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Having taken multiple sound recordings of both the Pearson Airport environs and Toronto City Centre Airport operations, I can tell you that the level of traffic contemplated by Porter Airlines, using the equipment ordered by Porter Airlines, will almost certainly not have a perceptibly harmful effect on the waterfront. That explains the Mayor’s resort to fervid rhetoric about a single flight path making an area “industrial”. Aside from the question of how “industry” (a synonym of “work”) got turned into a curse, what the Mayor’s rhetoric doesn’t say tells us a lot. He does not say we will hear the planes, because the harbour-front LRT (the streetcar) actually makes a lot more noise than they ever will. He does not say we will smell the planes, because they will pollute far less than other sources in the area, particularly the Gardiner. Thus, the Mayor tells us that the mere existence of flight paths, however clean or quiet the aircraft, render an area “industrial” and thus somehow contaminated or even cursed.
In fact, for every passenger who leaves from the Island rather than from Pearson, both noise levels and pollution levels will go down. Believe it or not, if Porter Airlines succeeds, it will have the tangible and measurable effect of making the Toronto area cleaner and quieter.
If Porter succeeds, it will also provide an intangible benefit: environmental justice, the fair sharing of environmental burdens. Airplanes use Pearson International Airport. Those planes produce noise and pollution. In fact, they produce far more noise events perceptible in residential areas (despite an often-repeated claim, Pearson International Airport does not have an “industrial” buffer around it; it directly abuts at least one residential neighbourhood, namely Malton). Like it or not, members of Toronto’s harbour-front and artistic communities benefit as much as anyone (if not more than most) from the prosperity generated by our highly mobile society. They have a responsibility to accept some of the environmental consequences of that prosperity. That doesn’t necessarily mean putting up with an airport: it could mean offering compensation, or working on alternative modes of transportation.
But over the past five years, if the publicly acknowledged representatives of the waterfront communities have attempted any of these things, the media have not reported anything about it. If representatives of harbour-front have approached the communities around Pearson most affected by our transportation system in order to offer compensation, they have kept it a secret. If waterfront activists have raised investment money from their communities to study alternatives to aviation, such as high speed rail, they seem not to have told anyone. In effect, only Bob Deluce and his investors have come up with any plan which would provide a respite to the communities around Pearson. The effective demand from the harbour-front neighbourhoods seems, by default, to have degenerated to a demand that communities such as Rexdale and Malton (and possibly Pickering, if that airport goes ahead) absorb the noise and pollution produced by our air transportation needs, while the waterfront dwellers enjoy “excellence” paid for by federal taxpayers.
The demand for that kind of “excellence”, unfortunately involves a demand for a manifest injustice, and however painful it may feel to some people, the visible thwarting of that kind of demand actually has a benefit to the whole community. It reminds us, however imperfectly, the regardless of our gifts, or our wealth, or our influence, we all belong to the same society and we all have an obligation to share it problems and their solutions.
Posted by
John G. Spragge on 09/01 at 02:48 AM
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I am impressed by Mr. Spragge’s comment. I am forced to agree with him that if all of Toronto is to benefit from our waterfront, instead of a select few supporters of David Miller, then the Ryan Air initiative is a good thing.
Who even noticed any “noise pollution” when City Express was in business? No one, except maybe a few of the millionaire squatters with their “99-year leases” on Toronto Islands’ otherwise public land. What environmental damage was caused by City Express planes? None. And the City Express fleet were creaky DeHaviland Dash-7s and Dash-8s, not the vastly quieter and cleaner Bombardier planes that Ryan Air will be using.
And speaking of the environmental impact, how on earth is it cleaner to have diesel ferries chugging back and forth repeatedly than to have a (paid-for!) bridge to the Island Airport?
It seems that our vocal envirnmentalists can’t get past “thinking locally”, and that renders them nothing more than self-interested astroturf NIMBYs.
