Toronto Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport | ?m | ?s | Ports Toronto | Arup

Any of the airport expansions just discussed (More at T1, Hamilton, Downsview, Oshawa) would cost what - $1B to $2B?

Spend $2B on better passenger rail, what would the reduction of short haul air ridership be? Toronto-Ottawa, Toronto-Montreal, Toronto - London?

Just sayin'.

- Paul
What do you think you can get rail wise for $2 billion? You won't get 3 hours Toronto-Ottawa or 4 hours Toronto-Montreal, and to put a measurable dent in short haul you probably need to get those down to 2hr and 3hr respectively. Try adding a zero. Maybe another if you want air from Toronto to Windsor or Quebec City to compete.

London and Kingston are realistic targets for improved rail out of Toronto. Let's review:

YYZ-YGK is 6 daily in a 19 seat Beech 1900. One VIA carriage each way could probably hold the entire daily load. AC charges $436 round trip but can get you to Pearson in 58 minutes as opposed to 2h30+UPX if catching an onward flight. Porter have been asked to look at Kingston (see their 2012 airport expansion document) and have demurred. So not a lot of traffic to divert there.

YYZ-YXU is a Dash 8 of some sort, so probably 50 seats. 5 daily and similar $. With better speeds post CTC etc etc and a proper connection between Malton and YYZ maybe the London traffic could be put under pressure but only if service is frequent and highly reliable so people can make flight connections - i.e. eliminate grade crossings including private driveways since positive dumbass control ain't happening any time soon.
 
How about this - no expansion of the runway, period. If you can't fly what you have on the runway that you have, that's your problem.

And at this point, it is out of the hands of the city.

AoD
I would trade a smaller expansion, to the west only (in order to bring RESA into compliance and to avoid additional impacts on maximum heights in the Port Lands) for permanently closing 06/24 (and 15/33 unless there was a medevac reason not to), building a parallel taxiway with a noise wall on the south side to keep things moving during peak hours and reducing the footprint of the airport lands/increase public access accordingly. Maybe close the seaplane facility too - those b@stards are noisier than Porter on their way over East York before turning for Muskoka.

Can anyone spot an issue with that? I can't remember seeing anything flying off anything other than 08/26.
 
How about this - no expansion of the runway, period. If you can't fly what you have on the runway that you have, that's your problem.

And at this point, it is out of the hands of the city.

AoD

I 100% agree -- don't expand, land what you want on the current envelope. But that then begs the question: Is there a commercial jet that can land on BB at the current runway length?
 
I 100% agree -- don't expand, land what you want on the current envelope. But that then begs the question: Is there a commercial jet that can land on BB at the current runway length?
Sure, just not at commercially viable loads or ranges, or in the summer :) After all, jets do land for medevac flights but those have maybe 10 people on board at most?
 
Sure, just not at commercially viable loads or ranges, or in the summer :) After all, jets do land for medevac flights but those have maybe 10 people on board at most?
That would be an ironic outcome.......acceptance of jets within a certain noise frame/range.....but no runway expansion......YTZ becomes choice number 1 for private jets coming to Toronto and really is the playground of the rich (I jest).

I am at YTZ just now.....and thanks to the wonderful incompetence of Air Canada have an extra bit of time to kill.......two observations, first time I noticed that there is an Aroma coffee coming soon to the land side building. Not sure why you would sell coffee there (it would have to be totally consumed before boarding) but they know their business better than I do.....sitting in the Mac room just got to observe a tour of some sort of architect/designer lady through the space and overheard "when we built this space it was a thriving place and very popular....as you can see now it is not and we need to repurpose it."....so if you love using those Macs (I don't...just using one of the empty desks) then your time is limited.
 
I 100% agree -- don't expand, land what you want on the current envelope. But that then begs the question: Is there a commercial jet that can land on BB at the current runway length?
No, but SDU is close, but IDK what regulations are specific to Canada. Santos Dumont Airport (SDU), in Brazil has a close but slightly longer runway and regularly operates both Boeing 737 and Airbus narrow body airliners.

SantosDumont.jpg
 
Details? What are those? It's more fun to be a dick on a public forum.

It's not 100m, that's why.

Explain.

Also, please explain why enlarging the airport is bad and verboten. Is it because some of the nude beach would have to go?
 
Also, please explain why enlarging the airport is bad and verboten.
No one here will be able to provide you with an explanation you can accept. Most by now have seen enough as not to bother attempting to explain.

I'll give it another go... enlarging the airport requires three levels of gov't to agree, and currently all three levels of gov't have agreed not to pursue it. Enlarging the airport is not forbidden, otherwise we wouldn't have seen first a larger ferry and terminal, and now a tunnel. However further expansion will require the three gov'ts to agree. That is all.
 
It's because people don't want the airport to exist, period. They're up in arms about "paving over the lake", while living on lake fill.
Not me, I don't want the expansion as I feel we already have a big airport within a 25 min train from downtown, but I like what we have now, a small airport that's a 15 min cab ride from my house from where I can fly to New York, Montreal and Chicago without the big airport headaches.
 
Not me, I don't want the expansion as I feel we already have a big airport within a 25 min train from downtown, but I like what we have now, a small airport that's a 15 min cab ride from my house from where I can fly to New York, Montreal and Chicago without the big airport headaches.

How does extending the runway make it a large airport? What number of flights in large?
 
Not me, I don't want the expansion as I feel we already have a big airport within a 25 min train from downtown, but I like what we have now, a small airport that's a 15 min cab ride from my house from where I can fly to New York, Montreal and Chicago without the big airport headaches.

Extending the runway would only add marginal number of new destinations. A good chunk of that would be northern Ontario. You might see some longer flights (Winnipeg and Halifax), but really, not enough to make the airport a "big airport". It'll never even come close to London City.

Really, I get that people would rather the airport died. That's really the truth of it. Why sugarcoat it? What we should focus the debate on, is keeping the city connected to other regional urban centres, if we want to junk YTZ. I don't really care whether I take a plane or train to Montreal or New York, as long as I get there in sufficient time to do business. That's what matters.
 

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