Jet proposal for island airport draws hostile crowd at environmental assessment meeting

The Toronto Port Authority faced a largely hostile crowd on Tuesday night in a public meeting about an environmental assessment of Porter Airline’s proposal to extend the runway and allow jets to fly in and out of the city’s island airport.

Nearly 500 people attended the meeting at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. While the meeting was ostensibly held to explain the environmental assessment process mandated by the City of Toronto, attendees were quick to raise concerns with the proposal itself.

In April 2013, Porter announced that it wanted to amend the 1983 tripartite agreement between the City of Toronto, the federal Minister of Transportation and the Toronto Port Authority (TPA) that governs the Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport. That agreement prohibits runway extensions and the use of most jet aircraft at the facility.

Porter would like to add Bombardier’s new CSeries jets to its fleet of turboprop planes in order to extend its reach on the continent. To do so, it would have to extend the airport’s existing runway by approximately 400 metres. The TPA oversees the airport.

After brief presentations about the assessment process, the floor at the convention centre was turned over to attendees so that they could ask questions and highlight areas that the assessment should cover. Their contributions varied from the enjoyment of public spaces along the water, the potential pollution jets would cause, the potential dangers caused by transporting jet fuel in the city, to the collisions between aircraft and migratory birds.

Several people complained about the technical language being employed in the presentations. The third-party firm that facilitated the meeting ensured attendees that this would change at the next meeting in January.

TPA and airport executive vice-president Gene Cabral dismissed accusations that the TPA is already firmly in favour of Porter’s proposals.

“We think there’s a lot of false information out there that needs to be rectified,” he said outside of the packed meeting, adding, “no, we have not made a determination on this.”

City Councillor Pam McConnell was in attendance. She expressed concern that the TPA is going ahead with an environmental assessment without addressing city council’s conditions that the TPA impose caps on airport traffic.

“The TPA is really distancing themselves from Porter,” she added. “But we wouldn’t be in this discussion if it wasn’t for Porter.”

Liberal MP Adam Vaughan was also at the event.

“The port authority is trying to rally the troops, but what they’ve really done is inflame the opposition,” he said. Vaughan was concerned with a newly unveiled wall that would span the city side of the airport.

“You’re not going to be able to see the Toronto Islands from Queens Quay anymore. That’s the proposal. And without that they can’t make the airport quiet enough to operate.”

Newly elected City Councillor Joe Cressy also voiced his concerns.

“The waterfront is the front yard for our city,” he said. “And that is not compatible with jets or island airport expansion.”