kEiThZ
Superstar
Pickering starts as a GA airport to replace Buttonville, Markham and Oshawa eventually. It's use as a commercial airport is still very much debatable.
|
|
|
Toronto Pearson International Airport
- Thread starter p5connex
- Start date
cd concept
Senior Member
Why should all those small airports be replaced by a major airport. Why not a new regional one. Put the rest of the funds in Hamilton's airport . build a new one between Hamilton and kitchener.
rbt
Senior Member
He didn't say major airport. He said Pickering starts as a GA airport (General Aviation, for flight schools, hobbiests, and very small 2 and 4 seat commercial flights).
The motivation behind consolidating (aside from the fact that GTAA was subsidizing the smaller airports when they took over the planning) is to simplify the airspace and flight paths which does have an impact on Pearson.
aquateam
Active Member
That's interesting, I didn't realize that was the case with the airport fees. What happened with Mirabel then? There's no way that multi-billion dollar white elephant was entirely funded by airport fees. Incidentally, I think that if Pickering airport is built it will be Toronto's Mirabel, so to speak.
Woodbridge_Heights
Senior Member
Buttenville airport for one is closing as a result of local council and resident decisions. It is not closing to allow for construction of a new one, in fact it's planned closing is one of the main reasons for the planning of a new airport in Pickering.
innsertnamehere
Superstar
Mirabel was constructed before the modern day model came to be.
rbt
Senior Member
I think Mirabel was one of the motivations for the feds making the airline industry self-supporting. Pearson and it's multi-billion dollar capital backlog was the another motivation. The current funding structure has been in place since around the mid-90's.
Yup, GA and limited commercial service. It should also be pointed out that all 3 of those sites that you mention are in areas where development is encroaching or has already surrounded the site, and would make for excellent redevelopment sites.
I'm completely fine with building Pickering as a small-scale GA airport with limited commercial service, similar to say Kitchener or Hamilton. That's an appropriate size for the area.
The other potential of course is, due to the proximity to the 407, the potential for a direct connection to the 401 via the West Durham Link, and proximity to both CN and CP main lines, is to turn Pickering into the primary freight airport for the GTA, and leave Pearson primarily for passenger flights.
Last edited:
innsertnamehere
Superstar
Markham is in the greenbelt, so it can't really be touched.
Greenbank is currently undergoing a large expansion as well, it will probably be able to take a significant amount of GA traffic.
Greenbank is currently undergoing a large expansion as well, it will probably be able to take a significant amount of GA traffic.
My mistake. However, the other two are certainly prime redevelopment candidates.
diminutive
Active Member
Fair enough but my point was that consolidation is happening all over the US. Even pretty major metro areas like Cleveland, Pittsburgh or Cincinnati have seen huge declines in passengers over the past decade as airlines consolidated hubs. Cincinnati has 1/4 of the passengers it had a decade ago, for instance. The consolidation is happening at a very regional level.
There's a reason why even pretty distant airports like London or North Bay, which are clearly beyond the GTA, mostly just have flights to Pearson. It's duplicative.
Maybe this would change if Canada got a big LCC (not WestJet) who was willing to make its own hub at a non-Pearson GTA airport, but it's hard to imagine a new LCC entering the market. Canada's a pretty high-cost market to begin with.
cd concept
Senior Member
Yes but there plans are to build a major airport in that area, which the people in Pickering never wanted since it was expropriated in 1972.
nfitz
Superstar
Over 40 years ago. Currently, the opening date is scheduled for 2027 (if it doesn't slip again!). That's 55-years advance notice.
It's hard to imagine that there's too many people left who are going to be impacted, who didn't buy their property knowing full well that they were near a planned international airport!
Woodbridge_Heights
Senior Member
Oh come now, poor selection of examples as all of these cities have suffered from the de-industrialization of the North East USA and have been in decline for decades. For example Cleveland has dropped 54% from a high of 914,000 residents in 1950 to 396,000 in 2010, Pittsburgh also has dropped 54% from it's high of 676,000 in 1950 to 305,704 in 2010, and Cincinnati has dropped 41% from it's high of 503,000 in 1950 to 296,000 in 2010. Given that it's hard not to attribute at least a significant part of the reduction of air traffic in these regions to the decline in population, not consolidation.
That being said I think I understand what you are trying to say, however I think the consolidation is happening at the smaller and medium sized airports which tended to be served during the days of US Airline regulation and routes tended to be leap frog routes (vs point to point routes), think NY-Rochester-Buffalo-Chicago routes compared to now NY-Chicago routes bypassing Rochester and Buffalo. The shift at these airports has been to either 1) close or reduce services at the airport in the hope that there is a second facility where air service can be consolidated or 2) Attract an airlines, or one of an airlines regionals to serve the area with routes to a hub. Think now that buffalo and Rochester mostly have flights into hubs in NY and fewer point to point routes.
At the upper end of the scale (Large regions/airports such as NY, LA, etc) consolidation is less of a factor and likely see increased traffic as a result of the Hub model. Toronto is closer to a large hub region than a declining market such as Cleveland, Pittsburgh or Cincinnati.
What that says about the future Southern Ontario's regional airports. As you said these airports mostly feed into Toronto. I mentioned a few months ago that consolidation of these airports might be the answer, Hamilton, Waterloo, and London have a combined 219,000 aircraft movements and 946,000 passengers. Pooling all this into one airport could create a big enough market to attract an airline (even if the routes are duplicated by Toronto Pearson) and serve the South Western Ontario market. The only question would be which airport would become the new 'mega' airport.
nfitz
Superstar
Your looking at the city population though, not the population of people nearby. For example, while Cleveland has dropped from 914,000 residents in 1950 to 396,000 in 2010, the greater Cleveland area has increased from 2.2 million to 2.9 million people in the same amount of time. However they all use the same airport!