OK, so you can't please everybody all of the time, but news that Ryanair is planning $12 flights to the States is more likely to divide opinion than any other story today. On the one hand we have the holidaymakers - already celebrating the launch of low-cost airline Zoom's new route to New York and now able to envisage a bargain Stateside holiday; on the other, the environmentalists.
At the start of the year I asked environmental campaigners and writers for their green resolutions. Nearly everyone mentioned flying and said we should all be doing less of it. Most were worried about the increase in popularity of overseas mini breaks and wanted people to consider more environmentally friendly holidays in the UK.
But if persuading people to ignore the lure of Italy and France was hard, with six cities in America now on offer for less than a wet weekend in Cornwall it will be a real struggle to encourage people to holiday at home.
Of course, the trip will cost slightly more than $12, once air passenger duty has been added. The duty, which is not exactly a favourite with Ryanair's boss, Michael O'Leary, was doubled in February and on a long-haul flight it will add £40 to the ticket price. It's enough to take some of the gleam off that headline price, but probably not enough to stop that weekend in America look pretty tempting.
