>>1280188>presumably the 797What's wrong with the A321LR?
A number of airlines are buying into the A321LR primarily because it can still allow for the same kind of business class, premium economy class and economy class seats as regular widebodies, at the sacrifice of first class.
Aer Lingus, SAS, TAP and Air Transat are all buying A321LRs, primarily to replace 757s, but also because in the case of both Aer Lingus and SAS, low population densities and low demand routes both mean that they currently have to operate mostly empty widebodies to their North American destinations.
Since the A321LR is probably only somewhat smaller than the 757 in length, but about the same in width, the A321LR is in a prime position to actually serve long haul flights which would already be low demand.
Budget airlines are also buying the A321LR, but in their cases, the main reason stems more from the added range while being able to serve within their regular A320 fleets, such as with Peach Aviation, Jetstar and so on.
Here's the thing, if Boeing doesn't officially unveil and show off the 797 this year..... then Boeing is going to lose out to Airbus, not only that, but airports like Belfast International Airport are going to quickly become irrelevant as other airports, like in Belfast's case, Dublin Airport, increase their operations and take more and more passengers away from even short haul routes to Europe. Belfast International isn't even doing so well in the domestic flight area, as Belfast City Airport still has higher passenger numbers for a much smaller airport, which is served almost exclusively by Dash-8s and A320s (and maybe the odd Embraer).
