VS domestic
Quote: "Agree with most but not the "most get the train" bit. The train takes you to an inner North London location which, while it might be convenient for those offices in Central London that most businesses had a generation or two ago, is useless for the Thames Valley, Surrey, Berkshire, and much of West London that is Heathrow's business catchment area.
I'm looking at our top 20 national corporate customers, of whom about half have their head office around the South East. There is ONE whose HQ is inside the Circle Line, and is more convenient to Euston than Heathrow."
This is exactly the point: not all pax are headed for the middle of London, it's a huge conurbation. Those that are take the train (if they can afford it), else flights to LCY. Either way, there should be choice.
Much of the business catchment area is west of London because of the location of LHR, so there will be point-to-point traffic at LHR as well as transfer traffic. This is also another reason why the Thames estuary airport idea is a non-starter.
Quote: "Does anyone know how many passengers a year actually connected on to Virgin services at LHR from MAN when under the bmi code-share? If it is sizeable then it makes sense."
VS domestic probably has as much to do with replicating the feed that BD provided as it does with the acquisition of BA slots.
Quote: "Aer Lingus have said they would be intrested flying LHR-EDI and ABZ. IMO I hope they don't get them as I see no benefit to the airline of flying UK domestic."
Yes, they are probably the only other contenders for the BA slots, maybe apart from BD regional perhaps. The likes of BE, U2, etc., appear uninterested in this.
Last edited by Fairdealfrank; 18th Sep 2012 at 19:36.