YEG - Edmonton Int Airport

[Coldrsx]

Originally Posted by IKAN104

Fly the medivac planes to YEG then chopper to University Hospital rooftop. Simple.

If having a central airport for medivac was really critical then all major cities would have one. But they don't.

bingo bingo...and it was funny because on global tonight it had a comment from a viewer talking about how we have amazing health facilities and how they will suffer from not having the muni/medivac there.

i immediately thought of your comment.

[Edmonchuck]

Originally Posted by kyle_olsen

If your med-evac'ing people, its probably because of something fairly serious. (...).

Be careful here. A lot of the medivac FIXED WING flights are patient transfers for tests that cannot be done elsewhere....

[Shodan]

Call for more flights at City Centre Airport

Gordon Kent
The Edmonton Journal

Thursday, September 04, 2008


Council may vote to hold a plebiscite on the airport's fate in the next civic election.
CREDIT: Chris Schwarz, The Journal, file

EDMONTON - The first phase of the debate over the future of the City Centre Airport wound up Wednesday with further calls to expand service and allow larger scheduled flights.

But Mayor Stephen Mandel said the city is only looking at two options -- keeping the facility as it is or shutting it down.

"At some point, we have to say as a council whether we want to maintain the status quo or look at closing the airport."

Although most of the 52 speakers who took part in the two-day public hearing asked to boost the limit on the number of passengers scheduled planes can carry to 19 from 10, Mandel said the restriction is in the Edmonton Airports lease and can't be changed by the city.

Mandel, who won't reveal what he thinks should happen to the Muni, said nothing new came out of the hearing.

It's possible council might eventually vote to hold a plebiscite on the issue during the 2010 civic election, but that won't be discussed until councillors decide -- probably next winter -- whether to continue looking at whether to sell the facility, he said.

Members of council's executive committee asked city staff to provide information Oct. 8 on the proposed next steps as well as how the airport fits into Edmonton's Transportation Master Plan.

They also want answers to councillor questions on Feb. 11. The administration has suggested a final decision should come by June to allow for planning of the north LRT line, NAIT expansion and other major projects.

Cab drivers, business operators and union officials argued the airport should remain, despite a city report that estimated the land could produce a profit of about $500 million if it was sold for housing and commercial development.

"I have yet to find a municipality in North America that has taken an airport of the consequence of the City Centre Airport and turned it into something else," said Don Grimble, who has spent decades fighting to keep the 217-hectare site operating.

"The day of the downtown airport is coming back."

Edmonton has considered the issue at least five times since 1967, each time deciding the airport should stay in service, he said.

While many speakers complained the capital is losing northern air routes to Calgary because people don't want to travel to the Edmonton International Airport, Edmonton Airports president Reg Milley said the reverse is happening.

The number of people driving to Calgary to catch planes has dropped about 10 per cent in the last two years, he said.

The International now serves 12 Northern destinations compared to four from Calgary, he said.

[email protected]
© The Edmonton Journal 2008

Copyright © 2008 CanWest Interactive, a division of CanWest MediaWorks Publications, Inc.. All rights reserved.
CanWest Interactive, a division of CanWest MediaWorks Publications, Inc.. All rights reserved.

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[MrOilers]

Ugh. I don't want a plebiscite. I want the people we helped elect to make the right decision for us.

I don't trust the average Edmontonian to really understand the ramifications of each side of the debate to make an informed vote. And somehow I don't believe that a plebiscite will be honored... a new city council might dilly-dally on the issue for another four years and in 2014 we'll be in the exact same position we are today.

Come on, City Council - grow a set and steer this ship in the right direction to keep this place booming.

[IKAN104]

^ Tell that to city council. They won't hear you on this board.

[rapid_business]

^ good point. we should email our city councillor and tell them how we feel. We elect them believing in their capacity and knowing we as individuals don't have the time to be properly informed from all sides to make a fair and balanced decision. Dishing it back to the public is avoidance, plain and simple.

[MrOilers]

I definitely will.

I want to write a short letter to each member reminding them that it should be their responsibility to make these decisions and do the follow-through while they have the power to do so, and not passing responsibility on to joe citizen and the next council that gets elected in.

I'll need some time to put together something a bit more articulate.

EDIT - I'm in Tony Caterina's Ward. I wonder what he wants to do?

[MalcolmTucker]

Originally Posted by Edmonchuck

Be careful here. A lot of the medivac FIXED WING flights are patient transfers for tests that cannot be done elsewhere....

