expect a mixed outcome.
"Ryanair aren't the only ones guilty of operating in the interests of their own bottom line."
As a rule, agreed, absolutely. And guilt needn't come into it. I expect every business to operate in the interests of its bottom line as a matter of course. Where confusion may have arisen with regards to my view on this particular issue relates to a point in my post of 14:09 yesterday. My contention is that Ryanair's specific decision to abandon nine Manchester routes was nothing to do with the bottom line. They were enraged that MAG would not give them something for nothing and pulled out in a knee-jerk reaction. I suggest that attention to the bottom line was cast aside in favour of making a point (give us a free ride or else?!!!). This particular decision was based on corporate politics, not economics. Accordingly, my view is that this decision was detrimental to the interests of Ryanair shareholders. MAG's [very generous] proposed service charge of around £3 per passenger journey could have been incorporated into fares with minimal resistance from consumers. Instead, Ryanair wrote off the investment made to date in building up those routes, disrupted many passenger journeys by canceling bookings, and forfeited customer goodwill in a rather large market. Many regular Ryanair customers such as myself are now cut off from convenient access to the wider Ryanair network (Dublin excepted) and as such represent a lost opportunity to the business. Those individuals who do place a premium on use of a convenient airport (as I do) are often the most frequent flyers.
"Wouldn't there be gains and losses at all airports in that market if the industry put their aircraft closest to the point of passenger origin or destination?"
The obvious answer here is YES, but let me be clear that I have never advocated a contrary view. The posting which spawned this discussion related to very specific actions by Ryanair in its relationships with assorted airport operators; it is a quite different argument with nuances well beyond geographical location. As a general observation, let me confirm that I am very happy for all airports to offer whatever air services they are capable of sustaining without public subsidy; they all provide employment and pay taxes to the exchequer after all. However, I do oppose measures which distort the market at taxpayer expense to play off one airport against another (as is common on the continent). This is ultimately a zero-sum game at the expense of the public purse. I realize and respect that some readers will disagree with this in principle, but my own view is as stated.
I hope you have found my answers helpful and thank you for your interest.
Cheers, SHED.