Cubana, South African Airways
Cubana stopped because of the sub-standard equipment (IL-62) being used and the fact it had to stop at Gander to refuel. It was mainly used by IT companies for holiday trips and pax were not told about the refuelling stop, even when on the flight. As a result, many thought they were at Havana when they landed at Gander and wondered why it was snowing in Cuba - this wasn't in the brochure.
SAA stopped because with the ending of apartheid, they suddenly had many new more lucrative destinations available
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It doesn't matter whether the CITY of Manchester is bigger, smaller, fatter, taller than Birmingham - for goodness sake - Manchester Airport isn't even in Manchester if we are being that pedantic!
To be really pedantic, most of Manchester Airport, including all the terminals, lies within the Manchester City Council area. However, unless the boundaries have been adjusted since my copy of the A to Z was printed, almost all of the southern runway is in Macclesfield!
From the map, it looks as though the boundary was modified many years ago to give all of the airport to a single local authority, but the powers that be have not caught up since the second runway was built.
Dairyground
You are correct. Originally the boundary between the City of Manchester and Cheshire ran through the middle of the airfield - the south side hangars were in Cheshire. This of course meant that the terminals were in a "nuclear free zone" and would be safe in the event the bomb went off as the bomb would have to be dropped in Cheshire. I'm sure this was very reassuring for the staff that worked there and tough luck on those on the south side
At some stage - think in the mid 80s? - the boundary was adjusted so that the whole airfield was within the City of Manchester. As may be imagined this caused some political friction between Manchester and Macclesfield Borough, the adjoining Cheshire authority, especially considering Macclesfield had no shareholding in the airport, yet Wigan (many miles away) did as it was part of Greater Manchester.
With the advent of the second runway, the section of 23L/05R west of the Bollin River is in Cheshire and I think there may well be something in the legal agreements that says that it will remain so. Macclesfield Council doesn't exist now - it became part of the imaginatively named Cheshire East council (in 2009 I think).
Suzeman