West coast, forget it.....cost a fortune to run unless a daily and the yields aren't there to justify a 365 operation.
I think the yields aren't there because our branding is poor. We only seem to be able to attract Irish travellers. You see this time and again. EK are overbooked into and out of DUB, United/Continental can fly from IAD to DUB, the yanks can make Shannon work and the Washington "success" story is down to the yanks booking on united.com. I can assure you they have no idea that a green aeroplane is going to fly them until they front up to the gate. The sad reality as has been seen in LGW is that people just don't know about AL nor seem to wish to.
Entry into one of the alliances may well have helped but Mueller doesn't seem to want to. Unfortunately I see no growth on the medium/long haul side of the business and we might even get pushed out altogether by the bigger players.
As an aside the impact that the likes of EK will have on the LHR route will be interesting to see over time as people head to Dubai to connect and avoid the high UK taxes.