Canadian Airport Thread

[Dominion301]

Originally Posted by qprcanada

AC and wants to push YOW traffic through it's hubs at YUL and YYZ. It cheaper to run Rapidair to YUL and YYZ than have any sort of a base at YOW for wide bodies.

WS is the same, forcing you to connect in YYZ for most destinations.

I've given up on YOW for anything other than domestic flights, LHR and package holidays and drive to YUL. There are so many more airline options at YUL even from TS and very few of them have a codeshare to allow you to connect from YOW. I don't travel to the US for work or pleasure.

I don't think it will change in the near future unless we get a large increase in population in Ottawa.

Well LH will be in town next summer. However, YOW forever seems to be in a one-step-forward, one-step-back type of situation. For example:
2018 sees the surpassing of the 5 million mark for the 1st time ever & strong transborder growth for the first time in years...AA ups PHL back up to 3x where it should be, DL announces doubling of YOW-LGA frequencies starting early 2019.

2019: 4N reduces YOW-YZF-YXY to summer-seasonal. Summer 2019 schedules looking really good, then the MAX disaster happens. YOW sees off-and on domestic flight cuts, especially YYT and YEG, then UA announce a 10 month suspension of ORD (with a pilot shortage just funnel everyone onto capacity-strained Rapidair instead of cutting a frequency off of multiple ORD regional routes! ORD wasn't cut due to lack of demand as several E75 and even 738 upgauges happened in spring 2019). AA cuts PHL back to 2x, while AC upgauge LHR, hand FRA over to LH and bring in Rouge and up sun capacity 20%. ORD return confirmed for March 2020, then in fall 2019, UA cut YOW-EWR, leaving only AC to EWR, resulting in 2020 looking like another poor year for transborder numbers.

As you can see, YOW can't catch a break, while at the same time continuing to get shut out from ULCC, while the likes of YHM & YXU gain LAS.

Originally Posted by Truenorth00

All these flights to CDG. And I'm still surprised there's no YOW-CDG.

Once there are more 321LRs & eventual 321XLRs in the air (& MAX if it ever gets back), I think YOW-CDG will eventually happen at least in summer. I think Aer Lingus 321LR or XLR to DUB down the road is a strong possibility too.

I see the AC YOW-LHR upguage to the 788 and the FRA metal swap to LH (even with a 6% capacity drop) as steps in the right direction. Having LH at YOW is huge as it's the first (and 2nd ever) European network carrier to serve YOW since KL left in 1996. LH will give Ottawa far more European P.O.S. exposure than AC can.

[samuelx88]

Hello, I've been reading this forum for a while and now I decided it was time for me to start making posts . Being from Québec, English is not my first language and I am sorry for wording mistakes in that post.


I have made some tables showing what would happen if the 120 flights per week between the Province of Québec and France were well distributed between Montréal (YUL) and Québec City (YQB). For those who don't know about Montréal and Québec city, they are respectively the largest and the second-largest French-speaking cities in North America, with Québec City being the capital of the province. Both cities are separated by 3 hours of highway.

So this is the current distribution of flight between the Province of Québec and France for next summer



Because of the lack of flights and higher fares from YQB, 1 million passengers per year drive from YQB to YUL for their flight, according to the Journal de Québec.


Now, if those 120 flights per week were distributed proportionally between Québec City and Montréal with respect to their population, number of tourists, number of HQs (average of 130 employees in each) and their current passenger numbers, it would look like that:













I have a general understanding of how airlines choose their routes. However, I don't find any reasons justifying 116 flights/week from YUL and only 4 flights/week from YQB. Even YHZ (Halifax) has more than that despite having less than half the population of YQB. Also, it doesn't make sense that Air France is still not flying to YQB and sends up to 4 widebodies a day to YUL.

What should YQB, the Government and Québec Tourism Authority do to deal with that problem? Because at the moment, according to studies, the lack of flights is the 3rd biggest obstacle for the tourism numbers growth of Québec City.

* The number of flights is round up to the nearest integer for YUL and that number is subtracted from the current number of flights per week to obtain the theoretical number of flights from YQB.

[Denscity]

No worries bro my French is not as good as your English.
And welcome to the forum.