Posted by on 09/01 at 10:25 AM
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What perverse world does John Spragge live in where his idea of “environmental justice” is not to reduce pollution but spread it around so everyone gets their share. Brilliant thinking. By that rational we should all dig a landfill in our back yards so our kids can get the benefit of the toxic sludge dumps produce—oh, let’s not forget the vermin too. I think Spragge escaped from some pre-Dickons version of London in the early 19th century.
Has he really thought about the real impact of the island airport or is he so much of a paid lobbyist that his ethical values and his conclusions are easily bought by anyone with cash?
The truth is, when Porter rolls out its service it will be in addition to the flights now departing from Pearson. They won’t stop, at least not in the near to mid term. By anyone’s reconning – anyone with sense that is – that means more fuel burnt, not less. It’s the good old competition argument at its finest, so let’s burn up the fuel, polute the harbour and let about 300 or so people make their meetings in Ottawa and New York with a bit less inconvenience for them but a hell of a lot more for the residents of downtown TO.
Who needs tourists anyway. Hey, your plan is working John, tourism is dropping in TO. But in your world view we don’t need tourism dollars. We can start getting kids working in factories at ten years old. That will help boost the local economy.
Who needs clean air and clean water and a relatively quiet harbourfront? Lefties that’s who! They just can’t take noise and pollution like us good old boys can. Move ‘em all out to Milton. They’d learn a thing or two by gum.
You’re doing a great job Spraggy! Keep spreading the propoganda.
Posted by on 09/01 at 03:45 PM
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...his idea of 'environmental justice' is not to reduce pollution...
Needless to say, this completely misrepresents my position. Any effort at environmental justice makes reducing pollution its first priority. And Porter airlines, by replacing jet flights over homes and schools with turbo-prop flights over the water, will reduce both the impact and the amount of pollution in the GTA. In any case the plan by the Mayor for a world's fair, causing a massive increase in aviation and it attendant pollution, makes any talk by his supporters of “reducing pollution laughable. TEDCO estimates that the proposed Toronto World's Fair would bring at least seven million visitors to Toronto by air; that works out to one additional aircraft movement every two minutes during the months the fair will operate. The choice does not lie between reducing pollution or sharing it fairly; it lies between reducing pollution and sharing it fairly, or not sharing pollution and expanding it. And why should that surprise us? If a wealthy, influential, and well-connected segment of the community gets a free ride on pollution issues, would you not expect the pollution dumped on the poor and the powerless to increase?Has he really thought about the real impact of the island airport...
I've thought about it (from all angles), researched it, and documented it....or is he so much of a paid lobbyist that his ethical values and his conclusions are easily bought by anyone with cash?
I have never worked professionally as a lobbyist of any kind. I do all my political work (and I do a lot of it) out of ethical concerns. This year, I've spent two months working full-time on issues of environmental justice and land rights. The ignorant ad hominem above to the the contrary, I've come to my conclusions because I have looked at the effect of Pearson on the surrounding communities. But even if I fit the corporate lobbyist caricature “Martin” obviously wishes I did, it wouldn't change the truth: if Porter succeeds, it will also succeed at reducing pollution and it will contribute to environmental justice.The truth is, when Porter rolls out its service it will be in addition to the flights now departing from Pearson. They won’t stop, at least not in the near to mid term.
At today's fuel prices, nobody can afford to fly empty planes. If Porter succeeds, a corresponding number of flights from Pearson will stop. Air traffic has its problems; these problems do not include a lack of flexibility.Who needs clean air and clean water...
Everyone, including the 58,000 people who live in Malton, directly downwind from Pearson....and a relatively quiet harbourfront?
The Porter Q-400s won't make the waterfront measurably noisier. Recording equipment pointed directly at the older, noisier Dash-8 aircraft used by Jazz barely registers them over the noise of the Gardiner. The Queen's Quay streetcar makes about twice as much noise as the planes taking off from City Centre Airport.
