.... picking up mid-to-high end leisure travel and less time-sensitive business travel would really reduce the burden on the airlines and airports. BA still flies from LHR to MAN, for instance, just a lot less frequently than they used to.
We're getting a long way from the original purpose of the thread here, but LHR-MAN is a great demonstration of a lack of integrated transport planning. If you've arrived by plane the connection by train to MAN is a real P.I.T.A. - you've got to lug your bags to the HEX, and then get from Paddington to Euston. The incremental cost of adding a rail shuttle from LHR to Watford would be small and could almost remove the need for LHR-MAN air services. Do the same for Eurostar, or better still run some Eurostar services direct from LHR, plus smilarly addressing a few other routes and you cut and/or delay the pressure for a third runway at LHR. Can you see the UK Government doing anything like that? It seems so obvious, and yet.... Hopefully the US will learn that lesson if it moves back to regional rail.