[Djeffery]

If those million people a year travelling from YQB area to YUL continue to do that, then the airlines don't really have any reason to add more services to YQB, unless they thought that million would grow substantially. 3 hours isn't really that far to drive for an international flight. Plus the aircraft are already in position for their next flight at Montreal. Where else is a widebody going to go from Quebec City after it gets back from France (the Canadian plane, not the Air France ones). It also doesn't make sense for Air France to open another station in YQB to service a single flight a day, or even 2, when they already have operations at YUL. Not to mention network feed into YUL compared to YQB.

[thenoflyzone]

Air France is very conservative ref. expansion, especially in North America. They only launched YVR a few years ago. So the chances of them flying to YQB, although not 0, is not that high. Corsair tried YQB 10 or so years ago. It didn’t work. Best bet for more CDG flights out of YQB will come at the expense of AC.

The way I see it, the more international carriers YUL gets, the more it benefits all of Quebec, including tourism numbers to Quebec City.

Also, it’s not like Quebec City has a problem attracting tourists.

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/globalnews.ca/news/4059509/quebec-sees-boom-in-tourists/amp/

Tourism in Quebec is booming. Last year (2017), Montreal saw the second biggest growth in tourism of any city in Canada. At the same time, Quebec City recorded the most tourists in its history.

[samuelx88]

Thanks for everyone that took the time to reply to my first post, I appreciate!

People continue to drive 3h because they don't have the choice to do otherwise considering the difference of price between yqb and YUL and considering that 3h is about the same time as a flight from YQB + the connection time in YUL.

In 2010, YQB had direct flights to ORY, CDG, NTE, MRS and BOD. Since that year, there was a 500k passengers increase in the airport. ORY and NTE stayed for some years however, the route was stopped when corsair got into financial trouble in the early 2010s. It wasn't because there was a lack of passengers because they were using 747 instead of A330. And I don't know why Transat removed Marseille and Bordeaux (both operated by a A310 for some years). Transat could put them back on their smaller A321. And lastly, Transat cut YQB-CDG from 5 to 3 weekly (4 next summer) and it was downgraded from a A330 and A310 mix to A321 only.

The tourists number of Québec city keeps increasing every year. It now has more tourists than Calgary, Edmonton, Winnipeg and Halifax (ref. Office du tourisme de Québec, 2017). Despite all of that, we went from 5 direct destinations to only 1. And from 10 weekly flights to France to only 4.

Lastly, let's not forget about the 500k quebecers living in Gaspesie, Bas-Saint-Laurent and Saguenay regions. YQB is their closest airport as well. They have to drive up to 10 hours to get a flight from YUL when it isn't available from YQB. Airlines usually charge an extra 600$ per passenger if they wish to leave from their local airport, which is very expensive for 5 ppl families. On the other hand, YQB is just at up to 7 hours from them, and as low as 2h from Saguenay. The reality is that people living there probably just never travel to France because of the complexity of the travel. Because when you calculate the way back, driving 20h for a family of Gaspesie for a week in France is a bit crazy at the moment. And counting them, the total number of Quebecers closer to YQB than YUL is 1.5 million.

[SignalHillHiker]

American and Canadian visitors to Ireland are down 8.8%, mostly as a result in the decline of available airline seats. Ugh.

[SteelTown]

DHL Express building $100-million facility at airport

Expansion quadruples the company’s space to 200,000 square feet.

29 Nov 2019 05:30 AM by John Rennison The Hamilton Spectator

DHL Express is planning to have the shell for its new $100-million facility operational in time for next year's yuletide rush.

The building at John C. Munro Hamilton International Airport, next door to the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum, will quadruple the company's space to 200,000 square feet. The company is expecting to add 200 people to the current complement of 375 within five years of the facility being completed in March of 2021.

On Thursday, officials from the airport and DHL stood beneath the wing of a Cargojet 767-300 turning earth for a groundbreaking in the warmth of a Cargojet hangar.

Cargojet operates planes for the logistics company currently landing two planes a day, three in the Christmas season. The company's projections call for five planes a day landing loaded with packages within 20 years of the new facility's completion.

Andrew Williams, CEP of DHL Express Canada, said 24-hour landing ability and the Canada Border Services Agency at the airport — along with the ability to expand in the future — helped influence the company's decision.

The company has seen the number of packages shipped to Canada double since 2014 with 60 per cent travelling through Hamilton.




