Waste of flight capacity

Yesterday evening, I flew from Rome to Brussels. Two Brussels bound flights were leaving at the same time. At adjacent gates.
And even worse: as both were codeshared between Alitalia and Brussels Airlines, both had both an SN and AZ flight number.

I looked up the schedule for the afternoon flights from Rome to Brussels:

13:15 AZ 7438 / SN 3180
(Alitalia/Brussels Airlines codesharing)

15:00 AP 4222
(Air One - now one group with Alitalia)

15:20 AZ 160 / SN 5022
(Alitalia/Brussels Airlines codesharing)

16:55 SN 3182 / AZ 7064
(Alitalia/Brussels Airlines codesharing)

20:45 AZ 7162 / SN 3184
(Alitalia/Brussels Airlines codesharing)

Five flights per afternoon... No wonder most flights are only half full... And then we are surprised airlines go broke, even after millions of public funds are pumped into them? Maybe one should think of rationalizing before subsidizing...

Or maybe I should not complain, and be happy I can always stretch out over three seats?

Picture courtesy InventorSpot