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It's a 'Bumpy' ride from full stop to takeoff
31/2-minute trip. Airport's $150M monorail links parking lots to terminals
Peter Kuitenbrouwer
National Post
Thursday, July 06, 2006
I have seen the future, and it is bumpy.
The future is the new $150-million "Automated People Mover," known as the "Airport LINK" and built by Doppelmayr Cable Car of Wolfurt, Austria, complete with three Star Trek-esque stations, which opened for a media preview at Lester B. Pearson International Airport yesterday.
The thing looks like a train but works like a clothesline. On either end is a huge steel spool. A three-kilometre cable runs between the spools. As you clip clothes to a line, they clipped the trains to the cable. The train also has wheels, which roll on a narrow track two storeys above ground.
And just as clothes bounce when you reel them in, the train bounces its riders as the cable moves. The LINK tossed around CTV cameraman Chris Williams like a leaf yesterday.
"I'm getting ready to take a tackle here," Mr. Williams said, bracing himself with his legs spread to film reporter John Musselman.
"The ride is a little bumpy," Mr. Musselman told his audience, gripping a pole. "But the total trip from the Viscount Station [Pearson's long-term parking lot] to Terminal 1 and Terminal 3 will take about 31/2 minutes."
The train, which will cost $1.5-million a year to operate (not including the hydro bill), replaces the buses that did the circuit from the parking lot to the terminals. It opens to the public this afternoon.
Having walked from Toronto's southeast edge to its northwest tip, it seemed only fitting I end my hike with a ride on the new train. (Full disclosure: I didn't actually walk to Pearson, though I wish I had: I got stuck in vicious traffic on Highway 401, courtesy of a jackknifed tractor-trailer.)
Pearson airport these days is quite the place: the hubris of its empire-builders seems to have no limit -- and this is already the biggest capital project in Canadian history.
Two years ago Pearson opened its $3.6-billion Terminal One. So far, less than half of the vast terminal is in use. That will change next January, when Pearson plans to close Terminal 2 and activate the rest of Terminal 1.
"If you think this is cool," Lloyd McCoomb, vice-president of planning and development for the Greater Toronto Airports Authority, told me at the LINK launch yesterday, "wait till you see the high-speed people mover going in between the hammerhead and customs and immigration at Terminal One. There's this really neat piece of kit going in."
The hammerhead (the piece jutting out from the terminal where jets dock) also features a 400-tonne sculpture by Richard Scerra, he said.
Some were shaking their head at all this lavishness yesterday, specifically, John Tomkinson, an air traffic controller at Pearson who moonlights as a reporter for Aviation.ca.
"A $150-million train that serves a parking lot for 2,400 cars?" he said, incredulous. "Come on!" As he pointed out, Pearson passes its costs on to airlines. It costs $14,000 to land a 747 jet at Pearson, among the highest fees on Earth.
The LINK train does have its own internal logic. In January, 2007, the airport will begin to demolish Terminal 2 and that terminal's 5,500-car parking garage, which it will replace with a 10,000 car parking garage at the end of the LINK line; the overhead walkway to the future garage is already built. That will add to the 9,000 spots they've already built at Terminal 1.
"You can never have too much parking at an airport," said Gerry Winters, the project general manager for the ground side at Pearson.
Yesterday, crews hurried to paint lines on the long-term parking lot, which I needed a compass to navigate, and to plant trees around the LINK terminal.
On the plus side, the LINK connects to the Sheraton hotel, and yesterday the Sheraton fed reporters lovely burritos, sausage, fruit and pastry.
Pearson has also built a platform to accommodate Blue-22, the new high-speed train planned to connect the airport to Union Station.
So come on out for a ride! Long-term parking is just $59 a week. The LINK is a bit scary, sure, but better than a ride at the Ex: It's free, doesn't smell of cotton candy and there are no lineups.
LINK
to articleIt's a 'Bumpy' ride from full stop to takeoff
31/2-minute trip. Airport's $150M monorail links parking lots to terminals
Peter Kuitenbrouwer
National Post
Thursday, July 06, 2006
I have seen the future, and it is bumpy.
The future is the new $150-million "Automated People Mover," known as the "Airport LINK" and built by Doppelmayr Cable Car of Wolfurt, Austria, complete with three Star Trek-esque stations, which opened for a media preview at Lester B. Pearson International Airport yesterday.
The thing looks like a train but works like a clothesline. On either end is a huge steel spool. A three-kilometre cable runs between the spools. As you clip clothes to a line, they clipped the trains to the cable. The train also has wheels, which roll on a narrow track two storeys above ground.
And just as clothes bounce when you reel them in, the train bounces its riders as the cable moves. The LINK tossed around CTV cameraman Chris Williams like a leaf yesterday.
"I'm getting ready to take a tackle here," Mr. Williams said, bracing himself with his legs spread to film reporter John Musselman.
"The ride is a little bumpy," Mr. Musselman told his audience, gripping a pole. "But the total trip from the Viscount Station [Pearson's long-term parking lot] to Terminal 1 and Terminal 3 will take about 31/2 minutes."
The train, which will cost $1.5-million a year to operate (not including the hydro bill), replaces the buses that did the circuit from the parking lot to the terminals. It opens to the public this afternoon.
Having walked from Toronto's southeast edge to its northwest tip, it seemed only fitting I end my hike with a ride on the new train. (Full disclosure: I didn't actually walk to Pearson, though I wish I had: I got stuck in vicious traffic on Highway 401, courtesy of a jackknifed tractor-trailer.)
Pearson airport these days is quite the place: the hubris of its empire-builders seems to have no limit -- and this is already the biggest capital project in Canadian history.
Two years ago Pearson opened its $3.6-billion Terminal One. So far, less than half of the vast terminal is in use. That will change next January, when Pearson plans to close Terminal 2 and activate the rest of Terminal 1.
"If you think this is cool," Lloyd McCoomb, vice-president of planning and development for the Greater Toronto Airports Authority, told me at the LINK launch yesterday, "wait till you see the high-speed people mover going in between the hammerhead and customs and immigration at Terminal One. There's this really neat piece of kit going in."
The hammerhead (the piece jutting out from the terminal where jets dock) also features a 400-tonne sculpture by Richard Scerra, he said.
Some were shaking their head at all this lavishness yesterday, specifically, John Tomkinson, an air traffic controller at Pearson who moonlights as a reporter for Aviation.ca.
"A $150-million train that serves a parking lot for 2,400 cars?" he said, incredulous. "Come on!" As he pointed out, Pearson passes its costs on to airlines. It costs $14,000 to land a 747 jet at Pearson, among the highest fees on Earth.
The LINK train does have its own internal logic. In January, 2007, the airport will begin to demolish Terminal 2 and that terminal's 5,500-car parking garage, which it will replace with a 10,000 car parking garage at the end of the LINK line; the overhead walkway to the future garage is already built. That will add to the 9,000 spots they've already built at Terminal 1.
"You can never have too much parking at an airport," said Gerry Winters, the project general manager for the ground side at Pearson.
Yesterday, crews hurried to paint lines on the long-term parking lot, which I needed a compass to navigate, and to plant trees around the LINK terminal.
On the plus side, the LINK connects to the Sheraton hotel, and yesterday the Sheraton fed reporters lovely burritos, sausage, fruit and pastry.
Pearson has also built a platform to accommodate Blue-22, the new high-speed train planned to connect the airport to Union Station.
So come on out for a ride! Long-term parking is just $59 a week. The LINK is a bit scary, sure, but better than a ride at the Ex: It's free, doesn't smell of cotton candy and there are no lineups.
