Canadian Airport Thread II

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by Harley613

I'm booking my annual Hawaii flight right now and the 'Ultrabasic' is a little more than I usually pay for the regular economy (inflation, I get it), but the 'Basic' is almost $200 more than the 'Ultrabasic'. No ability to add carry-on to 'Ultrabasic', only a checked bag for $130. I don't check bags anywhere I fly, so looks like I'm getting hosed here by Westjet.

They've just rolled this out. I would expect that they focus on the basic for seat sales. It's weird you can't buy a carry-on. $260 for luggage for Hawaii is crazy. Pack light. Buy anything you need when you are there and toss your old stuff.

[Djeffery]

Originally Posted by LO 044

^So we already have 2 people sharing their experience of how prices have not gone down. Nice try WestJet.

Shrinkflation just like the grocery store

[Justanothermember]

Can someone please tell me where the ultrabasic fares are. I only see economy and member pricing fares when I book.

[casper]

Originally Posted by Justanothermember

Can someone please tell me where the ultrabasic fares are. I only see economy and member pricing fares when I book.

They have a crappy website.

As an example, if you search for Victoria to Saskatoon on July 22, the 6:00 am departure shows Economy and Premium. If you select Economy it shows two columns with "Eco Flex" and "Eco" then bellow that it shows "UltraBasic" in a bar going across. The default is "UltraBasic".

If you search for the same flight on Expedia it is displayed in a much more transparent way.

WestJet and Air Canada have been in a competition over the last 10 years to see who can come up with the website that looks the fanciest while still being the least functional.

[nname]

Originally Posted by thenoflyzone

april stats for canada's busiest:

YYZ - n/a
YVR - n/a
YUL - 1,679,148 +6.2% YTD: +9.9%
YYC - 1,383,573 -0.2% YTD: +4.9%
YEG - 601,586 +1.3% YTD: +1.1%
YOW - 352,789 +12.6% YTD: +13.6%
YWG - n/a

YVR - 2,036,337 +6.6% YTD: +8.4%

Interestingly enough, Europe had the highest growth, at +20% over the 2019 number, and we all know that sector had big loss due to COVID, WS at YYC, and the retreat of TS... APAC is at 80-90% recovery.

[Dominion301]

This morning was PD's inaugural YYT-YOW (yesterday was the inaugural YOW-YYT). The route currently operates summer seasonally daily until late October.

[JakeLRS]

It looks like Westjet is pulling out of YHM at the end of June (except for YYC).

YHM-YHZ, YYT, MCO all axed ahead of the busy summer season. The YHM based aircraft will fly to YYC on July 1st as an additional pax flight.

Westjet has always treated YHM as a distant third world airport. They’ve never actually wanted to maintain service here and it shows by this cheap shot last minute cancelation of several routes. They tried to pull out in 2016 but flair made them angry so they maintained service.

God Forbid someone like flair entering the YHM market, since it’ll make WS angry and they’ll reinstate their routes.

The only pax service YHM has this summer is daily YYC and KEF both at once daily.

[Zmonkey]

Originally Posted by JakeLRS

It looks like Westjet is pulling out of YHM at the end of June (except for YYC).

YHM-YHZ, YYT, MCO all axed ahead of the busy summer season. The YHM based aircraft will fly to YYC on July 1st as an additional pax flight.

Westjet has always treated YHM as a distant third world airport. They’ve never actually wanted to maintain service here and it shows by this cheap shot last minute cancelation of several routes. They tried to pull out in 2016 but flair made them angry so they maintained service.

God Forbid someone like flair entering the YHM market, since it’ll make WS angry and they’ll reinstate their routes.

The only pax service YHM has this summer is daily YYC and KEF both at once daily.

"The cancellation is part of WestJet's broader plan to discontinue operations in Hamilton."

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/westjet-sc...104202041.html

Flair operates out of Waterloo and Toronto. They probably don't need a third airport in the region.

[Innsertnamehere]

Originally Posted by JakeLRS

It looks like Westjet is pulling out of YHM at the end of June (except for YYC).

YHM-YHZ, YYT, MCO all axed ahead of the busy summer season. The YHM based aircraft will fly to YYC on July 1st as an additional pax flight.

Westjet has always treated YHM as a distant third world airport. They’ve never actually wanted to maintain service here and it shows by this cheap shot last minute cancelation of several routes. They tried to pull out in 2016 but flair made them angry so they maintained service.

God Forbid someone like flair entering the YHM market, since it’ll make WS angry and they’ll reinstate their routes.

The only pax service YHM has this summer is daily YYC and KEF both at once daily.

oooof. Brutal. Amazing that a city with a metro population rapidly approaching 1,000,000 can't support even basic service levels. I get that YYZ is a big draw, but man..

[JakeLRS]

Originally Posted by Zmonkey

"The cancellation is part of WestJet's broader plan to discontinue operations in Hamilton."

https://ca.news.yahoo.com/westjet-sc...104202041.html

Flair operates out of Waterloo and Toronto. They probably don't need a third airport in the region.