Well, for those people it obviously wouldn't matter one bit where they went. but the argument on the side of keeping the airport open isn't using those people as examples. They will trumpet out the most extreme case that in any other circumstance of the airport not being there would have died.

[lubicon]

Time for a Calgarian to wade into the City Centre debate. I have 2 comments:

1. having grown up in one of the northern towns that is lobbying the city to keep the airport open, and even expand scheduled service I really am dumbfounded by their arguements. Look at any of the cities and towns who are doing the complaining (Peace River, GP, Ft Mac, High Level etc). They argue they need access to DT and the government and moving to the International makes that somehow inconvenient and uneconomical. The If you say the Muni is 10 minutes from DT and the International is 30, then you are talking about a 20 minute difference. Big deal. These places are a minimum 5 hour drive to Edmonton so driving isn't an option, and going to Calgary as some have threatened is definately no faster nor any more convenient. I really don't see what the basis for their arguement is.

2. The whole Medi-vac issue. I used to think the Muni was a valuable asset for medivac flights, and I still do. As someone else stated not all medi vacs are helicopter flights so to bring a patient in to Edmonton International would involve a transfer to a chopper and a short flight to the hospital. While that is a concern many other cities have found it to not be that big a deal. Look at Vancouver, or even Calgary (heaven forbid! ). They would be in the same situation as Edmonton would without the use of the City Centre airport.

part of me wants to say keep it open, but ONLY to corporate and GA aircraft. You simply cannot let scheduled service back in.

[0773|=\]

I say develop half the lands as something else (expand NAIT, interchange somewhere between 121 and 107 street so that those at-grade accesses can be removed from Yellowhead, LRT, the list goes on...), and keep whatever is required for the Indy to stay here, and maybe even expand the Aviation Museum on Kingsway into more of a flagship attraction for our city, where all the historical significance of this airfield can be preserved and appreciated by the general public, and one of the runways can be kept possibly even for airshows.

[rapid_business]

Way too valuable of land to keep for a 3 day race each year, and an once a year airshow. That can move somewhere else.

The museum can stay, that is a mute point...

[IKAN104]

There's got to be a way to make the race track multi-purpose so that the track/roadway and the land around it is still useful on non-race days.

[rapid_business]

Just build the streets in a multi-modal way, with functionality for a street race like Monte Carlo.

[Coldrsx]

Street race wont happen here...sorry.

But a dedicated track would and it very much could be supported with the motorsports community we have around here, however...the cost of running and capital to get it rolling would be very difficult justify.

[eemy]

Why won't street races happen there? The Indy race in Toronto is on the street.

[Coldrsx]

Not to say it cant but if i were a betting man i would say wont...due to the fact that Indy is an oval group supplimented by a few turn courses. Edmonton functions so well because of the venue...a street course is far far more costly to run and organize let alone tackle the logistics.

I would love to see it but again, i think Indy might move somewhere else if the muni leaves us.

[EdmTrekker]

Likely the replacement Indy Track would/could be Northlands sites - with easy LRT connection and Northlands facilities...the horse track itself has been scheduled for a makeover - so who knows how everything could be reconfigured?

[EdmTrekker]

Interesting chart showing YEG traffic increasing - nice to see a pictoral rather than just numbers....

http://www.anna.aero/2008/09/05/canadian-traffic-up-30-in-last-four-years/

[0773|=\]

Originally Posted by onishenko

Way too valuable of land to keep for a 3 day race each year, and an once a year airshow. That can move somewhere else.

The museum can stay, that is a mute point...

I was thinking something along the lines of keeping the race-track for the race, but ALSO for the remainder of the year, maintain a runway for the aviation museum, which they could fully use to showcase historical aircraft, possibly even provide an airshow, and even give visitors a tour of a preserved runway from the famous Eppeley Airfield. Get the museum to use it in a way that it doesn't become a waste of space.

I don't know how many readers have been to some of the US Air Force Museums, but they are incredible! I think Edmonton has a huge opportunity to show Canadians the storied history of Canadian Aviation, with no bars held (runway included!)

[IKAN104]

Originally Posted by EdmTrekker

Likely the replacement Indy Track would/could be Northlands sites - with easy LRT connection and Northlands facilities...the horse track itself has been scheduled for a makeover - so who knows how everything could be reconfigured?

Maybe Northlands would like to purchase a piece of that land for its own selfish purposes, including hosting a big race weekend every summer.