Posted by
John Spragge on {comment_date format=’%m/%d’} at {comment_date format=’%h:%i %A’}
Posted by
John Spragge on 09/01 at 05:04 PM
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“John” denies the lobbyist reference but time and time again I’ve found that if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck it probably is a duck unless, of course, it is some kind of weird, genetically altered fish species suffering DNA mutation from the chemical soup created by all that burned jet fuel spewing down on Toronto’s waterfront.
Your worry about the people who chose to live near Canada’s biggest airport is enough to bring a tear to a glass eye “John.” Let’s face it, your tactic is to convince voters at the edge of the GTA that the lefties are increasing THEIR exposure to pollution. Damn tree-huggers should burn in hell choosing to live downtown away from the jets that have been there for …, how long “John?”. Gee, I wonder why you’d do that? Oh, I know, the Tories need some more votes out there if they want to get enough seats for a majority. Divide and conquer, right?
BTW, I’ve been to your pro island airport web site. You call that objective?
Heck of a job Brown, er, Spraggie.
Posted by on 09/01 at 05:41 PM
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As interesting as this back and forth is no one has addressed one of the editor’s main points … the fact that as a society we continue to rely on antiquated, simplistic tools when analysing the “cost benefit” of a given situation.
Posted by on 09/01 at 06:41 PM
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John do you know anything at all about running an airline? I thought not. When do airlines do their maintenance? That’s right, at night. When do people sleep? Same time. The relatively quiet Q-400 can take off and land during the day for all I care but after 9:00 PM if they do engine tests the noise will far exceed that generated by an almost empty Gardiner Expressway. That is the difference between Malton and the harbour. Check all the facts John not just the ones that support your argument.
Posted by on 09/02 at 08:05 AM
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To take these points in order:
“Martin”: Leaving aside your emotional ad hominem (do you really think that spelling my last name with an “i” makes the slightest difference to anything?), I continually find the contempt with which people who call themselves “left” view the communities of hard working people who live around Pearson astounding. As a leftist (a real one, not just someone who pins the “politically correct” buttons to my organic fibre book bag) I make no apologies for taking an interest in the fate of 8000 children of colour (children, of course, do not choose where they live) in Malton. I certainly don’t regret expressing my disgust at those people who would dump pollution on them while denying their existence.
Ms. Buckley: It seems to me that the claim that we rely on simplistic tools for analysing a given situation assumes that we know what factors went into the decision to allow the revitalisation of Toronto City Centre Airport. That, in turn, depends on the real-life factors. The argument that the supporters Toronto City Centre Airport and Porter airlines ignore “intangibles” such as quality of life in the downtown waterfront area assumes that no other “intangibles” affect the decision. If you believe other “intangible” factors matter, such as quality of life in Rexdale and Malton, or environmental justice, then the decision itself makes sense, and the tools used to analyse it look much less “antiquated”.
Mr. Wilson: I don’t know what maintenance schedule Porter Airlines has in mind, since I have no connection with them. However, I have to wonder exactly what “difference” you claim exists between Malton and the harbour. Do you claim that Air Canada doesn’t maintain their aircraft, but that Porter will? Or do you claim that the residents of Rexdale and Malton don’t sleep at night?
Posted by
John Spragge on 09/02 at 12:38 PM
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John, if your arguments weren’t so trasparently biased I might actually take you seriously. The fact is you know that the island airport is not a good fit for Toronto’s plans for a revived harbourfront in a 21st Century economy.
That you choose to argue for it makes you, in the minds of many, a mouthpiece for forces who want to muddy the politcal waters. That’s why I call you Spraggy. You are like that politcal hack “Brownie” who let New Orleans sink below the waves and then tried to say how great everything was.
What Toronto needs is a strong urban transportation system that can get people to and from Pearson quickly, efficiently, with minimal environmental impact and at relatively low cost. Many schemes are out there that propose this solution but people like you insist on denying their viability for your own miserable ends.
