^^^ i know people here in winnipeg that drive to florida instead of flying that have condos there...

A lot of Quebecers are driving to Florida. It's a little bit cheaper(especialy with the gas prices in the US). It takes 2 days (around 25 hours to Miami).

^ Yep, driving to Florida is pretty common here. I did it once myself (all the way to Key West in fact)

florida aint a far drive realy... try driving to central amarica and back

True, many people do that...
but I easily prefer flying: it takes about 2h50 to 3h20, AND you have a great chance of flying directly over NYC!

I already got a plan for this hehe! All the way to Argentina. (I plan to buy a car and then get rid of it once I'm there, and then come back on a flight)

Florida is twice as close to Montreal than Vancouver, yet people drive across the nation all the time!

can't be done theres a darean gap.... 40miles of swamp and jungle

I did it twice, 1 was all the way to Daytona and the last one was all the way to Key West(that 1 line highway in the middle of the Ocean is scary...)

I know that, I suppose there is a ferry between Panama and, let's say, Venezuela or any other south american country (except Colombia)

Someone asked - here it is for the top 6 (by total passengers).

Ranking by international passengers (excluding US):

Toronto 9633084
Montreal 4466400
Vancouver 4172255
Calgary 1196716
Edmonton 386563
Ottawa 343315

Ranking by total international passengers:

Toronto 18439124
Vancouver 8507698
Montreal 7535232
Calgary 3632169
Edmonton 1330474
Ottawa 1083684

I'd look in to that if I were you. I met some people in Panama City that had the same idea, but had to abandon their car in Panama. They couldn't find any way to ship their vehicle to Colombia without having to pay an insane amount of cash.

Panama is pretty much the end of the road if you're driving north to south in North America.

I'm sure there is a way, you just need to find it first. When my wife and I were all the way down in Ushuaia, Argentina we ran into a fellow from BC that had ridden his motorcycle down all the way. Now perhaps a bike is easier to get down there than a car, but the possibility definitely exists.

Alberta airports benefit primarily from isolation and a lack of surface competition (namely VIA rail) when compared to their eastern counterparts.

This is why you see an airline like Westjet flying relatively large capacity B737 aircraft on small routes between Calgary/Edmonton and Fort McMurray, Kamloops, Abbotsford, Comox, etc. The eastern equivalents of such routes are at BEST served using CRJ or Dash-8 aircraft, and are subject to stiff competition from VIA rail and even the good old bus/auto.

Oh, and whoever said Vancouver isn't the hub of the west ... that's just silliness. Calgary is a busy airport and the primary hub for Westjet, but Vancouver is Air Canada's second-largest hub operation and the unquestionable Western gateway to Canada.

Vancouver Hub > Calgary Hub. No contest.

^hub of the west not to the west.

Last I checked (and the table on the previous page supports this .. although I don't know its source), YVR's numbers exceeded YYC's numbers in terms of international pax, transborder pax, AND domestic pax.

That makes YVR the unquestionable hub OF the west and TO the west.

I would agree to that. Calgary is the hub of the prairies.

I am actually surprised Kelowna and Victoria are so high on the list. I guess they are both located in heavy tourist areas and are both the gateways to their local regions?

Airports in the province of Quebec generally post proportionately lower traffic numbers than those in the other provinces because Quebecers are much less likely to have family and friends (and also to some degree, business dealings) in another province than other Canadians are. VFRs (visiting friends and relatives in travel jargon) make up a significant proportion of the travelling public - enough to make a difference in tables such as these.

English-Canadians are spread out more across the country and tend to move between provinces a lot. Whereas the francophone population is concentrated in Quebec and neighbouring areas of New Brunswick and Ontario, an area which is reasonably driveable.

I live in Gatineau in southwestern Quebec and have friends, neighbours, acquaintances and family members from all over French-speaking Canada. Everyone here drives when travelling within the broad area from, say, Timmins to Moncton.

Again driving to florida :koko:

Hell vegas/nevada and L.A/cali are closer to Vancouver than florida is to montreal.

Is the recession that bad in the east?

Victoria is actually much lower than it would be if not for its proximity to Vancouver. In other words, the numbers are low precisely because Victoria's airport isn't the gateway to its local region. Strange but true, a lot of Victorians prefer to drive to YVR and fly from there rather than fly from their own airport. And up until very recently, Victoria's airport was hardly advertised at all as a means for travellers to get to the island.

Also, 300,000+ passengers fly downtown-to-downtown every year, so they aren't counted in YYJ/YVR passenger stats.

Driving to Florida is cheaper than flying to Florida(gas prices in California are more expansive than any other state, except Hawaii and Alaska).

It's only cheaper if you don't value your time very highly.

I haven't made it all the way to Florida driving (flew there once), but I very much enjoyed my road trip to Myrtle Beach a few years ago. Stopped in Richmond, visited friends in Raleigh, and stopped in DC/Baltimore on the way home. There's a big difference between driving a long distance just to get to an airport to fly somewhere else and taking a road trip.

It's also about the long road trip. It's like a tradition. You stop to visit Raleigh, then you stop again to visit Jacksonville before heading to Miami. You can't do that on a plane. Always did road trips and will always do, it's so much more exciting than taking a plane.

You can take my own exemple: We started a long road trip from Montreal to Key West. When I was back, I had pictures of New York City, Washington DC, Richmond, Burlington, Albany, Fayetteville, Jacksonville, Orlando, Daytona, Fort Lauderdale, Miami, Key West

I always thought the best part of the annual trip to florida was the stop-over in NYC, personally.

Lots of people do California road trips here. :shrug:

Driving to Florida from Quebec (from all of Canada east of Manitoba in fact) is not a new, recession-influenced phenomenon. It's been the norm since at least the 60s and 70s.