If anyone is going to benefit from this, its Waterloo airport & Flair. I mean, they are already reaping the benefits of not having to directly compete on western Canada routes like abbotsford, vancouver, and edmonton since swoop took off, but now they'll also reap the benefits of passengers who planned on going to atlantic Canada from YHM.

[msmariner]

Originally Posted by JakeLRS

It looks like Westjet is pulling out of YHM at the end of June (except for YYC).

YHM-YHZ, YYT, MCO all axed ahead of the busy summer season. The YHM based aircraft will fly to YYC on July 1st as an additional pax flight.

Westjet has always treated YHM as a distant third world airport. They’ve never actually wanted to maintain service here and it shows by this cheap shot last minute cancelation of several routes. They tried to pull out in 2016 but flair made them angry so they maintained service.

God Forbid someone like flair entering the YHM market, since it’ll make WS angry and they’ll reinstate their routes.

The only pax service YHM has this summer is daily YYC and KEF both at once daily.

If an Air Canada doesn’t really care about YHM then why would you think a western based airline like Westjet care about it?

[Zmonkey]

Originally Posted by Innsertnamehere

oooof. Brutal. Amazing that a city with a metro population rapidly approaching 1,000,000 can't support even basic service levels. I get that YYZ is a big draw, but man..

Part of it is the airport just can't compete or being run poorly.

I remember when I started in the industry I was at a conference and people from the Hamilton airport were talking at the conference talked about how they could be the GTA's second airport, how they can attract cities by being lower cost, how they have 1.5 million people within 60 minutes. This was in 2011.

I know YYZ gave WestJet lower fees compared to Hamilton back than its part of the reason they moved flights over (one of many reasons). YYZ offered lowered fees to Flair compared to Hamilton too. I am sure Waterloo did as well as part of their subsidies. Pearson for over a decade has been creative with fees, take bad gates, bad landing times and you get some cheaper prime time slots, push out weekend flights, rebates for customer volumes etc.

Hamilton just could not compete. Now with WestJet really focusing on the west I assume they never really even tried to be competitive or creative.

I have been hearing Hamilton can be GTA's second major airport for 12/13 years now. There is a 0 % chance of that happening.

[Dominion301]

On WS' website YHM-YYC (and onward connections in the west) is still bookable beyond July 1st until the end of the booking window in May 2025.

The sun routes show as resuming in November. For winter 2025 in November, WS are showing:
YHM-YYC ops X67
YHM-sun flying ops 67

[hollywoodcory]

WS announces expanded codeshare with VS, including points in India and Africa.

Destinations include: DEL, BOM, BLR, JNB, CPT, LOS, DXB and VIA (The Maldives).

https://www.westjet.com/en-ca/news/2...xpansion-of-co

Article also mentions VS is launching YYZ-LHR in S25. VS already code-shares on WS YYC-LHR.

[fanofYOW]

Mexicana considering YOW, YVR, and YUL from Tijuana.

https://ottawa.ctvnews.ca/mexicana-a...sion-1.6920603

[LeftCoaster]

What an odd list. Did they forget about Pearson?

[fanofYOW]

Originally Posted by LeftCoaster

What an odd list. Did they forget about Pearson?

Not sure what their thought process is but my best guess is that Pearson is already very well served to Mexico and it’s not the only market that exists. What a breath of fresh air to see a carrier take competition into consideration instead of jumping directly into YYZ. Another possibility is that they already know fees in YYZ are too high with them being a LCC? Who knows. I don’t know about YVR or YUL but someone on the YOW page mentioned how San Diego and YOW O&D is something like 15k which can be done with an E2 either Winter seasonally or something like 3-4x weekly year round assuming that they are not opting in for connections to the rest of their network.

[Djeffery]

Originally Posted by Zmonkey

Flair operates out of Waterloo and Toronto. They probably don't need a third airport in the region.

4th since they also have a token presence in London.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by fanofYOW

Not sure what their thought process is but my best guess is that Pearson is already very well served to Mexico and it’s not the only market that exists. What a breath of fresh air to see a carrier take competition into consideration instead of jumping directly into YYZ. Another possibility is that they already know fees in YYZ are too high with them being a LCC? Who knows. I don’t know about YVR or YUL but someone on the YOW page mentioned how San Diego and YOW O&D is something like 15k which can be done with an E2 either Winter seasonally or something like 3-4x weekly year round assuming that they are not opting in for connections to the rest of their network.

It interesting given the Feds reintroduction of the visa requirement.

In light of news like this, our gov't better tread very carefully:

More asylum claims and more illegal crossings along U.S.-Canada border, despite the dangers

[Djeffery]

Originally Posted by Zmonkey

I have been hearing Hamilton can be GTA's second major airport for 12/13 years now. There is a 0 % chance of that happening.

Even longer ago than that when WestJet first moved east and made Hamilton their eastern hub. I remember the grand plans YHM unveiled with this massive new terminal and jet bridges and how many millions of passengers they would handle. I don't even recall the timeframe of when WS made the move to Pearson but it seemed to happen fast. I suppose the jury could be out on whether the timing was good or not depending on how much of that expansion could have been built, as I'm sure most users would like a newer building there but the expense of that might have bankrupted the place too.