Fred Eisenberger
https://twitter.com/HamiltonsMayor/status/1200117365335191553/photo/1

[hollywoodcory]

WS requested 14 weekly slots at LHR for S20, but were completely denied. https://www.acl-uk.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/LHR-S20-INITIAL-COORDINATION-REPORT-FINAL.pdf

Also hearing about a possible MAN launch from YHZ as well. If true, it would be the first time that WS has launched 2 new European destinations in the same year. This probably also depends on whether the 7M8 returns to service too.

[wave46]

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

American and Canadian visitors to Ireland are down 8.8%, mostly as a result in the decline of available airline seats. Ugh.

I don't think I understand this.

Were the flights just simply filled? You'd think that airlines would increase capacity in response to demand.

Or was it capacity dumping by airlines like WOW that was unsustainable? In which case, the 'demand' was being subsidized by someone losing their shirts on the airline business?

I mean, it's great for me that some airline wants me to buy $139 round-trip trans-Atlantic fares, but that's not a viable business plan.

[wave46]

Originally Posted by hollywoodcory

WS requested 14 weekly slots at LHR for S20, but were completely denied. https://www.acl-uk.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/LHR-S20-INITIAL-COORDINATION-REPORT-FINAL.pdf

Also hearing about a possible MAN launch from YHZ as well. If true, it would be the first time that WS has launched 2 new European destinations in the same year. This probably also depends on whether the 7M8 returns to service too.

Getting into Heathrow is very challenging these days. You either pay dearly for the slots from some other airline, or hope that somehow the lottery system works in your favour, which every other airline in the world is desperate for too.

That being said, if Westjet wants to go upmarket and lure the business crowd, Heathrow is a must.

[SignalHillHiker]

Originally Posted by wave46

I don't think I understand this.

Were the flights just simply filled? You'd think that airlines would increase capacity in response to demand.

Or was it capacity dumping by airlines like WOW that was unsustainable? In which case, the 'demand' was being subsidized by someone losing their shirts on the airline business?

I mean, it's great for me that some airline wants me to buy $139 round-trip trans-Atlantic fares, but that's not a viable business plan.

Oh it's been so long since I read that article, sorry. But if I recall correctly, it was a reduction of 5200 seats on various flights from NA to IE.

[thenoflyzone]

New entrants have priority over available slots at LHR, so that plays in WestJet's eventual favor for getting some slots.

But one thing is for sure, this was one of the best years for slot availability at LHR.

The EU banned Turkmenistan airlines from flying to Europe last February, hence why they lost their 2x weekly slots. The EU ban has since been lifted, but its "too bad so sad" for their LHR slots.

Tunisair also lost some of their LHR slots, due to their flights being delayed all the time. LHR has a "use it or lose it" policy with their slots, and even those airlines that don't respect the times allocated risk losing their slots. Tunisair is the latest victim in this regard, and lost 6 of their 8 slots.

Opportunities like these do not present themselves every year.

It's worth noting however that Tunisair's and Turkmenistan's slots were mostly on weekends, so of limited value to WS.

[TheGreatestX]

Still no word on where AC's available LHR slot is going?

[SpongeG]

why is WestJet called WS? shouldn't it be WJ?

[hollywoodcory]

Originally Posted by SpongeG

why is WestJet called WS? shouldn't it be WJ?

WS is WestJet's IATA code. The ICAO one is WJA.

[whywhyzee]

Originally Posted by TheGreatestX

Still no word on where AC's available LHR slot is going?

AC was awarded the same amount of slots as last year (154) so they will either lease it or open up another frequency from somehwere. 5x daily from YYZ anyone?

[thenoflyzone]

From what I remember, the timings of that AC slot means it can only be used from the west coast. They would need to trade slots with another airline in order to launch more east coast flights.

[whywhyzee]

Originally Posted by thenoflyzone

From what I remember, the timings of that AC slot means it can only be used from the west coast. They would need to trade slots with another airline in order to launch more east coast flights.

You are correct. YVR is down from double daily to single daily. Numbers on the route this year we're horrendous, down by double digit percentages in terms of total pax. Wouldn't be surprised to see BA cut back as well given the results.

[Coldrsx]

Originally Posted by whywhyzee

AC was awarded the same amount of slots as last year (154) so they will either lease it or open up another frequency from somehwere. 5x daily from YYZ anyone?

Oh hi there AC, YEG is happy to take a 3 x weekly.