For those people who maintain that flying is cheaper (or close in price), I guess that's only if you're a single person or perhaps a couple. But pack a family of four or five into a car and it's much, much cheaper to drive. Plus you don't have to rent a car once you get down there.

In this part of the world, "going down south" usually involves two choices:

- driving to Florida

OR

- flying somewhere even further south for an all-inclusive holiday (usually in Cuba, Dominican Republic or Mexico)

Driving to Florida is not cheaper than flying if you're going for less than a week. It's just what people in the eastern part of Canada (Ontario and Quebec) do.

But it makes sense if you own a second home (or are renting one) or are traveling with several people (or don't want to incur the cost of a rental car if you are staying for prolonged periods). But in high season, the cost of a return flight is probably no more than $300.00 per person.

Or Wildwood, NJ for some strange reason..

Yup! We're doing San Francisco/Napa this summer, stopping along the way in Portland for a couple.

The furthest we've ever driven was to Moncton, New Brunswick from Toronto. We were hoping to make it to at least Halifax, and possibly go onto PEI, but we were too tired and decided to turn around.

I can barely stand the drive to New York, I don't know how people manage to drive all the way down to Florida.

I think most people that drive to Florida are going there for longer than a week stay. Also, you can't really live in Florida without a car.

It's still better than sitting on the tarmac at Laguardia for two plus hours

:previous: Those aren't road trips, now this is a road trip (sorry for the Crocodile Dundee ref.) Winnipeg-Minneapolis-Milwaukee-Chicago-Cleveland-D.C-Philadelphia-New York-Toronto-Winnipeg this is our road trip this summer(so pumped) and no we are not Aerosmith:haha:

That would be awesome...I love driving. I wish that we had time to drive to Nova Scotia rather than flying.

Common BC road trips (besides local ones in BC) are to Alaska, Alberta, Oregon coast, Las Vegas, California and Arizona.

The thing with Florida is that you really need a car to get around when you are there. In the east, taking a car to Florida is so popular that Amtrak runs the Auto Train from Lorton VA to Stanford FL, for people who don't care much for the long drive.

I thought I would bring this thread back from the dead.

The underground train station at Dorval Airport in Montreal is pretty much complete. The second picture is over a year old.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3591/...f0ce4962_o.jpg

http://www.cyberpresse.ca/images/biz...3/04/52691.jpg

At the moment the Airport Authority (Aéroports de Montréal) and the Regional Transit Authority (Agence métropolitaine de transport) are bickering over which line is best to connect Dorval Airport to downtown by rail. Aéroports prevers the CN route (in red), while the AMT prefers the CP route (in yellow).

http://communities.canada.com/MONTRE...D00_routes.jpg

Both have a lot of pluses and minues.

Here is the ADM's proposal. It involves contracting out a private train service to Bombardier. It would be direct between the Airport and Central Station. It would run at intervals of 20 minutes and have only 3 cars.
• Video Link

The AMT on the other hand proposes linking the airport with a new transit hub to be located across the street from the Bell Centre and Windsor Station. Trains would run on its Dorion–Rigaud Line commuter rail line.

http://ultraxs.com/image-4CD0_4AFD697E.jpg

winnipegs airport
http://james2010.ca/files/gallery/391_full.jpg

soruce: http://www.james2010.ca <<more here

St. John's Airport is working on getting provincial and federal funding for a $25million category 3 landing system. The new landing system will mean that 99%of flights will be able to land in St. John's even when it's foggy. I cannot find the exact story on it but this story is about plans for a business park around the airport and it also mentions the new landing system.

http://flyeia.com/media/7858/447.wmv

Cool run-through of YEG's expansion. Note the large glass walkway has been changed to a frosted / darker glass I believe, for obvious reasons. :P

Here's a little more info about the airport at St. John's. Because of the high number of fog days these improvements are especially important -

Source: http://www.dailybusinessbuzz.ca/2010...upport-growth/

I don't see much here from Halifax so I am re-posting these photos by ALPS of the Halifax section. I think that Halifax has done a good job (in terms of square footage added versus dollars spent).

It isn't any thing spectacular like in Toronto, but certainly functional and I think that it looks much better than prior to expansion. Halifax been spending a significant amount on terminal and parking expansions each year.

Thanks to alps. (from November 12 2009)

We have some sexy airports in this country.

YEG expansion

I attended a rather interesting lunch event a couple weeks ago on the expansion plans for the Calgary International Airport.

What particularly surprised me was the design images they displayed of the new east concourse, which will be entirely for US/International Traffic (which is growing with the recent addition of new flights to London (Heathrow) by British Airways, Frankfurt by Lufthansa and Amsterdam by KLM. Not to mention the new Tokyo flight operated by Air Canada.

Link the Airport Expansion details

Looking good YEG :tup:

As for the Calgary plans mentioned above it appears that the Airport Authority is moving ahead with this work. Driving by the terminal the other day I could clearly see the elevated departures roadway continuing due east to nowhere while the current road drops down before this new section. There is also a lot of earthmovers on site east of the existing airport ramp starting to scrape and move earth in preparation for this expansion and the parallel runway.

The Vancouver airport looks really nice, going by these pictures. Personally, I LOVE the new T1 at Pearson... it has a very minimalist, modernist feel to it. Vancouver went the opposite route it seems, the airport looks very colourful and messy, but it works well.

All of the Canadian major airport terminals I've seen compare nicely (or soon will in Winnipeg's case) next to many of the US terminals. I like YVR, but my personal favorite is YOW. The materials they picked for that terminal's interior complement each other very nicely.

where is YOW?