I think the geography at Arnhem, with the bridge being in the middle of a city, would preclude the use of a Pegasus-style coup de main attack as they could not land close enough to achieve surprise
There are (ok, were) three bridges at Arnhem. Going West-East the first is the railway bridge South of Oosterbeek which was blown up by the Germans as 2 PARA reached it. The next is a pontoon bridge in the town, just before the Rhine changes course towards the sea. At the time it was dismantled and the center span removed. Then you have the main road bridge (destroyed after Market Garden and replaced after the war in the same style, now named the John Frost Bridge after the commander of 2 PARA).
Of these, the railway bridge is in open terrain (polderland), the pontoon and road bridges have one end polderland and the other urbanised. Terrain did not rule out a coup de main. Indeed, one might even have landed gliders North of the roadbridge by exploiting the open area directly North of it (essentially a series of parks/embankments around the road ramp).
Arnhem was the bridge too far, it was unrealistic to begin with, particularly with heavy armor being held in reserve nearby that was ignored so the plan could continue. It was an all or nothing gambit, and only FM Montgomery saw it as highly successful.
It's net effect is that the American ability to punch through the Saar while the Germans were still in full retreat and unable to reorganize becomes a moot point whose theoretical viability is blown massively out of proportion by the 'historians' who think the History Channel is one long documentary. The same 'hystorians' who actually believe Patton crossed the Rhine holding the Spear of Longinus in his right hand rather than stopping to take a piss as he actually did. They never let the truth get in the way of a good story.
The best analysis of this is Ritchie,
Arnhem: Myth and Reality and Buckley,
Monty's Men. However, I'd suggest that any negative effect on operations elsewhere was minimal (save in the Scheldt). The prevailing conditions of September simply didn't make a strategic operation practical.
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It is speculation brought up by the author of Pegasus Bridge that asks whether or not Howard's unit, intact with its original glider pilots, could have been used to secure one of Market Garden's chain of bridges that had to be captured before the armor could even think of arriving at Arnhem.
Stephen Ambrose? Quite the poor writer IIRC. Certainly his D-Day book was a load of horse manure.
As for the question in hand, the answer is simply a no. The glider pilots were withdrawn, and Howard's unit was not something in itself so special. Such an argument also ignores that the Orne-Caen Canal operation was planned intensely for a long period. Market Garden meanwhile was planned over a period of days. The real problem however was the operational scheduling, which made a coup de main impossible. Hence why these were a feature of Comet (which had an earlier dropping time than Market). Basically you would have had a small force of gliders either descending on the bridge in daylight (suicide and without the element of surprise unlikely to succeed), or going in at night and waiting several hours for relief.
It's also important to note that Arnhem Bridge was 'captured' (as in one side of it, and notably the far side by XXX corps perspective) intact. As Andre says, it's the ones on the way there where you could really use the help (e.g. the northern side of Nijmegen, or Son, or Grave...).
It still doesn't fix the logistics problem of going even a step beyond Arnhem using a single road to supply a corps...
Grave did see a coup de main operation, IIRC by H Company of the 504th PIR. The problem with the other objectives was largely one of overstretch. The classic appreciation of Market Garden is that there were 4 bridges involved (Son, Grave, Nijmegen, Arnhem). Really there were far more, from South to North; Valkenswaard, Eindhoven, Son/Best, Sint-Oedenrode, Veghel, Grave, Heumen, Nijmegen, and finally Arnhem. In many cases these obstacles had multiple bridges for the airborne to capture. Because of that it simply wasn't possible for them to take all their objectives. Take the 82nd for example. Grave was taken, as was Heumen, but due to other concerns the Nijmegen bridges couldn't be seriously attempted until it was too late.
"This is the wide part of the road", one of my favorite lines from the movie, which really is really a pretty decent portrayal of the campaign. As, say, 'The Battle of the Bulge' where the Ardennes Forest was a wide open plain in Spain with some fake snow tossed about for effect.
It's a good film, but its portrayal of events is somewhat off. Monty is nowhere to be seen and thus escapes blame, Browning receives an utter tarring, as do the RAF planners, the British Army is portrayed as a bunch of tea drinking sloths, and Urquhart and 1st Airborne are portrayed as far more competent than they really were.
