Lack of use by the locals who wouldn’t pay the fare rates, so service pulled simple economics really, same for the On/off AerLingus offerings and the lamented BMA services to Heathrow and Frankfurt.
And this is the reality being deliberately ignored by politicians and vested interests at HAL.
Shout all they like about R3 and ring fenced domestic access without PSO grants the services won’t ever develop.
For the most part they don’t exist today because they aren’t viable- in fact never were !
Cambrian and North East made losses to the point of the BA merger, The Twin Otter and Shed services over the 70 and 80s carrierd literally 10s ! of high fare paying passengers at huge loses as well.
Over all the numbers of inter line passengers that might make use of these mythical future domestic hub and spoke feeder services top out at perhaps 100,000.
That’s a drop in the ocean at Heathrow today and adds relatively few passengers to any of the half dozen potential UK regionals
Once again domestic air connectivity is a smoke screen.
Further some of the UK politicians are utterly naive in their actual understandings of Hub and Spoke models and their actual complexities, and competitive markets.
Heathrow is Europe’s largest One World Hub serving just about anywhere except South and Central American markets where Madrid steps in.
IAG group AA CX MH QR AY JL JJ QF feed each other with BA the distributors around the whole of Europe indeed they get a better return collecting an Italian business person from Milan and onward to Austin than a Yorkshire business person to Chicago.
Competing hubs all have this effect .
Unless British carriers somehow gain access to Heathrow and membership of Star what advantage is there in putting anyone on a domestic leg with a competitor rather than lifting them directly to Frankfurt Munich Brussels or Zurich - NONE
Sky team similarily via Amsterdam and Paris.
These fundamentals do NOT change when Brexit is delivered , it’s the way the European Legacy Hub and Spokes have developed and fortified over decades.
And this is the reality being deliberately ignored by politicians and vested interests at HAL.
Shout all they like about R3 and ring fenced domestic access without PSO grants the services won’t ever develop.
For the most part they don’t exist today because they aren’t viable- in fact never were !
Cambrian and North East made losses to the point of the BA merger, The Twin Otter and Shed services over the 70 and 80s carrierd literally 10s ! of high fare paying passengers at huge loses as well.
Over all the numbers of inter line passengers that might make use of these mythical future domestic hub and spoke feeder services top out at perhaps 100,000.
That’s a drop in the ocean at Heathrow today and adds relatively few passengers to any of the half dozen potential UK regionals
Once again domestic air connectivity is a smoke screen.
Further some of the UK politicians are utterly naive in their actual understandings of Hub and Spoke models and their actual complexities, and competitive markets.
Heathrow is Europe’s largest One World Hub serving just about anywhere except South and Central American markets where Madrid steps in.
IAG group AA CX MH QR AY JL JJ QF feed each other with BA the distributors around the whole of Europe indeed they get a better return collecting an Italian business person from Milan and onward to Austin than a Yorkshire business person to Chicago.
Competing hubs all have this effect .
Unless British carriers somehow gain access to Heathrow and membership of Star what advantage is there in putting anyone on a domestic leg with a competitor rather than lifting them directly to Frankfurt Munich Brussels or Zurich - NONE
Sky team similarily via Amsterdam and Paris.
These fundamentals do NOT change when Brexit is delivered , it’s the way the European Legacy Hub and Spokes have developed and fortified over decades.