That you do this with a straight face makes me fear for the future of this city.
Posted by on 09/05 at 10:12 AM
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This issue has nothing to do with me or my character, and everything to do with the 8000 children of colour in Malton. Unless the 21st-century economy you speak of carries forward the nineteenth century habit of quietly dumping all the burdens on poor people and people of colour, proponents of the project to “centralise” air transport at Pearson must address the effects on the communities around Pearson. They have had almost three years, since the cancellation of the bridge to Toronto City Centre Airport, to do so. So far, the waterfront development promoters have offered nothing except a plan for a world’s fair which will bring a huge noise and pollution spike to the area around Pearson.
If the people in favour of this “revived Harbourfront” can accomplish their goals honestly and justly, in a manner that respects the people living around Pearson, then let them do so. If they cannot, if they have to resort to claims that Pearson has a “larger buffer zone”, when in fact, Pearson has no buffer zone at all, then I will continue to insist that a policy base on injustice and distortions has no future.
If you want to address the facts of this issue, rather than complain about my supposed biases, then please go ahead. If you want to justify the proposal to build a “clean waterfront” on the basis of a very dirty injustice, you’ll have to come up with an actual argument; slurs aimed at my character won’t keep Deluce from taking off, and they won’t make him any less right to do so.
Posted by
John G. Spragge on 09/05 at 03:27 PM
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John, if your agenda is to save those poor kids in Malton why don’t you boycott or otherwise protest the gtaa? Why waste your breath downhere on the lefty waterfront? Seems like your are awefully conflicted John. Go get Pearson and get them to reduce flights, emissions and improve transit links to reduce auto exhaust. Do all the things that are important for helping those kids, don’t go promoting harm for kids somewhere else. That’s sick! Unless, of course, saving kids has nothing to do with your agenda.
Posted by on 09/05 at 06:17 PM
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If Porter Airlines is going to make it financially, then we’re looking at upwards of 800,000 passengers annually, twice where hapless City Express peaked out in 80’s, and failed financially. If that’s achieved, then it’s fair to say the island airport will be solidly entrenched, with the prospect of commercial jets pretty well a certainty, regardless of the mouthed assurances to the contrary. The same arguments will be trotted out about the “quiet”-ness and “Canadian-made”-ness of this “new advanced technology”. The prospect too of take-offs and landings every five to ten minutes during morning and evening peak times is as real as it is currently at the busy London City Centre airport which is touted by the Toronto Board of Trade as being a model for the island airport. And in other large cities that have sacrificed their waterfronts to busy jet airports, there was a point of no return which most regret having missed. San Diego comes to mind, where most citizens now regret having it allowed to happen, but can’t afford to reverse it.
Posted by on 09/06 at 08:22 AM
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Well! Finally we have a reasoned and informed argument from Mr. Townsend, unlike the shrill, irrational attacks from “Martin” and “Wilson” (who I suspect may be the same person).
Mr. Townsend, can you elaborate on why you feel the Toronto City Centre Airport, even at you ambitious estimate of 2,000 passengers a day, cannot coexist with a vibrant, active waterfront that both tourists and Torontoniona can enjoy? This doesn’t seem to me to be an either-or choice.
In fact, what WILL be prevented by the airport is the future zoning for more 50+ story condo towers that will permanently wall away the waterfront from the city. Where’s the outrage about this?
Posted by on 09/06 at 09:33 AM
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By running North America’s most expensive airport, the GTAA already does quite enough to ensure that the residents of Toronto do not over-use aviation. However, the 21st century economy you speak of requires the free movement of people and ideas. Our prosperity, and thus ultimately the transformation of the waterfront its promoters envision, depends on air transport.
