Hamilton International Airport Public Annual Meeting

The John C. Munro Hamilton International Airport (hi) will be holding its Public Annual Meeting on Friday June 5th, 2009. All members of the public are invited to attend this event, which will highlight hi's achievements and financial performance over the last year.

This meeting coincides with the release of hi's 2008 Annual Report, which will be made available for download via the Airport's website, www.flyhi.ca. As it strives to minimize its impact on the environment, hi has chosen a paperless delivery for its Annual Report.

Date: Friday, June 5, 2009
Time: 8:30am - 10:30am
Location: Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum Thomson Gordon Room

WestJet today announced it will fly to Cancun from Hamilton next winter, beginning this November. The announcement comes in advance of the airline releasing its full winter schedule in early July.

Hamilton - Cancun Starting Saturday November 7, 2009 Once weekly,
Introductory fares starting at $169 (taxes and navigational surcharges extra)

http://img2.imageshack.us/img2/2553/p6070125.th.jpg

flyglobespan B767-319/ER G-CEOD former Air New Zealand ZK-NCO

From the minutes of the Airport Implementation Committee meeting.

Council OK's airport land deal
City will spend $3.2 million on property for runway expansion

June 26, 2009
Nicole Macintyre
The Hamilton Spectator
http://www.thespec.com/News/Local/article/589877

The city is buying land to expand the airport in a real estate deal that some councillors think is too rich for taxpayers.

Council voted this week to spend $3.2 million to buy a plot of land on Airport Road.

The property is needed to expand a runway, said Tim McCabe, general manager of planning and economic development.

He added the city is required to buy that land under its 40-year lease agreement with the airport's private operator, TradePort International.

But Councillor Chad Collins believes the city is paying too much. He notes the land was appraised in April 2007 before the recent economic downturn.

"Prices have dropped all over the place," he argued, suggesting the city should be able to get a better deal in a recession.

McCabe said the city's offer is within 5 per cent of the appraisal, though he would not say if it was above or below.

The city's real estate staff confirmed that land around the airport has rebounded in price, he added.

"We're not overpaying for the land."

Collins voted against the deal along with councillors Bernie Morelli, Sam Merulla, Brian McHattie and Bob Bratina.

TradePort CEO Richard Koroscil said the extension of the airport's secondary runway will help prevent plane diversions in poor weather conditions.

"It improves the reliability," he said, noting the upgrade will also help the airport market itself to more companies.

Koroscil expects it will be at least a few years before the extension is finished, as an environmental assessment is required before construction can start.

The fact that the city, instead of TradePort, is buying land for the airport has been an ongoing issue at City Hall.

Last year council decided in a tight vote to spend $3 million for a 20-hectare parcel of land for airport development, such as new hangars, a fuel farm and flight kitchen.

The city is also spending another $3 million to buy two properties on Glancaster Road to be part of the planned airport industrial park.

Yay! Just in time for oil prices to skyrocket again when the economy starts recovering from this recession.

I'm curious as to why they didn't refer this capital purchase to the budget process...

That's because the runway expansion has been in the books since 1996.

http://www.thespec.com/specialsectio...ngBlind/264249

And cycling network expansion has been on the books since 1999, with a clear funding commitment from council in 2007 when they approved the Transportation Master Plan.

Posted in the Ancaster News:

What exactly do you mean by this ???:shrug:

There's a double standard in how the airport land expansion was funded vs. how the cycling network is being funded.

So you are saying that you feel as if the cycling master plan should have been funded before the airport-runway expansion, even though the runway land has been demonstrated to have been on the books longer ??? Or are you saying that because the runway-expansion plans (and pretty much most of the grander plans of the airport as a whole) have been mired in this city's bureaucratic wasteland, it should be shoved aside by such profitable notions as what a cycling master plan might do for this ass-backward city ??!
Last time I checked it was pretty important to raise jobs for this city, hopefully within the primary industries (particularly after the fallout of lost steel jobs) and diversify our primary industrial base so that this city can survive in the long run. We fail to do that, concentrating instead on frivolous recreational programmes, service industry and an over-zealous craving for light rail transit, you'll see this city become exactly what you are trying to make it- another sleepy Toronto bedroom suburb !!
I'll take more primary industry jobs first, please. Thanks ! Then we can start addressing the other issues in due course. This city needs to get back on it's feet ASAP- one of the best ways is to get more people working in jobs that bring money into the city .

