Hamilton International Airport

[fastcarsfreedom]

Porter is a great operator--and I'm thrilled to see them (apparently) doing well. Deluce's pockets are deep and they have Don Carty steering the ship--and if you can run an operation the size of AA, I trust you to run something the size of Porter.

That being said--Porter has survived because it managed to do something different. It hasn't engaged in suicide pricing--and it's been able to do so mainly on the basis that it's at City Centre Airport--which it has to itself. If Porter were at YYZ, it would be eaten alive in the way Intair, VistaJet, Astoria, Nationair and everyone else that had the brass balls to attempt to get a piece of AC's action in the "triangle". AC will tolerate one competitor, as it did with Canadian--and now WestJet--but it's not going to let anyone else in to its lunch. Frankly if I see Porter in Hamilton it will disappoint me--not because I don't want to see someone else on those key routes--but because it will mean Porter is drifting off course as far as it's business-plan--and that's never a good sign. If WestJet added a couple of flights a day back on the YOW and YUL routes, I'd be ecstatic. The problem of course is that these are frequency-sensitive routes...time will tell.

Great shots LikeHamilton--incredible to see all that iron on the ramp--its been a long time coming.