How not to run a Canadian city
April 28, 2009
National Post Editor
Yesterday morning, a group of airline executives and invited officials gathered at Toronto’s small downtown airport to celebrate an example of successful Canadian entrepreneurship in the face of determined political obstructionism. It is a tale with lessons for the entire country.
The event was the announcement by Porter Airlines of a $45-million expansion of its airport terminal on Toronto Island, a hop, skip and jump from downtown. By now, most Torontonians are already familiar with Porter’s small but efficient Toronto Island operation, which permits travellers quick access to flights bound for Montreal, Ottawa, Quebec City, New York, Chicago, Halifax and other destinations — all without fighting traffic to and from Pearson International Airport, on the city’s western fringe. But now, Porter is expanding: The airline will build a 150,000 sq.-ft. passenger terminal with expanded passenger facilities, 10 bridged aircraft gates, U.S. and Canadian customs service, new lounges, car rental kiosks and retail outlets.
Porter also plans to double its fleet of fuel-efficient Bombardier Q400 jets to as many as 20 as it adds routes. Company chairman Don Carty said the expansion will mean 300 immediate infrastructure jobs, plus 400 more positions with the company once the expansion is complete. Bombardier builds the Q400 in Toronto, meaning additional employment benefits right inside the GTA.
On hand for the announcement was a bevy of officialdom, including Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, Minister of Transport John Baird, Port Authority chairman Mark McQueen and even former Toronto mayor Art Eggleton. Jean-Marc Lalonde, parliamentary secretary to Ontario’s economic development minister, said he flies often on Porter, avoiding the lengthy trek to Pearson.
Conspicuous by his absence was current Mayor David Miller, whose head remains buried deeply in the sand when it comes to the benefits Porter brings to his struggling city.
Mr. Miller won his job by leading a campaign to block construction of a small bridge that would have saved Porter passengers the hassle of a ferry ride. He and a few similarly short-sighted allies consider the airport’s growth a blight on the waterfront (which the city has done its best to ruin anyway — but that’s a subject for another editorial), and an unacceptable annoyance to a few hundred eccentric hippies who resent any form of intrusion on their island neighbourhood. Even as the expansion was announced, in fact, Toronto councillor Adam Vaughan joined a motley group of protesters demonstrating against it.
More sensible Canadians can only shake their heads at such displays of small-mindedness. Porter — like larger, Calgary-based WestJet Airlines Ltd., which also took the risk of challenging Air Canada’s monopoly power — is succeeding in a cut-throat industry in which bankruptcies are all too common. (Air Canada is struggling to avoid its second such filing in six years in the face of dwindling demand and crushing debt and pension obligations.) It has done so not only through innovation and efficient service, but thoughtful amenities such as complimentary cappuccinos, Wi-fi service and computers in the Toronto terminal. (Oh, and you don’t have to join some hoity-toity “gold club†to get them.)
It is disheartening that Mr. Miller stands against the interests of a new, up-and-coming airline that has proven popular with passengers and revolutionized air travel in the region. Like Westjet, Porter has managed its feat without recourse to government bailouts or special subsidies. It deserves commendation, but instead faces continued hostility from Toronto’s obdurate left-wing council, which favours spending billions on a transit line to the distant and crowded Pearson while spurning the benefits to be had from promoting the more convenient island alternative.
It’s not like Toronto doesn’t need the jobs. Under Mr. Miller’s guidance, the city budget has plunged deep into deficit, eating up contingency reserves and hiking taxes and user fees to offset mammoth increases in spending. A recent Board of Trade evaluation warned that the city’s union-coddling, anti-business attitude is turning it into a bedroom community for the surrounding suburbs, where investment is welcomed rather than spurned.
Porter is proof that the entrepreneurial spirit remains strong in Canada despite the dire state of the economy and the daily onslaught of pessimistic forecasts. Its success suggests it will remain in operation long after the demise of Mr. Miller’s mayoral career.
Mayors, take note: This is how not to govern a Canadian city.
This is a rather lopsided argument. I guess I'd start by saying that unless the Port Authority was so undemocratically sustained by government obstructionism in the first place, the Island Airport probably would not have survived at all. Leasing the land at $1 per year and not paying any formal property taxes, the unelected, uncivil Toronto Port Authority relies on government intervention to survive, as has, directly or indirectly it's awkward love-child, the Island Airport.
The land it is on was never supposed to be an airport at all: it was opposed from the start by Toronto mayor Sam McBride (who died mid-obstruction), and the construction of it demolished residential homes, amusement areas and natural lagoons. I wonder what the National Post would say now about tearing down a successful family neighbourhood to "get shovels in the ground"? Jobs, jobs, jobs. Yeah, right. I don't hear much these days about rehabilitating Downsview or the immediate contruction of a bullet train to anywhere.
The proposed tunnel from the mainland to the island didn't make it through then, though, either - looks like the semi-comedic issue of getting the damn thing hooked up to the city has a long history, too.
The National Post article seems to subsitute "government" (read, "big bad government") for "democracy" early on. I mean, it was the citizens of Toronto - all over the city - who voted via Miller against the damn bridge, in order to not infringe more on the islands. It wasn't just a few waterfront residents that had a claim to caring about them.
As for how to run a city - well, there were those lawsuits.
Reversing a decision made in it's earlier incarnation made as the THC (!), where it gave the city
via TEDCO a bunch of land to develop for waterfront revitalization, a newly congealed TPA - back from the grave and looking for life-sustaining blood - attempted to sue the city for 1 billion dollars to get the land back, finding it suddenly rather amenable to plans for an expanded airport. Who can forget the incomparable maneuverings of Lisa Raitt during this heady time? City Council voted to accept a settlement to end the TPA port-lands lawsuit in exchange for an immediate payment of $5.5 million and an annual subsidy of $5.5 million to the TPA until 2012. Ouch!
If people thought that a bridge to the island stank already, this turd-a-rific deal really sealed it.
Then, Mr. Deluce, suddenly finding that his TPA-assured fixed link to profits were, suddenly, more or less at sea, decided to go after...The City, suing it to the tune of five-hundred-and-five million. Why not? Now that's business!
Now it does confuse matters that the city and the feds are in bed together in the TPA. So who's guilty partner? One can pick a favourite, but it looks like this is one marriage quarrel that won't be quickly resolved.
As for the tax-and-spend line, well, one can just hear the handle on the Cliche-O-Matic being churned.
Let's face it - Porter is doing an excellent job running a customer-pleasing operation with a minimum of disruption to the surroundings. As long as we're going to have an island airport and not a verdant public pleasure-ground over there, it's about as good a holding position as we can expect. But this expansion is what was feared from the beginning - that what's coming will tip our new business neighbour from being just aggressively accommodating to just plain aggressive.