No. I believe Ryan was saying that an exception was made for the vote on subsidizing the airport, while the city is clearly not willing to make any exceptions for any other mode of transport. Our tax dollars are subsidizing an industry with poor long term prospects, while we put off even minimal investments in alternative transportation.

Great! Glad you agree that the cycling master plan is a profitable notion for this ass-backwards city.


Our primary industries are health care and education. The expansion of our second runway will bring in how many jobs in these industries exactly?

Again we agree! That's exactly what balancing our transportation options is all about - the long term economic survival of our city.

Once more with feeling: the cycling master plan is primarily about cycling as transportation, not recreation.

We'll be lucky to even make it as a Toronto suburb if we continue along the path we've been on in the past.


Nobody disagrees with this, except for the part where you suggest that the real economic generators such as LRT, are "other issues" that can be left on the back burner until the mythical time when logistics warehouses, big box stores, and residential sprawl return us to our former glory.

The city's own studies (PDF link) have determined that most of the land around the airport will be used to move boxes off airplanes and onto the backs of transport trucks.

These studies are optimistic in that they assume oil prices won't go up over the next two decades, an assumption that is not supported by any credible data whatsoever.

Warehousing and logistics are not "primary industry jobs". They are at best tertiary jobs, and to the extent that they depend on cheap air travel, they are tertiary jobs with very poor future prospects.

The Province is telling us that we should not base our future economic development on the "airport employment growth district" (AEGD) in a series of letters to planning and economic development staff that argue our assumptions about how much land we'll need are way off base.

The Province has created a pretty clear growth framework that emphasizes intensification, mixed-use development, brownfield remediation, and transportation improvements, including higher order transit and expanded pedestrian and cycling infrastructure.

The city responded with a ludicrous study that claimed we don't have any brownfield sites. This was accomplished by redefining our thousands of acres of unused and under-used brownfields properties out of existence. It was so bad that even Council noticed.

But it gets even better. At the same time that the City insists we need these highway-accessible industrial employment lands around the airport to meet our future employment land requirements; Council is falling over itself to re-zone our already existing highway-accessible industrial employment lands for use as single family residential or big-box commercial sprawl.

This is precisely the opposite of what both our Provincial and Municipal planning strategies advocate and flies completely the the face of the fact that we need to plan for both lower fuel consumption and lower greenhouse gas emissions.

In terms of the latter, I'm not going to try and rehash the overwhelming, evidence-based scientific case for climate change but will merely point out that the US government just passed legislation establishing a GHG cap-and-trade framework, a framework we will have no choice but to adopt to the extent that we do business in American markets.

Actually, given this city's track record at following its own policies, it's Council's decision to refer the cycling plan to the budget process that is the exception. It leaves us with no alternative but to conclude that process exists mainly to tie up initiatives Council feels obligated to acknowledge but doesn't really care about.

Is this really a fair assesment, considering you are comparing a single-instance captial acquisition (land for the city's airport) to an multi-year operational expense (reconfiguration of transportation network)?

City airport trying to land U.S. airlines

uly 04, 2009
Steve Buist
The Hamilton Spectator
(Jul 4, 2009)

Hamilton's international airport is attempting to attract three of the largest low-cost U.S. airlines to fly north of the border.

Richard Koroscil, CEO of John C. Munro Hamilton International Airport, said he's been in discussions with Southwest Airlines, JetBlue and AirTran Airways to make Hamilton the first Canadian destination for each of the discount airlines.

All three of the airlines currently operate at Buffalo Niagara International Airport, where Canadians have been flocking in growing numbers to take advantage of cheap flights to U.S. destinations.

