The lack of an early train service to Southend was one of the reasons easyjet gave for their EDI and BFS services underperforming. So I suppose they could try again if an early train is introduced.
Also just wondering about the NCL-BRU service. I was wondering what sort of loads they'd need for the service to be profitable. I have no idea the reliability of these figures, if you think they're incorrect please correct me.
The aircraft is supposed to do 0.24 miles per litre, so lets say the aircraft uses 4.1 litres per mile (rounded the wrong way to be conservative). so NCL-BRU is 385 miles which equals 1578.5 litres. That's as the crow flies so we'll assume... 1700 litres accounting for takeoff, climb, the lack of straight lines etc... The ERJ145 has a fuel capacity of about 6400 litres, so, so far only 26.6% of the fuel capacity has been used. Now I don't have details per hour so, the intended flight time is 1h 25, so that's 85 minutes. 1700/85= 20 litres per minute, so 20*90=1800, 1700+1800=3500 litres accounting for reserves. Then. I couldn't for the life of me find recent definite Jet A1 prices and the ones I did, I don't know if it's per litre or per gallon. So I'm going to go with the one I think is the most reliable. According to ukga, on the 13th June 2011, fuel cost £0.84, I'm assuming per litre, so if it is, 0.84*3500= £2940. So if we assume £3000 to be on the safe side, and then a complete guess of £200 for other expenses equals, obviously, £3200. So if you use the cheapest the flight is currently available for, £70 outbound, 3200/70=45.7 = 46 passengers on the saver fare which is completely unrealistic to keep up a load factor of 94% but then at the other end of the spectrum, if all passengers fly business at £516.38, they only need 6.2, so 7 passengers to make a profit. So that's unfortunately gotten us nowhere, should have done this first and not typed as I went, so... If I take a mean of the lowest, economy saver and the most expensive, business flex, 70+516.38=586.38/2=293.18, 3200/293.18 = 11 passengers, if there is an equal balance of last minute bookings and cheapies, but assuming there weren't, an educated guess from the above calculations would suggest that 15-20 passengers would make the route marginally profitable assuming only the bare minimum saver seats were sold. Does that sound about right to people?
If anyone can see any maths errors above, or can add more accurate information then please don't hesitate. What sorts of loads are being carried on sectors of similar lengths?
Thanks
Martin