Oh, that makes more sense. Some of the conditions did seem rather arbitrary and ridiculous, like the interline requirement.

YYC October stats.

Domestic 310,178 -70.4% (Year-to-date: 3,843,898 -63.83%)
Transborder 13,717 -95.3% (Year-to-date: 765,526 -74.18%)
International 8,061 -93.1% (Year-to-date: 483,932 -70.04%)
October Total: 331,956 -77.2%

2020 Year-to-date: 5,093,356 -66.54%

Total overall international pax surpassed 20,000 even before the trial program kicked in. Pretty solid month overal.

Interesting. This shows a couple of things:
1) WS putting all their eggs into YYC (even YYZ's currently about 1/2 of YYC for WS); and
2) The higher need for air travel in Western Canada given the vast distances between cities.

Compare this with YOW's October abysmal results:
Sector / Oct-19 / Oct-20 / % Chg.
Dom: 351,500 / 38,551 / -89.0%
TB: 49,252 / 0 / -100.0%
Int'l: 19,811 / 0 / -100.0%
TTL: 420,563 / 38,551 / -90.8%

In normal times, YYC handles about 3.5 times the traffic of YOW. In October 2020, YYC handled more than 8.5 times the traffic of YOW.

Hub and spoke operations make more sense when passenger volumes are much lower than direct capacity between two points.

It's when hubs get congestion that point-to-point proves its worth. Right now, retrenching to hubs makes the economics of flying slightly less terrible.

That is very true, but even the feed flights into hubs out of YOW is miniscule these days. Take today's departure count of a mere 9 flights...that's back to May numbers. It's broken down by:
YFB x1 on 5T
YYC x1 on AC
YUL x2 on AC
YYZ x5 - x4 on AC + x1 on WS

WestJet has a single flight out of YOW for the 3rd time in 4 days. That's pretty incredible considering they normally have 18-20/day in winter.

Also, look at Toronto, normally there's 45-48 flights/weekday. Today 5, which also shows local Ottawa-Toronto demand is non-existent these days. Even Via only have 4 departures a day when they normally have 10, while Greyhound for months have had ZERO when they normally have 10-12. In other words, travel demand in Eastern Canada has completely dried up.

This made me curious about YWG's traffic levels these days... I checked, and it's low. Only 14 departing flights today, 3 of which are on very small regional carriers to destinations like Red Lake and Rankin Inlet, which is basically spring levels. Interestingly Delta is still operating to MSP.

YHZ has at least 15 flights tomorrow (at least until 18:30, which is how late their FIDS are displaying). Nothing smaller than a DH4 either. Atlantic Bubble influence perhaps, where it's easier to fly into Atlantic Canada than drive.

Even YYT has 2 more flights today than YOW at 11, even if 4 of those are PAL.

As for DL not cutting YWG while cutting YEG, YXE, YOW, YQB and YHZ, I guess that's NW's legacy 80 year history at work there.

You might be right... NW service between MSP-YWG has been running continuously since 1928 and I have to admit the avgeek in me wants to see it reach the 100 year anniversary.

It is interesting to note how optional air travel is.

We've had months of low travel and it doesn't seem to be affecting the economy much outside the aviation sector.

Maybe I'm wrong, but it definitely seems that travel by airplane is an optional luxury thing. Life otherwise seems to putter along as per usual in this country, despite there being half the air traffic.

Again, another example of investing in an airline is fraught with risk. Between the high capital costs, sensitivity to commodity prices (jet fuel), high level of regulation, the terrible PR costs of an accident and the fickleness of a customer base that is mostly leisure-based, it's a tough industry.

Porter and the operator of Toronto Island airport exchanging lawsuits. Kind of rich as Porter wouldn't even still be in business if they hadn't sold off the terminal to the group for $700 million in the first place!

Toronto Island airport terminal owner countersues Porter over unpaid slot fees
ERIC ATKINSTRANSPORTATION REPORTER
INCLUDES CORRECTION
PUBLISHED NOVEMBER 25, 2020

The legal battle at Toronto’s island airport is heating up as the terminal’s owner and operator has filed a countersuit against Porter Airlines Inc., alleging the carrier has wrongfully refused to pay fees during its pandemic-related shutdown.

