Sutcliffe: Easy access to airport vital for Ottawa’s business and tourism economy
By Mark Sutcliffe, OTTAWA CITIZEN October 24, 2013 1:02 PM
OTTAWA — The growth of Ottawa’s economy will be driven largely by two things: Getting more visitors to the city and getting local companies access to external markets to sell their products.
That’s why the community is investing more resources in marketing the city as a tourist attraction and attracting big events to Ottawa. And it’s why the mayor and a few dozen business leaders just travelled to China to explore business opportunities in that emerging economy.
If getting people in and out of Ottawa is essential to our economic prosperity, then the Ottawa Airport will be an increasingly important facility. We aren’t likely to build a second airport or relocate the current one, so we must find ways to make it easier for people to get to and from the existing airport so they can get to and from Ottawa.
On the surface, it may appear that the success of the airport will simply be a consequence of other economic activity. If we attract more people to Ottawa, for example, that ought to mean the airport will have more traffic as a result.
But if the right decisions aren’t made about access to the city and its airport, it could restrict the flow of visitors and the influx of businesses that sell their products abroad. To facilitate the travel that creates prosperity, we must ensure the Ottawa Airport continues to be a viable, sustainable, efficient hub for our community for the next generation.
The timing is critical because the airport is already facing revenue pressure from a declining amount of federal government travel (and not just from the senate).
The first step is to make air travel more affordable. The airports in Ottawa and other major Canadian cities are already losing traffic to competitors in Northern U.S. cities that capitalize on our higher taxes and fees. I did a quick search for a flight to Florida. The taxes and fees on the flight from Ottawa were roughly double the charges on a similar departure out of Syracuse.
We can’t continue to allow small facilities in the U.S. undercut our airports. In a time of budget deficits, the federal government may be reluctant to cut travel taxes but if the fees are too high, fewer people will pay them anyway.
A second important factor is increasing the number of direct flights to Ottawa. Having to transfer once or twice to get to and from Ottawa is a major deterrent to activity, adding time, logistics and the risk of a missed connection to the journey. The business community should continue to work with the airport on identifying key markets for tourism and export opportunities and then build and sustain some new routes.
But if business wants a new route, it has to use it regularly. The airlines that use Ottawa won’t subsidize a direct flight if there’s no business case for it. Indeed, the timeline for proving a route is viable has tightened dramatically.
Finally, the community has to make some decisions about the best way to get to and from the airport. The city’s transportation master plan proposes expanding the Airport Parkway to include lanes for taxis and high-occupancy vehicles. But it doesn’t yet go far enough.
Airport officials are arguing for an O-Train route that serves their facility. The city argues an expanded O-Train will serve more passengers if it goes south to Bowesville rather than turning at the airport. Some councillors have pointed out that the airport is already served by a bus route. And the mayor has reminded everyone that many major airports in other cities aren’t served by rapid transit.
But we shouldn’t rule out a transit link so quickly. The city and the airport should work together and come up with traffic forecasts and cost estimates on which they agree. Based on those numbers, they should evaluate whether there’s a business case for the O-Train to go to the airport. If there isn’t, then they should explore alternatives, including a monorail or other transportation loop that would link the airport and the Ernst & Young Centre to an O-Train on a different path.
But such an important decision is a mix of data and long-term vision. The city’s justification for a downtown tunnel and light-rail route from Tunney’s Pasture to Blair Road is built partly on numbers and partly on expectations for the city to grow and evolve. There’s a bit of “if you build it, they will come” to the rationale.
While a solid business case is crucial for any major investment, the same city-building logic applies to a transit link to the airport. If we are to imagine a prosperous Ottawa for the next 50 years, we must find ways to get people to and from the city easily and affordably and likewise to and from the airport.
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) and the thought of that and the positive impact on the business side that the people here are arguing for excites me to think of it as a possibility someday.
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