Calgary International Airport II

[yyc_engineer]

Originally Posted by cyeg66

I've been doing my sim training for the parallels this week. That is gonna be sweeeeeeet. Without even breaking a sweat, anywhere between 44 and 56 arrivals/hr. Some confusion as to when the actual opening date is, June 15th or 28th, but who really cares? Can't come soon enough. Long gone will be the days of crossing runways and wearing the "missed approach" crown of Canada. Imagine: planes landing into the exact same winds! I know, right? A novel concept. Plus, parallels a much simpler operation = better qualification rate = more bodies = more time off. Yay.

I heard 35L / 17R will be quasi-dedicated to flights departing and arriving from west of YYC (BC, Western US) and 35R / 17L will serve flights to/from the East ... any truth to that rumor?

I always thought we would use one runway for departures and the other for arrivals?..

[Bigtime]

Originally Posted by yyc_engineer

I heard 35L / 17R will be quasi-dedicated to flights departing and arriving from west of YYC (BC, Western US) and 35R / 17L will serve flights to/from the East ... any truth to that rumor?

I always thought we would use one runway for departures and the other for arrivals?..

cyeg66 will be able to answer those questions in due time I'd assume.

I would gather nothing is set in stone, and limiting a runway to only specific arrival/departure areas would reduce the capacity being given by the parallels.

For example field position may play a role, I doubt ATC would want to land/depart Suncor or Sunwing traffic all the way over to 35R/17L.

Nick knows the answers to these questions and hopefully can share sooner rather than later. I hadn't thought of Cage's DEN setup and that sounds cool. Not sure our parallels are far enough apart, but worth looking at for sure.

[Bokimon]

^ Ahh the regulatory headaches. There comes to a point where red tape becomes a hindrance to common sense and progress. I wouldn't rule that out as causing enough harm to the wallets of both air carriers and the traveler like us. Which it very much does.

Interesting tidbits on the parallel. Will be interesting to see how the operations stream out. I am just looking forward to the opening day in June.
Does anybody for the record know if any other 737-800s do the Hawaii hops from mainland North America? Maybe even from the far south pacific? I recall Continental Micronesia had some 738s hoppin from Guam and I think Alaska from Seattle. I wonder if they get ETOP challenged from whatever atmosphere conditions they face. Maybe more diverting spots along the pacific islands..

Originally Posted by Bokimon

Does anybody for the record know if any other 737-800s do the Hawaii hops from mainland North America?

Alaska: SEA, PDX, OAK all to KOA/LIH/OGG/HNL
Alaska: SAN - LIH/OGG/HNL
United: SFO - HNL/OGG; LAX-KOA
And of course WS: YVR - HNL/OGG/LIH/KOA

Stopped checking there cause that's plenty, but it would appear the 738 is very popular to Hawaii.

Originally Posted by Cage

Using this example could YYC do the following:
- Arrivals on 17R and 35R
- Departures on 11.
.

Still thinking about this, and protection for missed approach and noise abatement are coming to mind. Just getting to that stuff in my reading.

[cyeg66]

Originally Posted by Cage

Does Navcan have any precedent for unique runway operations in the playbook. I am thinking of DEN which does the following during periods of high intensity arrivals. For Den the runway configuration is as follows:
- Arrivals on 16R and 16L (western most N-S runways)
- Arrivals on 35R and 35L (Eastern most N-S runways)
- Departures on 25
- Departures on 8

DEN uses this configuration when there has been a short traffic disruption/delay caused by thunder storm.

Using this example could YYC do the following:
- Arrivals on 17R and 35R
- Departures on 11.
This would help during the evening arrival crunch when there are few departures.

The reverse could also be utilized on the morning departure bank:
- Departures on 17L and 35R
- Arrivals on 29.

Not gonna happen, unfortunately. Too many reasons to list, but despite my personal penchant for doing hairy, sometimes nail-biting opposite end stuff and all that, not everyone is trained to higher standards, and consequently, aren't comfortable with thinking outside the box for the sake of efficiency. It has come down from the laughable power players in all this that we will remain on, and "only on", the parallels until the crosswind hits 33 kts.

