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Harbour City or any similar concept could only be built if we were in a place like Dubai. But in Toronto? No way.

I'd trade the airport for a mixed-use neighbourhood with a 100k residents. But with the way toronto works, we'd end up with exclusive condos, containing half the residents, almost no commercial space and very little notable greenspace. I'd rather have ane excellent downtown airport than that kind of mediocrity.
 
dt_toronto_geek said:
The content that I submitted was altered, it was not a poorly communicated post.
That said, perhaps I overreacted. I got the smiley but I didn't think it was an appropriate thing to do. Correct me, disagree with me - that's all good, but I don't think that changing a post to reflect a different point of view is cool.
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well, my apology still stands....did not mean to offend/upset anyone. My "logic" in showing my disagreement by quoting/amend quoting is this.....


.....by showing your quote with the amendments that I would make in bold (as I did) someone coming along later can clearly see what you said and what I disagree with....as to someone elses idea of deleting your name, I think that removes the ability of future readers to check back and see whether I have taken anything out of context.....

...so the "I fixed your post" method (IMO) is the best way to fairly reflect what each person's point of view is......as long as (as I always do) it is clear what words belong to the original poster and what words are changed/inserted by me.

.....fully ready, however, to accept that I could be wrong or, at least, subject to opposing opinions....so I will be careful in the future.
 
Interesting to realize that when Pickering Airport was allocated land that it was envisioned as the replacement for the island airport. I didn't realize all these plans were interconnected.
 
EnviroTO said:
Interesting to realize that when Pickering Airport was allocated land that it was envisioned as the replacement for the island airport. I didn't realize all these plans were interconnected.
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They have always been inter-connected. You can't just plop down airports anywhere you like. The airspace over Toronto is quite busy and needs to be managed carefully.

This creates a unique tension though. Those Pickering airport lands is some of the most valuable greenspace in the city. How many GTA residents would support an Island park if it meant building an airport in Pickering?
 
The Island is already mostly a park. This small airport is functional now and should be kept. I would say that Pickering lands are better left natural.
 
kEiThZ said:
They have always been inter-connected. You can't just plop down airports anywhere you like. The airspace over Toronto is quite busy and needs to be managed carefully.
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I mean interconnected in that the vision of a Pickering Airport stems directly from a view to find a replacement for Toronto Island. Obviously the airspace is connected.

kEiThZ said:
This creates a unique tension though. Those Pickering airport lands is some of the most valuable greenspace in the city. How many GTA residents would support an Island park if it meant building an airport in Pickering?
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Even as an airport most of the Pickering Lands would remain green space. I support the Pickering Airport Lands being held in reserve for an airport in case Pearson gets maxed out or Buttonville closes. I wouldn't want passenger or cargo services there unless Hamilton has no cargo capacity left (not going to happen) or Pearson becomes severely slot restricted after building the second north runway (might be possible). If an airport solely for general aviation was to open in the Pickering Lands the amount of area it would take up within those lands would be a fraction of the space and the amount of green space (between the runways and taxiways) would a significant portion of that. Add to that the benefit of removing aviation noise from around Buttonville Airport, Markham Airport, and Oshawa Airport which could occur with consolidation there would be a significant benefit. The space reserved for the airport is so significant and the orientation of the runways are such that with general aviation almost nobody would be impacted by the noise.
 
^ Buttonville is closing. There is no way that airport will stay open without the subsidy. The traffic will be re-distributed to Markham, Brampton, Oshawa and the Island. And I see most of it moving to Oshawa before the others. In fact, I'd say that for GA it'd be far better to improve Oshawa than to build a whole new airport. Oshawa already has fairly decent services and a staffed tower (Brampton and Markham are uncontrolled airfields)....and that's why the Island should be preserved for commercial traffic for now.
 
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I'd say it makes a lot more sense to continue subsidizing Buttonville than to potentially build a multi-billion dollar new airporter mostly for GA in Pickering.
 
unimaginative2 said:
I'd say it makes a lot more sense to continue subsidizing Buttonville than to potentially build a multi-billion dollar new airporter mostly for GA in Pickering.
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Financially, that may not be the case. The land is extremely valuable for its development potential. We are going to need larger and larger subsidies to prevent the owners from tearing up the runway and putting up homes on that land. At some point it won't be worthwhile.

However, the construction of Pickering is not directly tied to the closure of Buttonville. At present, other airports in the GTA can absorb the GA traffic from Buttonville. However, as the city grows, so does air traffic, and at some point it might just be worthwhile to consolidate traffic in one location and close down the other airports. A purpose built airport with lots of capacity meant to handle all the traffic from Buttonville, the Island, Oshawa (which is facing development pressures too) and Markham might not be a bad thing. I also don't know why Pickering is the only option. I'd rather they build on Markham airport. That could present some airspace issues though, since Markham is close to Pearson's approaches.
 
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Another possible new destination for Porter, starting in February:

Myrtle Beach Area Chamber of Commerce and airport representatives are in final negotiations with Toronto, Ontario-based Porter Airlines to begin offering a nonstop flight from the Toronto Island Airport to Myrtle Beach next year, said Brad Dean, president and CEO of the chamber...

"For us, it represents a unique opportunity to provide some of our passengers with a new destination that offers quite a few things that we normally don't experience, including access to beach and golf," [Robert Deluce] said. "Canadians love Myrtle Beach and Myrtle Beach has been an attractive place for quite a long time."...

The inaugural flight is scheduled for Feb. 28, [Kent Myers, president of AirPlanners] said....If everything goes as planned, travelers should be able to book flights between Myrtle Beach International Airport and Toronto Island Airport online by Nov. 9, Myers said. He declined to say how many times a week or day the flight would be available....

About 852,400 Canadians visited South Carolina in 2007, according to the most recent statewide data from the Department of Parks, Recreation and Tourism.
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kEiThZ said:
That's quite the trip. I wonder ho they'll do it without stopping for gas.
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gcmap


Myrtle Beach vs Q400 range. Of course, the range circle is based on no takeoff restrictions, but it gives you an idea.
 
They are 600 feet short for a MTOW departure at the Island. I doubt they can reach Myrtle Beach without restricting passenger loads or incorporating a fuel stop. The charts are misleading. They assume no departure restrictions and standard weather. Reality can vary a bit and requires more specific calculation.
 
They've flown a few charter flights to Myrtle Beach before. So this isn't anything new. The problem is those flights weren't full.

They'll have to minimize baggage (one 20kg bag + one golf bag max) or passengers (45-50pax) or else they will run into the same issues that have happened every christmas with their direct Halifax flights where they've spent tens (maybe hundreds) of thousands on shipping bags to Halifax that couldn't be put on the planes. Considering people would most likely be going down there for the sole reason to golf, Porter has to realize that they can't simply remove some golf bags if they go beyond weight limits or bulk out. It could (and probably will) be a nightmare in the making.

I'll ask my friends in operations if they have any plans to cap passenger loads. I'm sure they're hoping this will be the case, but considering the battle going on there between operations and office staff (basically a battle between maintaining a high quality service and revenue maximization), it wouldn't surprise me if they simply saw the dollar signs of fully sold out planes and then passed the buck off to the front line folks to deal with all the baggage issues. For a company's whose reputation is based on high quality customer service, I don't know why they put that at risk. It just doesn't make sense.
 
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