New provincial alliance links 11 regional airports

With passenger numbers expected to take off in the coming years, a new network of southern Ontario airports has a plan to share the wealth and help attract more air traffic throughout the region.

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Toronto's powerhouse airport, Pearson International, is joining with other airports in the province to form the Southern Ontario Airport Network. Forecasts show 110 million passengers will be looking to fly into, out of, or around the region by the mid-2040s, but capacity across area airports is currently estimated at around 90 million passengers.

Goals for the new alliance include completing a study of southern Ontario to better identify opportunities to grow air travel at regional airport, according to the Greater Toronto Airport Authority. Toronto Pearson wants to become Canada's "mega hub" airport, by attracting more international flights to the airport. 

The network also plans to look at ways to better understand ground transportation needs in the province, pointing out that travel time to Pearson via car is set to increase annually.

Regions could feed Toronto "mega hub"

More international routes could mean higher traffic for smaller regional airports, according to officials with other airports in the new network.

"If they want to be a mega hub they're going to need passengers coming in to feed that," said Jim McCormack, director of finance for Windsor International Airport. "We have 6.9 million people within a 90-minute drive to the Windsor airport. We have a great opportunity to feeding those people into that mega hub."

Higher demand is already a factor at the Toronto airport, with passenger numbers going up by a record eight per cent between 2015 and 2016.

Officials with the Toronto airport said the expect that growth to continue over the next three decades. "[That presents] tremendous opportunity, not only for Toronto Pearson but for the region as a whole," said Howard Eng, President and CEO of the Greater Toronto Airports Authority.

Windsor's McCormack said every airport will see unique benefits from the alliance. 

For example, executive flights on smaller planes may instead fly through regional airports which are still relatively close to Pearson. Cargo opportunities could be moved to Hamilton, while maintenance work could land at Windsor's airport.

The eleven members of the new airport alliance are Toronto Pearson, Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport, Hamilton John C Munro International Airport, Kingston/Norman Rogers Airport, Lake Simcoe Regional Airport, London International Airport, Oshawa Executive Airport, Niagara District Airport, Peterborough Airport, Region of Waterloo International Airport and Windsor International Airport.