Another reason is the published missed approaches will now have a turn component to them, where previously tower issued the turn aiming for clear air (due to crossing runway ops, it could always be different). This could prove problematic if using a crossing runway for other arrivals or departures. Many other reasons, too many to discuss. Calgary weather, photo flights, traffic watch, Hawcs helicopter, CARs, debate about efficiencies actually gained (antithesis to CDA's, fuel savings, pilot planning), etc.

Originally Posted by Acey

Nick knows the answers to these questions and hopefully can share sooner rather than later. I hadn't thought of Cage's DEN setup and that sounds cool. Not sure our parallels are far enough apart, but worth looking at for sure.

Traffic inbound from west (and North to a Edmonton) will indeed land predominantly 17R/35L, and conversely, traffic from east and the States on the new runway. As mentioned, we'll employ the polish parallels only when a stiff chinook wind dictates so.

Originally Posted by cyeg66

...we will remain on, and "only on", the parallels until the crosswind hits 33 kts. As mentioned, we'll employ the polish parallels only when a stiff chinook wind dictates so.

33 knots!? Surely they'll be asking for 29 long before then? If the field is busy will they be refused? Perhaps 33 kts was chosen because it's the limit for a whole bunch of common types at YYC (well over half), I've posted some others we see plenty of as well...

DH3/736: 36 kts
733: 35 kts
737/738/739/763/319/320/321: 33 kts
Q400: 32 kts
E190: 28 kts

I wonder if Panorama, Evanston et al. residents realize that pretty much overnight their airplane noise will disappear, even on quite gusty days, it would seem...

[Bigtime]

We need better spotting locations to get great shots of the crosswind action that will be coming our way.

[Nick]

We will be doing our sim stuff coming up pretty quick, but I got a preview of our operation. A big issue preventing us from using 11/29 as a complimentary runway is that we will rely on it heavily as a taxiway.

Assuming we are ground sorting to arrive and depart on both parallels from day 1 going forward:
Flights from Sunwest, Millionaire, Air Partners, Ramp 7 & 9 will be going off the east runway due to direction of flight (McMurray/Patch, Eastern Canada, Lethbridge, Medicine Hat) have to taxi over to the east side while being mixed with the arrivals going back to those areas mixed with the main apron traffic. If the 35s are active, Juliet will be for all the west bound traffic, and Golf, Foxtrot, Romeo will be for the eastbound traffic. All traffic going to the east runway from the NW corner + Ramp 7 will use Runway 11, Cross 35L, Foxtrot 1 short of Foxtrot as issued by West Ground. East Ground will mix them with all the other departure traffic from the main apron, and the south field at the corner of Foxtrot and Romeo (Romeo is the taxiway that bridges over McCall Way). With the volume of traffic that will need to use Runway 11/29 as a taxiway, there isn't much of an appetite to also mix in arrivals or departures in the mix.

For us in the tower, the job in TWR will be SIGNIFICANTLY easier, while ground's complexity will grow quite a bit.

PS, I'm reluctant to share all the goings on as per our Business Code of Conduct (we may be mistakenly treated as unofficial spokesman of Nav Canada), but if you have a specific question shoot me a DM and I'll do my best to answer!

That plan actually makes a lot of sense, my gosh what a cluster it could potentially be around the main apron if there was no Romeo (kind of already is even with no parallel). Ramp 7 and 9 folks could take that same route you mention to get to the threshold of 17L as well so at least something stays the same in south flow. For 35R, I guess Canadian North will go yankee - uniform over the threshold of 29 - fox - romeo. Are you guys anticipating a lot of intersection departures for 35R from that third to last taxiway? Google Earth says that's 12,140 remaining. Pretty much everybody could take that and for Canadian North that ends up not even being that much further than taxiing up to 17R is right now. 17L another story, however.

I guess theoretically arrival rate should be the same for north and south flow (unless there's Springbank or some other factor I don't know of), but given the aforementioned ground complexity one will end up being easier from that standpoint?

Originally Posted by Bigtime

We need better spotting locations to get great shots of the crosswind action that will be coming our way.

While the firm east-west spilt kinda 🞵🞵🞵🞵🞵 for people having taxi a long way, it does make it a bit easier for spotters... it's a no brainer to park your 🞵🞵🞵🞵 near the threshold of 17L in the afternoon to get the AC 77W x2, KL 777 and the others. FedEx/UPS will be over there as well, it sounds like. Who besides AC to NRT will be on the west side? Cargolux could arrive on the west but depart on the east side. All Air Transat heavy action would be on the east side too

[Bigtime]

That is true Acey, it will make that part of the spotting easier!