"We're still in the fairly early stages of those discussions, partly because of their own strategies," said Koroscil. "Southwest's strategy is not to go outside the continental U.S. but we know at some point they will, so we're working with them to start building a relationship.

"We know there's a big market that would prefer to go out of Hamilton and not have to go to Buffalo," he added.

"I would say our discussions have been positive and productive," said Koroscil, also noting that the downturn in the economy remains a concern for airlines.

A spokesperson for JetBlue said the addition of Canadian destinations is a long-term strategy.

"The airport cost structure in Canada makes it prohibitively expensive for a low-fare airline like JetBlue," said spokesperson Sebastian White. "The cost of operating at Canadian airports is enormous."

Southwest and Canadian airline WestJet, which operates at Hamilton's airport, announced last year that they were going to enter into a code-share agreement, where the two companies would sell seats on each other's flights and operate some routes jointly.

That could provide Hamilton passengers with added flights to U.S. destinations, particularly Southwest hub destinations, such as Chicago's Midway Airport.

But the two airlines announced in May that the code-share agreement has been postponed at least until the second half of 2010 because of the economy.

sbuist@thespec.com

905-526-3226

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's a ... Canadian

One in three passengers going through Buffalo's airport calls Canada home
July 04, 2009
Steve Buist
The Hamilton Spectator
BUFFALO, N.Y. (Jul 4, 2009)

Dan Porta is standing next to the shelter, waiting for the free shuttle bus that will take him from the parking lot to the terminal of the Buffalo Niagara International Airport.

The pack of Export A smokes in his hand is the dead giveaway.

Porta's a Canadian but that hardly makes him unique here at the Buffalo airport.

Look up and down the parking lot rows and it's easy to spot car after car after car with Ontario licence plates.

On this warm, sunny day, Porta is flying to Chicago to attend a business exposition.

Why Buffalo and not Toronto's Pearson International as a departure point?

Simple, he says.

"My Southwest flight to Chicago is $59.99, taxes included," he said, pausing to take a drag on his cigarette. "It's $69.99 to return, taxes included.

"Last week, just to park at Pearson for six days cost me $128. That's a return flight to Chicago here.

"I prefer Buffalo," he added. "The airport is very, very straightforward. You're not walking for miles."

Canadians are flocking to Buffalo in growing numbers to take advantage of low-cost U.S. carriers and the airport's convenient layout.

"It's just so much easier and it's much cheaper," said Kim Blair, who lives in Fort Erie and just returned from New York City.

About one of every three passengers flying in and out of Buffalo now is Canadian, up from about one in four passengers just a couple of years ago. At peak holiday times, such as March break, the proportion of Canadians rises as high as 40 per cent.

Last year, the Buffalo airport handled about 1.8 million Canadians, according to the Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority, which operates the airport.

By comparison, about 546,000 people flew in and out of Hamilton's international airport last year.

"It's all based on price," said Doug Hartmayer, director of public affairs for the NFTA.

"It's very advantageous to come down and save $300 or $400 a ticket, have the convenience of parking literally almost at the front door of the airport, and getting in and out very easily," he added.

The growth in Canadian traffic is a direct result of the Buffalo airport's strategy to transform itself into a haven for low-cost carriers.

During the mid-1990s, according to Hartmayer, Buffalo was ranked the second-most expensive U.S. airport for flights.

Now, Buffalo is ranked the ninth-least expensive airport in the U.S., according to a U.S. Bureau of Transportation Statistics survey.

There are 112 daily flights at Buffalo, compared to the 10 or 15 a day, for example, at Hamilton's airport, depending on the day of the week and season.

Nearly half of the passengers in and out of Buffalo fly on low-cost carriers Southwest Airlines and JetBlue, both of which arrived around a decade ago.

"Some of our biggest fans are Canadian customers," said Sebastian White, spokesperson for JetBlue. "The volume of Ontarians we push through Buffalo every day is just astounding, when you think about it."

White said that when JetBlue recently introduced new flights from Buffalo to Florida, the company noticed on the very first day that a third of the passengers were Canadians.

