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Old 25th Jun 2011, 16:57
  #94 (permalink)  
jabird
 
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When passengers do the time-cost-benefit analysis, sure, they'll frequently choose the longer ground-level journey that makes numerous stops on the way rather than an expensive uninterrupted flight and no amount of marketing will change their minds. So the airlines need to offer a different product.
I'm not sure if we're comparing like with like here?

PLH-NQY-LGW means two sets of sitting at the gate (+1 set of security), taxiing, take of, climb - and only then can the table come down, although for the PLH-NQY sector is goes straight up again!

Now that is a hell of a lot of hassle for a short sectory, which still only delivers you to Sussex, not central London (well, the outer edge of Zone 1 at least).

The train v plane debate has often focussed around a threshold journey time where people will prefer to take the train. This has typically been 3-4 hours for biz pax, but imho it is getting longer as wifi becomes standard practice and laptops + mobile devices get more & more powerful.

So yes - each stop of the train will add 10 minutes to journey time, and maybe someone will sit at the table for four you have to yourself but otherwise there is no inconvenience.

Of course, biz pax can spread out more in 1st class, whereas my suspicion is that all the discretionary leisure pax will have been totally put off by two sets of APD. Now there is the real injustice - leisure flights out of EXT to Spain which support the Spanish economy very nicely thanks get taxed once. Take a PLH-GLA flight to support the UK economy and get taxed twice. Actually if the sector features a stop, is that APDx4? Always confused on that one!
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