A little of a bit of anticlimax with the KLM announcement ,I doubt whether there will much of a increase in pax numbers for the Amsterdam route.I guess everyone hoped for the Sun routes announcement, that would have been great news with the potential of a big drop off in pax numbers for the airport if it doesn't happen.
That's an interesting view. I guess almost every airport in the world in the SOU category is keen to be linked to one of the three big alliances' hubs to allow seamless worldwide connections to hundreds of destinations - aeven though passengers on those flights will not buy as much booze in the duty free than those heading to the costas...
SOU will have approx. 200 additional seats on a daily basis once the E90s have replaced the F70s. If BE indeed stops AMS, it remains to be seen if they will pull the SOU-based DH4. Even if so, with Flybe's international routes coming and going and Flybe having a change of heart reather frequently, a robust hub link by a blue chip carrier like KLM certainly is extremely valuable for the airport. Plus: Given that the alternative Sun routes would not have seen A321s for obvious reasons, but same-sized DH4/E9X aircraft , a better deal passenger-wise would have required something like 20-30 additional sun flights per week alone. Not very realisitic in my opinion...