Quite surprised to see that those west side FBO's/operations will have to taxi all the way over to the eastern runway, grounds job did just get a lot more complicated.

One other thing we'll have to see is if 35R becomes the preferred runway for noise abatement hours.

[Full Mountain]

Originally Posted by Acey

One other thing we'll have to see is if 35R becomes the preferred runway for noise abatement hours.

Seems it would be the opposite, the threshold of 35R is far closer to homes than the threshold of 35L. Am I missing something else?

[cyeg66]

Originally Posted by Bigtime

Quite surprised to see that those west side FBO's/operations will have to taxi all the way over to the eastern runway, grounds job did just get a lot more complicated.

Better they "meet" at a combined speed of 30 kts and same altitude, rather than speeds of 300-700kts while climbing/descending and pointed at each other. The number of TCAS RA's has spiked since the latest changes to our STARs. This will come down as we switch to the parallels. Honestly, unless the wind steers the boat sideways, I can't think of any reason to need 11/29 except other than as a taxiway when we're operating on the parallels. The twins will give us (and then some, *under 95% of weather conditions) all the capacity that is needed. It *should* be nothing short of

As for nighttime noise abatement, I don't think it's finalized yet but with ground sorting no longer required into the late(r) hours, I don't think it'll matter which of the 35's will be utilized for departure. I'm assuming 29 will still be in the arrival picture, though I've been wrong lots before. There's a few places (BNE, I think is an example) where during nighttime ops, they'll regularly land coming in over the water, and depart off the opposite end, all for noise abatement reasons. Similar to what Cage was proposing with landing 17R, departing 35R, however using the same strip . Not sure there's a black and white provision for that in Canadian Aviation Reg's but who knows?... Stranger things have happened.

[MalcolmTucker]

Would you really want to do noise abatement? When capacity becomes an issue (long time for sure), and you can't do it anymore, there might be an uproar (though planes are much quieter now)

[cyeg66]

Originally Posted by MalcolmTucker

Would you really want to do noise abatement? When capacity becomes an issue (long time for sure), and you can't do it anymore, there might be an uproar (though planes are much quieter now)

I'm not sure I follow what you're asking...

Originally Posted by MalcolmTucker

Would you really want to do noise abatement? When capacity becomes an issue (long time for sure), and you can't do it anymore, there might be an uproar (though planes are much quieter now)

Here's the current procedure I'm referring to (running rwy 11/16 is slightly better capacity so they do that when wind allows, outside of noise hours):



I quite appreciate the lack of 29 departures until 0900 on Saturday morning going over us in Panorama. Seems they stick quite closely to this sked; like clockwork the 29 departures start at 0700 every weekday morning.

Originally Posted by Full Mountain

Seems it would be the opposite, the threshold of 35R is far closer to homes than the threshold of 35L. Am I missing something else?

Nope you're right... for noise I'd guess at 35L for departures, and 17L/17R/29 for arrivals.

[Nick]

As far as I know we are sticking with the "standard mid" of Land 29, depart 35L starting day one but the hours may change. As well something to keep in mind for all our ops with the new runway is that as someone lands 29, nobody can be south of taxiway Sierra (the 3rd one from the south end) while they are landing due to tail height, ILS interference etc.

The transition from standard mid to full parallel ground sort will be something we have to practice.

[Cage]

Originally Posted by YYCspotter

http://www.yyc.com/Portals/0/MEDIA/BR_PaxTotal.pdf

January 2014 PAX stats are out:
Domestic: +5.2%
Transborder: +8.7%
International: +10.1
Overall: +6.5%

The reason for international and transborder growth can be explained here:

http://www.calgaryherald.com/news/calgary/Calgary+suffers+coldest+February+years/9588659/story.html

Last month was the coldest February in two decades, with an average daily temperature of -12.2 degrees Celsius. According to Environment Canada, the historic average is -5.4 C. Calgary hasn’t had a colder February since 1994, when the average temperature was -13.5 C.

The article quotes coldest ever February as -24.5C average for Feb 1936. At these temps even AC would be running 77Ws to Tuffy's front door in CUN.