You are well respected on this thread so what alternatives do you suggest?

Could a 320 fully loaded make the Canaries from Southampton with the extension? I think it's unlikely!

You can change a s106 agreement. Might be on the cards?

Thank you for your kind comment. As indicated by cavokblues the current Section 106 can be amended but could be a very costly exercise with no guarantee of success for AGS.

From what I recollect from the original, which I have no evidence to show that it has been amended, despite making several requests to EBC for a copy, it is overdue for a review, but in the current financial climate no doubt the question is "who pays?".

There is no longer a need for the Section 106 to ban Concorde or B747s from using the airport. Albeit we did get both within a few hundred feet of the runway on a number of occasions!

The main focus of the original Section 106 was noise, which with the advent of the A320 Neos and others is a fraction of what we had when it was first written.

Due to the night movement restrictions specified in the 106 the ATC manning was/is tailored to it, with little or no flexibility (due to duty time limitations) to cover delayed arrivals. These I believe are in fact permitted under the current agreement, the requirement being that they are not originally scheduled after 2300HR. It was/is inevitably the non-availability of ATC staff that has caused diversions of late arrivals..

Didn't operating hours come up again in the recent runway extension application process? Applying for extended hours now just seems like a way of re-opening the recent arguments, and will be interpreted as acting in bad faith.

The Section 106 Agreement for SOU was recently concluded as a precondition for planning permission for the runway extension. !06 Agreements generally seem to last for about ten years, so in this case to 2032 - they tend to need updating when something material happens (such as the runway extension at SOU) and always place legal restrictions on the airport operator. That might be a passenger cap - normally related to surface access congestion, or a night limit/movement cap (usually noise related). Or in the case of Gatwick, the establishment of (I think) a 20 year restriction - which expired in 2019 - on the use of the northern runway as anything other than a taxiway/standby runway. My expectation therefore is that the newly signed 106 agreement at SOU will remain unaltered until 2032, unless something big changes (such as the introduction of regular drone services in large numbers), which is probably 8-10 years away.

FF

The S106 that will sit alongside the runway extension continues with current operating hours (0600-2300) although I believe there is an adjustment for an increase in 1st wave of departures between 0600-0700, assuming to entice a LCC. Doesn’t however change closing times at the back end of the day!

EZY at SEN operated a 320 during winter with a 10-15 seat penalty

Sorry, but how many times does it have to be said......a LCC will not open a base at SOU, due to, the lack of CAT3 ILS, the above mentioned 106 agreement relating to operating hours and not to mention, even with alterations, the size of the terminal facilities. A possibility of W patterns yes, but a very slim chance at that.

Well what is the point of the runway extension?,indeed if there is a slim chance of W patterns ,the question is what does the future of the airport hold?

In FF's post 1026 he states

So the 2018 profit was based on short haul regional flying and a smattering of charters.

The losses since then are down to Flybe and Covid. SOU has recovered slower than other airports due to the loss of BE, but the evidence seems to be there that those gaps are being filled by LM, EIR etc. The runway extension will benefit those flights and might also see an increase in charters and W flights like EZY's ski flights. There'll also be a contribution from new business park.

I don't see a LCC base as the be all and end all

The original planning application stated the extension was to allow current type aircraft to fly further and without restrictions, to me nothing has changed from that. The whole talk of a LCC base has and always will be a fantasy, that's from both the airport itself and many people on this forum. The cold hard reality of it all is it just can't be done from SOU successfully, even with the extension.

The future is as it has been up until now, continued UK connectivity with a few bucket and spade routes thrown in, agreed the extension will allow for more of both of the above, but at what levels we'll have to wait and see.

Exactly this, they need to continue doing what SOU has always been good at doing, with the added benefit of a slightly longer runway, to reduce the summer weight penalty issues previously encountered.

If / when the extension is completed I would be fairly surprised if EZY didn't dip their toe in the pond with a FAO and / or AGP or PMI based frame visting 2-3 times a week for at least a summer.

Given the vibrant economy of the area I would have expected EZY flights from some of their city bases such as Berlin or Milan.

70 min from the railway station opposite the terminal into central London. Southampton has a huge huge catchment area just based upon the stops on that line.

If TUI and RYR can base a single aircraft each at BOH and perform successfully with very limited public transport infrastructure, then I see no reason why they can’t also replicate the same at SOU (post extension) with a few select routes utilising the excellent road and rail links

What would an easyJet and a Ryanair departure do to the terminal? At 186 + 189 that's 375 seats, or 5 x Q400s in olde world flybe terms. Now if you did have 5 Q400s and/or ATRs boarding at peak morning rush and and only the two jets above in addition, that's equivalent to TEN Q400s at once. So your BAU props and the beginnings of wished for loco business, what does that do to your CX? (customer experience)

Basically what they're chasing needs a new terminal for jets and not just a longer runway. IF that's what they need.

There was a terminal extension planned a few years ago as well, quite ambitious by the looks of it - adding a full second floor to the departure lounge area.
https://cimg6.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....131bf55c73.jpg
Worth noting they did manage ok when Flybe had 3x E195's based there, generally arriving and departing at quite similar times - 3x 118 seats is similar to the 2x 738/320 scenario. Of course beyond two of these that question comes back around...

Let’s not forget the huge reduction now seen in peak morning pax traffic compared to pre Covid and BE. Flew from the airport recently and at 0730 it must have been 70% or more quieter. There is definitely a lot of room for manoeuvre in the departures area before it hits capacity once again and a couple of A320 departures would only bring it back up to somewhere near 2019 levels!