"You cross the border (to Canada) and your ticket price instantly skyrockets due to all the airport fees and landing fees and taxes that our customers don't have to incur when they fly out of Buffalo," White noted.

Surveys of Canadian passengers by the Buffalo airport shows that they're being drawn from Toronto and beyond.

Edmund O'Keeffe is one of those Torontonians flying out of Buffalo, although not necessarily by choice.

He works for Cott Beverage Company and needed to fly to Atlanta on business.

From Toronto's Pearson airport, the cost would have been $1,400. From Buffalo, it was $432 Canadian.

So Edmund was told to hit the highway.

"We're in cost-cutting mode at our company," said O'Keeffe, "and this saves $1,000.

"It's a pain in the neck," he added with a sigh. "You never know how long it's going to take crossing the border."

Cameron Doerkson, an airline industry analyst for Versant Partners, said he's seeing similar migrations of Canadian air travellers from Montreal to Burlington, Vermont, and from the southern B.C. mainland to Washington state.

"Price is obviously one of the major factors," said Doerkson. "I think the other thing is perhaps access to more destinations from certain U.S. airports relative to what you might get locally in Canada."

One advantage for Canadians flying from Buffalo to another U.S. destination is that the flight is domestic not international, which means lower U.S. fees and taxes - which are already cheaper than Canadian equivalents.

"It's a concern to all Canadian airports in terms of our competitiveness with U.S. airports," said Richard Koroscil, president and CEO of John C. Munro Hamilton International Airport.

"We have an uncompetitive fee and tax structure in Canada that makes it more difficult for any Canadian airport."

Koroscil said Buffalo's growing popularity has a much greater impact on Toronto than Hamilton's airport.

"We don't have a lot of product going into the U.S. whereas Pearson does," said Koroscil. "So it's more of an effect on them.

"Our product is primarily domestic as well as international, so we in fact draw from the Buffalo market for international," he added. "We get a number of Americans that will come up and take advantage of that.

"It's good proximity for them and the fares are pretty good."

Buffalo's popularity with Canadian travellers provides the low-cost U.S. carriers such as JetBlue and Southwest with the best of both worlds.

Their flights operate as domestic routes within the U.S. but they're attracting Canadians without having to establish an international operation.

"It's a nice deal for them," said Peter Belobaba, a professor at the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology who specializes in airline issues.

Belobaba is a Canadian, from Waterloo, so he understands the issues on both sides of the border.

He suspects Air Canada has made the strategic decision to seek out higher-paying business and first-class passengers and leave the cheap flights that appeal to price-conscious travellers to the low-cost carriers in Buffalo.

"At some point that strategy breaks down," said Belobaba. "At some point, if the shift continues, the carriers at Toronto have to wake up and say 'Wait a minute, we have to do something here,' either by lowering fares or offering other incentives."

He said he wouldn't be surprised to see a discount airline, such as JetBlue, begin operating a New York-Montreal or New York-Toronto service.

"There's a case where Air Canada definitely would not stand by," said Belobaba.

"Air Canada historically has been very effective at defending their own turf."

sbuist@thespec.com

905-526-3226

Addition of JetBlue would be fantastic.

Didn't London just get service twice per day on United to Chicago? In some ways I would prefer that to JetBlue or Southwest, mainly for the better connections to weirder US destinations for business. I think the problem with the lowfare airlines coming to Hamilton is the fact they use 737s, whereas United going to Chicago or the like would use a regional jet and be easier to fill.

As much as I would like to see some larger airlines fly out of Hamilton I just can't see them moving in. The problem as I see it is the terminal. It's nothing more than a glorified bus terminal. Until they get a proper terminal with skywalks to planes, the larger airlines will only use Hamilton as a stepping stone to Pearson. We have seen that with Westjet. As soon as they could get gates in Toronto they left.

The reason Canadians fly out of Buffalo is quite simple, it's cheap. Cheaper than any airline flying out of any Canadian airport could ever be, including Hamilton. The gate fees, taxes and fuel charges here make it impossible for cut rate airlines to operate here.