Pop of Newcastle:1,650,000
Belfast:671,559

I don't think Newcastle is anywhere near that population...maybe Tyne & Wear, Northumberland and Durham together...., but in that case Northern Ireland is around 1.8m.

I see Jet2 has 4 departures tomorrow morning. Is it now a 4 aircraft base?

I would recommend that you read my previous post, which shows that the ‘BFS/BHD handle more passengers than NCL’ argument is simply pointless and misleading.

If Northern Ireland was connected to GB by road/train, then passenger numbers from BFS/BHD would plummet. Remember - 73% of BFS/BHD passengers in 2017 were domestic. A more fair analysis is by looking at international passengers, in which NCL handles more than double the number from BFS/BHD, or by looking at hub links - NCL thrashes BFS/BHD on this measure as well.

Also, BFS/BHD have a 120 min catchment area of 1.95 million. NCL’s 120 min catchment area is 3.7 million. It’s much more accurate to use these figures given by the airports instead of saying Belfast doesn’t deserve a ME3 route because it is smaller than Newcastle. Afterall, the cities don’t encompass the entire catchment area. One point worth noting is that while approximately half of BFS/BHDs catchment area is solely theirs, almost all of NCLs catchment area overlaps with those of EDI, GLA and MAN.

However, your point with regards to the Asian population of NI is interesting. Just because NI has a small Asian population, it doesn’t necessarily mean that a ME3 route isn’t sustainable. After all, there are only approx 60,000 Asians living in Ireland, and they make up roughly the same percentage of the Irish population as in Northern Ireland

Not sure they are the only options...

Indeed. Air Canada are launching YYZ-SNN and YUL-DUB on the Max this year, and It’s only a matter of time before JetBlue start plying the Atlantic on 321LRs.

We need a legacy carrier.

I personally would consider Air Canada as a "Legacy carrier" others would disagree :) As for JetBlue it is reasonable but their A321NEOS are coming in 2019.

Indeed, 3 -300s and 1 -800. G-GDFL came from EDI today.

You wouldn’t call Air Canada a legacy carrier?

I don't see Air Canada coming here. They went to SNN and that part of the Island doesn't have strong links with Canada, so there's little chance of them coming here.

What an absurd comment to make, thousands of people from this side of the island moved to canada during the recession...links with canada go all the way back to the great famine.

We were meant to get a neo in june for the season, does that mean this neo is just a week long or a longer stay?

It’s not just Asians that would use a ME3, what about all of the people connecting to Aus/NZ. Lots of people from NI travel there for leisure and there are strong Irish links in that part of the world.

Maybe this has already been discussed, but I see that NAS is reducing SWF to seasonal? Although EDI and SNN are also being treated the same.

ORK/EDI/SNN-PVD cut for the winter, BFS-SWF cut, BFS-PVD was always seasonal. SNN-SWF increased from 2x weekly last winter to 4x weekly this coming winter. DUB-SWF going to 2x daily in the winter.

TUI Summer 2019 on sale no changes from Summer 2018.

Just thinking about attracting a North American legacy carrier. UA had subsidies and an exemption from APD when they were in, so naturally DL, AA, AC would want similar if they were to consider flying to BFS. With no Stormont in place to approve/finance, would such a deal be possible right now?

I think so because the money and policy was all in place before Stormont was collapsed.

Given that the final deal Stormont gave to United was rejected by the EU on grounds of state aid, wouldn't that mean that United (or indeed another airline) could be given that same deal once we leave the EU? It would be interesting to know if United and BFS have already come to an agreement that would see the route reinstated when the funds are made available post Brexit. That being said, I know that at least two US carriers have been knocking on BFS management's door, so maybe there's a deal being made with one of United's rivals...

Two American airlines have been desperate to create a route from Belfast? Delta and American, lol.

From where?

United probably wouldn't want to come back to Belfast with the removal of quite a few 757 routes recently.