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

afransen said:
I had a layover in Laguardia that was astonishingly bad--reminded me a Greyhound terminal. It kills me that flying to smaller US cities in the Great Lakes area is so painful (flying through Philly or NYC). I spent a day travelling to Columbus, wondering if I should have just driven.
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LGA has vastly improved in the last few years. You would barely recognize any of the old. The transportation link is still an issue though.
 
Yeah - LGA is going through a massive overhaul, and the new terminals are really nice: super high ceilings, good lighting, lots of greenery, airy (Pearson is so dark grey...)
 
As we all look at the vaccine administration in Canada which shows there are major challenges and it will take more time as expected. Also only a few country could secure supply. Most countries are not able to run a mass vaccination program. This is overall not positive for tourism and the airline industry.

Whoever can, is now accustomed to work remotly. Also the increased insecurity in the job market urges people to reduce spending and safe more money for retirement. They are not in a position to spend big on travel. The biggest group of travellers are the retirees. They see the pandemic as a threat and stay home or in their cottage for at least the next 12 months.

What does this mean for the airline industry and specifically for Porter? What does it mean for the City Airport? As far as I see it, the majority of profit was made with business travellers. E.g. RBC employees traveling between Toronto and NYC. Also, business travellers have been ok to pay $600 for a ticket to Montreal and back. This is all gone and will not come back. Even with a vaccine business travellers are not interested anymore in the burden of getting up very early and head to the airport. Why should they with new collaborative IT tools available? Cooperations see this also as an opportunity to reduce costs. Those who do that best have a comparative advantage and will survive - with a remote first working environment.

With business travellers as the cash cow gone Porter won't be coming back. I would say there will be only one national airline to be left over. This one airline might be very well nationalized at the end. The City Airport land will be sold off and be developed into Port Lands II. I can see the waste on renovating the Gardiner Expy will be stopped at some point as without commuters coming in from the suburbs this makes no sense at all. The maintenance cost for such a colossal building with no purpose can not be justified in the future. Also the money won't be there anymore with Ontario baby boomers going into retirement and the low oil price in Alberta the tax base will be reduced by a lot.

That will make the Waterfront area much more appealing to live and enjoy nature and the service the area offers. This is how I see it going. Certainly politics and bailouts can artificial prolong this fate, but won't prevent it.

Porter will be missed by some. Part of history now.

What other opinions are there regarding the fate of Porter and the City Airport?
 
Andy_in_Toronto said:
As we all look at the vaccine administration in Canada which shows there are major challenges and it will take more time as expected. Also only a few country could secure supply. Most countries are not able to run a mass vaccination program. This is overall not positive for tourism and the airline industry.

Whoever can, is now accustomed to work remotly. Also the increased insecurity in the job market urges people to reduce spending and safe more money for retirement. They are not in a position to spend big on travel. The biggest group of travellers are the retirees. They see the pandemic as a threat and stay home or in their cottage for at least the next 12 months.

What does this mean for the airline industry and specifically for Porter? What does it mean for the City Airport? As far as I see it, the majority of profit was made with business travellers. E.g. RBC employees traveling between Toronto and NYC. Also, business travellers have been ok to pay $600 for a ticket to Montreal and back. This is all gone and will not come back. Even with a vaccine business travellers are not interested anymore in the burden of getting up very early and head to the airport. Why should they with new collaborative IT tools available? Cooperations see this also as an opportunity to reduce costs. Those who do that best have a comparative advantage and will survive - with a remote first working environment.

With business travellers as the cash cow gone Porter won't be coming back. I would say there will be only one national airline to be left over. This one airline might be very well nationalized at the end. The City Airport land will be sold off and be developed into Port Lands II. I can see the waste on renovating the Gardiner Expy will be stopped at some point as without commuters coming in from the suburbs this makes no sense at all. The maintenance cost for such a colossal building with no purpose can not be justified in the future. Also the money won't be there anymore with Ontario baby boomers going into retirement and the low oil price in Alberta the tax base will be reduced by a lot.

That will make the Waterfront area much more appealing to live and enjoy nature and the service the area offers. This is how I see it going. Certainly politics and bailouts can artificial prolong this fate, but won't prevent it.

Porter will be missed by some. Part of history now.

What other opinions are there regarding the fate of Porter and the City Airport?
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Personally, I would love to see Billy Bishop gone.

But; Porter and Mr. Deluce have had 9 lives thus far; I wouldn't bet against a 10th prematurely.

Irrespective, business travel will return; it may be be down a bit, but I would expect a solid recovery of 80% from the time flights and the social acceptance of their use begin a return to normal.

But; the latter may begin by July; or late as 2022; with the former having, I would think a 6-12 month lag.

Porter will need a very substantial bailout to survive; will it get one.......? Shrug.........no idea.

I'm just not attending the funeral til I see the body.

Apologies to the good staff of Porter for whom I have no enmity.
 
I lived on the Waterfront before Porter and up until a couple of years ago. It’s a noisy, busy place both with and without Porter. The airport existed before Porter.
 
Johnny Au said:
Once there's HSR between Toronto and New York City and between Toronto and Montreal, Porter would not be able to compete with that (and Porter could go out of business before HSR becomes operational between Toronto and either New York City or Montreal).
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No sign of HSR between Toronto and Montreal for decades to come. At a distance of about 525 km, it's not not quite in the distance that makes trains beat out planes.

As for New York City - that's an 850-km run. That's well beyond where high-speed rail wins. I can't see this happening - ever. Even the more frequently discussed 600 km distance from Montreal to New York City is unlikely.

One possibility would be the 250 km from New York City to Albany. Another is the 200 km from Toronto to London. These are the kind of places we are more likely to see high speed.

I don't see any point in getting rid of a useful airport.
 
Andy_in_Toronto said:
As far as I see it, the majority of profit was made with business travellers. E.g. RBC employees traveling between Toronto and NYC. Also, business travellers have been ok to pay $600 for a ticket to Montreal and back. This is all gone and will not come back.
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That's quite the assumption. I'm going to bet that as soon as vaccinations are substantially done, we'll see business travel come back with a vengeance. There's only so much you can do over Zoom. And teambuilding just isn't the same virtually.

nfitz said:
No sign of HSR between Toronto and Montreal for decades to come. At a distance of about 525 km, it's not not quite in the distance that makes trains beat out planes.
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True. But you don't need full HSR with trip times competitive with air to for rail to compete. A rail service that took 2 hrs to Ottawa and 3 hrs to Montreal would pretty much kill Porter.
 
Based on this discussion, every city will be dead. no more downtown cores. All these high rises that everyone loves will be useless. Oh and by the way, every pension plan globally will be bankrupt. They own most office towers and no rent means no income. No income, no pension payments. Values of these properties will fall drastically and guess what, we are all screwed. So tell me again, this WFH will continue Forever?
 
It won’t be WFH forever. It will be working from everywhere forever. Going to the office will mostly for collaboration and corporate training. Different business centres around the city will evolve, but a major HQ will become much less important. CIBC already faces pressure from investors what to do with their offices.

Downtown won’t be dead as all services a city has to offer is still very appealing. Imagine dating in a small town compared to downtown life.

Working life will be much more flexible. Working remote will be by default first. You can spend time with friends and family instead of coworkers you don’t really all like. I can call this as the biggest upgrade in life we are getting.
 
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