Toronto City Centre Airport

The Toronto City Centre Airport in Toronto, Ontario is a regional airport located on the northwestern portion of Centre Island, one of the Toronto Islands. Its IATA Airport Code is YTZ and ICAO code CYTZ.

Related Topics:
Toronto, Ontario - Airport - Toronto Islands - IATA Airport Code

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Opened in 1939 as the Port George VI Airfield, it became generally known as the Island Airport. At opening it was intended to be Toronto's principal airport; a secondary airport was built in Malton, ON (now part of Mississauga) for use in case of inclement weather. However, these roles quickly became reversed, and the Malton Airport became the main airport, a role in which it continues today as Toronto Pearson International Airport. In 1994, the name was officially changed to Toronto City Centre Airport.

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The original 1939 wooden frame terminal building is still present and used although not as a commercial passenger terminal. The only major change to the structure was a change to sloping glass in the control tower to facilitate night operations.

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The airport is owned by the Toronto Port Authority. The operation of the TCCA is subject to a Tripartite Agreement, created in 1983 at the request of the City of Toronto, among the then Toronto Harbour Commissioners (now the Toronto Port Authority), the Government of Canada and the City of Toronto. The 1983 Agreement makes provisions for a restricted list of aircraft allowed to use the airport due to noise levels, prohibitions on jet traffic except for MEDEVAC flights and prohibition against the construction of a fixed link between Toronto Island and the mainland.

Related Topics:
Toronto Port Authority

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The TCCA is used primarily for medical emergency flights (due to its proximity to downtown hospitals), commuter airlines (at this point only Air Canada Jazz flights to Ottawa), small charter flights, private aircraft, and flight training. There is a floatplane base adjacent to the main airport. Currently, some 120,000 flights land and take off from the airport each year, down from a historic high of 240,000 in the mid-1960s. About 80,000 passengers use the airport annually down from a peak of 400,000 in the 1980s when the City Express commuter airline was based at the airport.

Related Topics:
Air Canada Jazz - Ottawa

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The airport is served by a ferry from the foot of Bathurst Street (at 121 metres, it is reputedly the world's shortest regularly-scheduled ferry route). Access to the airport from the rest of the Islands is restricted. There was a plan to link the island to the mainland by a new bridge, and it almost happened, with contractors showing up at the Foot of Bathurst St on the first day of planned construction work. A mix up at City Hall was to blame, with confusion about what had been signed when and by whom. A hurriedly arranged court order stopped any further bridge building.

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Since the late 1990s there has been great debate over the future of the airport, which has required constant financial assistance from the federal government. The Toronto Port Authority has called for either expansion of the airport to accommodate up to 900,000 passengers annually, or its closure. Expansion plans include the increased use of turboprop planes and the construction of a new terminal building, as well as a 22-million dollar lift bridge to connect to the mainland. It is noteworthy that "expansion" is a misleading term, because none of the plans include enlarging airport runways or property. Some people have speculated about the possible introduction of regional jets to serve destinations such as New York City, Chicago, Detroit and Washington DC but there has been no serious proposal for this and the legal changes to the tripartate agreement governing the airport would have to be made and runways would have to be extended to support regional jets.

Related Topics:
Turboprop - New York City - Chicago - Detroit - Washington DC

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The main proposal for increasing traffic at the TCCA was a new airline to be started by Robert Deluce which would use Bombardier Aerospace Q400 turboprop airplanes to provide service to several destinations. Mr. Deluce's proposal was tied to the construction of a fixed link to the airport.

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Local activists, among them the lobby group Community AIR (Airport Impact Review), oppose the expansion on the grounds of increased air and noise pollution, as well as safety concerns. They claim that the increase in traffic will hamper recent government initiatives to rejuvenate the Toronto waterfront; proponents point to the expansion as a financial boost for the city's downtown.

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In 2002 Toronto City Council amended the tripartite agreement to permit a fixed link and approved the contstruction of a lift bridge.

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In November 2003, David Miller was elected mayor of Toronto. One of his major election platforms was a halt of construction of a bridge to the TCCA and expansion of the airport and that this would cost the city "no more than $2 postage". This has been done, the bridge project is cancelled. The city was sued for breach of contract and eventually settled with the TPA (who itself in turn settled with Robert Deluce and two other parties) in May 2005 for $35 million dollars.

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