Originally Posted by
tphuang
LHR is by far the largest market out of NYC. For finance industry in NYC, their European office in vast majority of cases is London and secondarily in Dublin (due to language/culture similarity and low taxes in Ireland). If Aer Lingus joins OneWorld at some point, then OW would dominate NYC to these two markets. Both LHR and DUB are better located for transit than continental Europe. I don't see how skyteam more than duplicate connections vs LHR, when I can fly to anywhere I care to fly to in Europe with short layover at LHR.
Outside of CDG and possibly AMS, the other locations ST flies to are vacation spots. LHR by itself is more important than those 2.
I really don't think BRU, FRA, ZRH, MXP or TLV are mainly vacation spots. I personally don't see how an LHR connection (especially with a T3-T5 transfer) ever beats a nonstop. Unless it is my final destination, I find LHR is a pain to deal with (plus BA intra-europe sucks big time). While AA/BA's position on JFK-LHR is a strength for them it is not the end all of NYC marketplace - lots of business goes on in other destinations...