crewmeal & GayFriendly
I assume a mixture of reasons but BHX is not alone although Heathrow is holding up well as one might expect - here some are some May figures for three Middle Eastern routes. I still think the major aspect is over-capacity with GF states BHX getting squeezed. TK have increased but some say they have just picked up the Mahan Air passengers since they left.
Dubai (2011 in brackets)
Gatwick - 42886 (48074) -11% average per flight 230
Heathrow -139736 (137110) +2%
Birmingham - 30542 (36953) -17% average per flight 246 - 61%
Glasgow -19995 (20651) - 3% average per flight 323 - 75%
Manchester - 43590 (50511) -14% average per flight - 259 - 64%
Newcastle - 10329 (11778) - 12% average per flight - 167 - 62%
Manchester only achieved 64% due to EK21/22 was cancelled 9 times and EK17 was a low density A380 25 times out of 31 flights.
BHX saw 21 of 62 flights down-graded to low density 777's and it would have looked much worse if it was all two-class (20 x 3-class already in June).
Abu Dhabi
Heathrow 41739 (42798) -2%
Manchester 21369 (14625) +46% - 172 average per flight - 66%*
*Based on zero cancellations
Doha
Gatwick Nil (9103)
Heathrow 61043 (52271) +17%
Manchester 16516 (12271) +29% - 188 average per flight 67%
Both Heathrow and Manchester saw extra QR flights in 2012.
I used libhomeradar and planespotters.net for the frequency, type of aircraft used and seating capacity for each aircraft but I would say these figures will not be too far out. CAA stats used for the passenger figures.
There is little relief in the short-term as Ramadan starts mid July this year when traditionally figures usually recover due to the impending school holidays but it could be September before figures improve.
Pete