The owner of the passenger terminal at Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport, Nieuport Aviation Infrastructures Partners LP, said in a lawsuit filed in the Ontario Superior Court of Justice that Porter has withheld $38.6-million in charges since March 1, in violation of a contract.

Nieuport, controlled by New York-based J.P. Morgan Asset Management, is asking the court to order Porter to pay the fees for the use of airport slots and ground-handling services, in addition to providing $11-million in credit guarantees.

“Porter has unilaterally decided that it will no longer pay the fees that it owes during the COVID-19 period … fees that Porter itself set in 2015 in order to maximize the purchase price that it would earn from selling the terminal,” Nieuport said in its court filing. “Porter has sought to leverage the COVID pandemic to effectively restructure its business, at Nieuport’s expense.”

The lawsuit follows a move by Porter last week to sue Nieuport for breach of contract, seeking $21-million plus forgiveness of $45.3-million in fees. The airline is also asking the court to prevent Nieuport from seizing three Dash 8-400 turboprop planes put up as collateral. None of the lawsuits’ claims has been proven in court....

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/busi...r-over-unpaid/

The hospitality sector would vehemently disagree. Hotels, conference facilities, tourism based industries including restaurants and getting decimated this year. This is not a small industry.

The federal government is injecting money into the economy to keep business afloat that are not sustainable at this level of economic activity and making direct payments to people who have lost their jobs. The entire economy is in a weird form of life support. Nothing is normal about this. Many large corporations have shifted projects from 2020 to 2021 and they will likely again be shifted to 2022.

Air Canada is planning to commence dedicated air cargo operations with the conversion of "several" former passenger 767s to freighter configurations.

"Air Canada today also provided an update on its cargo business and the next steps in its strategic plan as the airline continues to adapt rapidly to evolving market opportunities. To date, Air Canada has operated more than 3,500 all-cargo flights globally, and the airline is now finalizing plans to convert several of its owned Boeing 767-300ER aircraft to freighters to fully participate in global cargo commercial opportunities.

The carrier has successfully concluded collective agreement amendment with its pilots represented by the Air Canada Pilots Association (ACPA), for contractual changes to enable Air Canada to competitively operate dedicated cargo aircraft in the cargo marketplace, which have now been ratified by the Air Canada pilots."

Other members might know better than I do - is it correct that the planned 767s will be the first freighters operated by Air Canada Cargo in-house since the DC-8 freighter operation?

Press Release

Depends on the definition of "Freighter" The 747-400 Combi had cargo on the main deck and a movable wall. So it could be converted into an almost all freighter. There are the 777 and A330 they are currently temporarily operating with the seats removed.

The original 777 order had two freighters, but they were converted to passenger aircraft orders before being built.

Overall good to see some competition.

Wonder if AC is going to look at competing domestically with CargoJet? I think there is a large overnight courier contract coming up for bids in the next couple years.

I'm not versed in Air Canada's cargo operations... their cargo jets used to be a common sight, and I remember they used to have billboards around their Winnipeg cargo facilities. This was all up until the mid 90s as I recall. Why did AC get out of that, especially given that it seems to be a fairly big chunk of business for many large flag carrier airlines?

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikiped..._AN0999264.jpg

I don't Air Canada ever completely got out of cargo. I think they were looking at Boeing 777 freighters during the initial purchase. I think those eventually were converted into 777-200LRs. Maybe the mid-2000s when the 747 Combis went out as they were the last freighter-ish aircraft they had?

Most airlines found it easier to take cargo with their regular passenger flights as opposed to dedicated fleets. I think a handful of airlines out of major shipping destinations (Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, Germany) might still figure it's worth it for a dedicated freighter fleet.

In North America, UPS and Fedex have it pretty sewn up, so the domestic airlines don't really bother with it. I imagine Europe is similar with DHL.

It's not quite 1928 but Delta (Northwest) began service to Edmonton in 1947 so there's a very long history there as well.

Air Canada has also on and off chartered cargo only aircraft.

As I recall, the DC-8 retirement had a lot to do with losing the Purolator contract to Kelowna Flightcraft, who of course then lost it to CargoJet 8 or 9 years ago.