By IAN ROSS
A reduction in flights to two northeastern Ontario airports has some frustrated business leaders pondering their transportation alternatives, which may not bode well for the immediate future of regional airline travel.
 |
Northern business leaders have written letters of protest to their local chamber of commerce, requesting cancelled flights be reinstated. |
A proposed elimination of a midday Air Canada Jazz flight to Toronto this fall, and the choice of a smaller aircraft on another flight, is sparking dissatisfaction in professional circles about whether Northern Ontarians should be content with reduced service despite increased passenger traffic.
In any one week, John Cutsey's North Bay software firm can have four employees travelling through Toronto to reach clients across North America.
Located on Airport Road in North Bay, Cutsey Business Systems has 18 employees who regularly travel through Toronto to customers in Ohio, Pennsylvania and California, where 98 per cent of their business exists.
Cutsey is seriously considering hiring a driver to whisk employees down Highway 11 to Pearson Airport for drop-off and pick-up.
"There's no way I'm going to have my people wait four or five hours in Toronto to get that late flight (back to North Bay).
"I use limousines every time I miss a flight. I'm not going to wait. It costs me $500 per limousine to go one-way and I will still use that. It's getting worse," says Cutsey, who estimates his company probably spends more than $1.5 million in airfares and accommodations annually.
That option may also be in the cards for customers of Tom Patterson, manager of Stowe Woodward Inc., a manufacturer of roll covers for the pulp and paper industry, who says the reduction in flights is an inconvenience for clients arriving in the city.
He is one of a dozen North Bay business people sending letters and e-mails of protest through the city's chamber of commerce asking for the flight to be reinstated.
Patterson says, with a significant wait at Toronto's Pearson International Airport that could last the better part of a business day, he suspects
customers may drop taking Air Canada flights to Northern Ontario altogether and drive instead.
"They could be sitting for four hours (between flights). People are not going to sit for four hours."
However, last month, Air Canada reported it moved more passengers per flight during September than in any other September in its history.
Air Canada's Regional Jazz airline reports a load factor of 66.2 per cent in September 2004, significantly higher than the 54.7 per cent recorded in
September 2003.
The company, which emerged from bankruptcy protection in late September, reported the month of September was the sixth consecutive month of
record load factors, as a result of passenger traffic growing faster than the number of seats and flights the airline makes available.
"That's what I can't understand is that their volumes are up," says Patterson, "and if you're showing a profit, it doesn't make sense."
Representatives from Air Canada corporate communications and the regional manager from Air Canada Jazz were not available for comment on the issue.
But, as of Nov. 1, North Bay airport management were notified that Air Canada Jazz plans to reduce air service between North Bay and Toronto by one flight, from five round trips per day to four. Seat capacity will also drop from 332 to 258 as a 37-seat Dash-8 aircraft is being replaced by an 18-seat Beech 1900 aircraft for a 6 p.m. Toronto-to-North Bay flight.
Timmins is undergoing similar changes.
North Bay is looking to have those flights reinstated or have the void filled by another airline.
Rick Proulx, manager of North Bay's Jack Garland Airport, suspects with Air Canada emerging from creditor protection, the carrier is taking a greater focus on directing traffic flow into its more profitable, high volume markets between Toronto and Vancouver.
He believes the decision was made by head office without much consultation with regional base managers across the country.
Tracking daily passenger numbers on a per-flight basis in North Bay has shown "very healthy passenger" volume, says Proulx. Though varying by flight, passenger head counts ranged in the 64 to 65 per cent capacity.
"It's certainly better than 60 per cent for the last three months of the summer (June-July-August)."
A 1 p.m. Toronto flight this past summer, using a Beech 1900, was consistently overbooked, says Proulx.
"There's two or three days of every week where it's oversold and they're offering $100 cash or a $200 travel voucher for somebody not to take the flight."
He says even though the economics could be supported from a regional perspective, "from an economic and profitability perspective, it doesn't seem to hold much weight with the new Air Canada."
North Bay Mayor Vic Fedeli calls the move a "bad business decision" and a "cookie-cutter solution" by Air Canada to remove aircraft from serving the North.
Fedeli, who is lobbying the airline to restore the flight, is encouraging area businesses to consider chartering aircraft while working to have the flight reinstated.
Steve Kidd, outgoing president of the Timmins Chamber of Commerce and the president of the newly reformed Northeastern Ontario Chambers of Commerce, says the issue is not the airline industry's troubles post 9/11, but is centred around the North's declining population base.
"There simply has to be the population base and a growth cycle in place to justify other carriers coming in."
While not looking favourably upon government-subsidized air service to support a second or third carrier, Kidd suggests one idea worth exploring, as a short-term solution, is a government-regulated standardized tariff arrangement for air carriers on a cost-per-mile basis.
"There's a terrible inequity on some of these flights into Northern Ontario on a per mile basis."
In the longer term, "we have to grow in Northern Ontario," says Kidd, by reversing population out-migration to present a more stable business case for the airlines.
"It's unreasonable to ask a carrier to lose money. But if you have a level playing field across the country, in terms of cost per mile, the playing field is instantly levelled."
In Timmins, airport manager Harley Nikkel says Air Canada Jazz has indicated they will be paying close attention to the yield numbers on seats, and if it warrants an additional flight, they are prepared to restore one back.
"They've distributed their larger seat aircraft to where the yield is highest," says Nikkel.
