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Pickering Airport (Transport Canada/GTAA, Proposed)

Woodbridge_Heights said:
I posted a link to the first article up thread. My analysis remains the same. I find it interesting that Pickering is willing to designate the land surrounding the Pickering airport site as a "innovation corridor" paving over acres of farmland, but an airport is just too much.

For reference, Pickering's innovation corridor plan calls for 70 000 residents and up to 35 000 jobs spread across 800 acres (Link)
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The innovation corridor was signed off when council was generally in favor years ago. This new council (elected last fall) is overturning any new spending promoting the airport; presumably until there is a valid/solid business case for an airport. All we had at this point was the KPMG study which said nothing needed til 2036 if expansions maxed elsewhere.
 
kEiThZ said:
Pretty much. Pickering proponents have this idea that Pickering would become Toronto's version of Gatwick or Newark. I just can't see it. Every network carrier wants to fly to Pearson because that's where all the alliance carriers are. Discount carriers have Hamilton already. Pickering would largely steal and split discount airline traffic from Hamilton. And then consolidate general aviation from around the region. This wouldn't even be Toronto's Stansted. It would just become Durham's version of Munro.

Also, Pearson has a ton of room to improve. They still don't move as many passengers as JFK, O'Hare, Heathrow, LAX, or Charles De Gaulles. Plenty of room to squeeze out more efficiency and output from Pearson.
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I do wonder how those secondary airports compare to Munro, and what their draw was to the various carriers.
 
micheal_can said:
I do wonder how those secondary airports compare to Munro, and what their draw was to the various carriers.
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Newark is United's hub in New York, Delta and AA are at JFK. And Newark is historically considered the least desirable New York airport because it's a pain to get to by taxi from Manhattan since it's in a different state (It's telling that United's Star Alliance partners prefer JFK) and is thus more dependent on connecting traffic from other parts of the country rather than demand in New York itself. Gatwick is now mostly where low cost airlines and vacation charters that have been priced out of Heathrow go, though British Airways does have a split hub, and they put mostly low-yield O&D traffic at Gatwick to save Heathrow slots for more profitable routes. Historically a lot of mainline carriers were stuck at Gatwick because they could't get slots at Heathrow, which is why airlines will only give up Heathrow slots if they absolutely have to (in the past, I'd say Westjet would likely be trying to get Heathrow slots as a long term goal, but with their post-COVID retrenchments who knows now).
 
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IRT_BMT_IND said:
And Newark is historically considered the least desirable New York airport because it's a pain to get to by taxi from Manhattan since it's in a different state
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Eh what? Newark is just as our even easier to get to Manhattan. Sure, it's not as useful to the rest of NYC. But it is absolutely easy to access Manhattan from EWR.
 
kEiThZ said:
Eh what? Newark is just as our even easier to get to Manhattan. Sure, it's not as useful to the rest of NYC. But it is absolutely easy to access Manhattan from EWR.
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Agreed - I try and fly into Newark because it's simpler to get to than JFK or LaGuardia. Though the one aspect of that is LaGuardia is just such a pain to get to.

Checking right now ... from Times Square, Newark is 55 minutes compared to JFK at an hour, and LaGuardia ... well, it's as fast as 40 minutes, but it takes 3 trains and a bus - not fun with luggage.

Really, all are poor, with no express services similar to what you have in Toronto and London.
 
IRT_BMT_IND said:
Newark is United's hub in New York, Delta and AA are at JFK. And Newark is historically considered the least desirable New York airport because it's a pain to get to by taxi from Manhattan since it's in a different state (It's telling that United's Star Alliance partners prefer JFK) and is thus more dependent on connecting traffic from other parts of the country rather than demand in New York itself. Gatwick is now mostly where low cost airlines and vacation charters that have been priced out of Heathrow go, though British Airways does have a split hub, and they put mostly low-yield O&D traffic at Gatwick to save Heathrow slots for more profitable routes. Historically a lot of mainline carriers were stuck at Gatwick because they could't get slots at Heathrow, which is why airlines will only give up Heathrow slots if they absolutely have to (in the past, I'd say Westjet would likely be trying to get Heathrow slots as a long term goal, but with their post-COVID retrenchments who knows now).
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Using this model, it was how for the longest time, Westjet used Munro for their hub instead of Pearson. Or how Porter uses Billy Bishop. The fact that both of those carriers are moving to, or have moved to Pearson is saying something. To me it is saying that the need for Pickering is even lower than some would say as all carriers are vying for spots in Pearson.
 
The Friends of Pickering Airport group has proposed a "Union Station East" near the Pickering Airport Lands.This is in the wake of the RFP that went out for an HFR station in Pickering.

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kEiThZ said:
That's nice of them. For a long time they argued rail was absolutely inconsequential to their region.
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That, or are they simply aping the GTAA's marketing strategy for Pearson Airport. Right down to the Union Station East/West naming convention.

Re. Hamilton as Greater Toronto's secondary airport hub. I'd love to see Munro leveraged as Toronto's second/alternative international airport. The population density certainly favours a western GTA site, however after nearly 2 decades there has been little movement in attracting foreign airlines to Munro. Just look at WestJet's history, they initially started out in Hamilton but eventually moved to Pearson. Yes Pearson is a monolith vis a vis airlines looking to serve the Toronto region but I also wonder what other factors are preventing Hamilton from attracting airlines. I think the main factors are: competition from other airports in the larger region, Pearson primarily but also Waterloo, London, and Buffalo Niagara all cut into demand; and location/accessibility, there really isn't any easy road access to the airport.
 
It's more than a mile from the top of that fanciful Union East orange box, where the future HFR line passes by (over a creek at the edge of a woodlot...) to the 407 transitway. If my reading of the Greenbelt maps is correct, most of this is protected countryside, as are the places, in Markham and inside the Rouge Park, where the railway does actually cross 7 and 407. So isn't this a big nothingburger? If there's ever an actual airport, a rail spur could make sense. If HFR wants a shoulder station in Toronto (Eglinton seems to have disappeared) the crossing on Sheppard seems like a better idea, and it has a plausible shot at rapid transit in the next 20 years.
 
CapitalSeven said:
It's more than a mile from the top of that fanciful Union East orange box, where the future HFR line passes by (over a creek at the edge of a woodlot...) to the 407 transitway. If my reading of the Greenbelt maps is correct, most of this is protected countryside, as are the places, in Markham and inside the Rouge Park, where the railway does actually cross 7 and 407. So isn't this a big nothingburger? If there's ever an actual airport, a rail spur could make sense. If HFR wants a shoulder station in Toronto (Eglinton seems to have disappeared) the crossing on Sheppard seems like a better idea, and it has a plausible shot at rapid transit in the next 20 years.
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I feel this latest "announcement" is nothing more than trying to be relevant.
 
Woodbridge_Heights said:
Even the airport terminal is a ways away from the proposed station. How do they expect their imaginary passengers are going to get to the terminal? Walk? People mover?
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If they were serious about this, they would design the whole area so that the airport terminal and train station are in the same building.
 
micheal_can said:
If they were serious about this, they would design the whole area so that the airport terminal and train station are in the same building.
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I mean in fairness, if the goal is a general transport hub rather than just another airport link, a station at the rail corridor and an APM link probably does make more sense than a mainline branch to the terminal.
 
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