I never understand in the UK the lack of desire or maybe its lack of permission to build upwards. You could get rid of the enormous car parks and claim back so much room. It shouldn't be that difficult, There are spaces here there and everywhere to plop multi-storey car parks. Obviously traffic flow plays its part but still. Same goes with all these endless little hotels. Just build upward, reach for the clouds instead of building these 2 floor little chef looking buildings.
Referring back to Southend they and Stansted are rivals. They are in the same county/area that LTN isn't in. They will still never trouble STN long term, Not even remotely