That just brings us back to the same question: do we minimise the resulting pollution and share it fairly? Right now, Bob Deluce has the only plan on the table to do both. His operations will prove barely perceptible, literally: you can see the Q-400 at the distances it will operate from the shore, and not hear it over normal conversation. If he succeeds, the communities around Pearson may well enjoy a reduction in their noise spikes of up to five or ten percent. The improvement that a successful development of Porter Airlines may bring will come at little or no environmental cost to the waterfront community.
The opponents of Toronto City Centre Airport have had three years to come up with an alternative plan, and they have offered nothing. No high-speed rail (except to Pearson, in a plan which will gut the Weston neighbourhood), no comprehensive study of transportation needs in the GTA, in fact no alternative form of transportation at all. Far from working to reduce traffic, they have proposed a world’s fair, which will ramp up air traffic by a minimum (according to TEDCO estimates) of seven million visitors.
Accepting the Deluce proposal will not harm the people on the waterfront; it simply means accepting the only effective proposal now on the table to accomplish an overall reduction of aviation pollution in the Toronto area.
Posted by
John G. Spragge on 09/06 at 11:05 AM
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Mr Townsend:
Your description of the tripartate agreement’s prohibition against jets (other than for medical flights) as “mouthed assurances” seriously misrepresents the situation. The tripartate agreement sets out the operating conditions for Toronto City Centre Airport, and the courts will enforce them.
Even if the tripartate agreement did not protect the city, no passenger jet now in production will fit on the current TCCA runway. Anyone wishing to bring in passenger jet service using even the relatively small CRJ-200 would have to bring in close to half a million tons of fill to lengthen the main runway.
The idea that the current Deluce proposal represents some kind of “tipping point” on the way to a major jetport on the waterfront simply defies logic. Acting on it would mean giving up on environmental justice, and a chance to reduce pollution right now, out of fear of future developments from which both settled law and solid engineering constraints protect us.
Posted by
John Spragge on 09/06 at 11:44 AM
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RE: “Mr. Townsend, can you elaborate on why you feel the Toronto City Centre Airport … blah blah”
I would willingly oblige if I could understand what you’re talking about. First off, the “estimate of 2000 passengers a day” you attribute to me isn’t mine, ambitious or no. And secondly, I didn’t say I “feel” anything about anything. I simply stated fact about what is.
If Torontonians want a busy jetport on their waterfront, then they could well be on their way to having it, permanently. It’s not something new … other cities, such as San Diego, have it for all to see and experience for themselves. Hell, who am I to judge? Torontonians may well like it. San Diegans don’t by and large.
Posted by on 09/06 at 04:24 PM
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RE: ?The tripartate (sp) agreement sets out the operating conditions for Toronto City Centre Airport, and the courts will enforce them?.
Is that so! Where were the courts when the Toronto Port Authority ran rough shod over the tripartite agreement prohibition of a fixed link to the island airport in their bid to do just that by building a bridge? It took a mayoralty election to stop them dead in their tracks, not ?the courts?. And it cost a pretty penny too. Torontonians ended up with the improbably bizarre situation of a massive payoff of $35 million of public funds (with no apparent justification) to cancel the bridge before it was built.
Doubtless the totally unaccountable Port Authority will thumb their nose at the tripartite agreement again when the inevitable push for jets and an extended runways materializes.
Posted by on 09/06 at 04:41 PM
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The Toronto Port Authority did not run “rough shod” over anything. They proposed to city council, and got, a change to the tripartite agreement allowing them to build the bridge. When, after David Miller’s election, the city council reversed itself, the Toronto Port Authority abd the federal government accepted that decision, even though they had no strictly legal obligation to do so.
The history of that episode makes it absolutely clear that the voters of Toronto can prevent any change to the airport, however minor and reasonable. If anything, it makes nonsense out of your expressed fear that the Toronto Port Authority might somehow get permission to extend the runways 1800 feet into the harbour. If they can’t get permission to build a bridge which would have enhanced safety for the airport and the medical flights which use it, how can you believe they could get permission to dump half a million tons of fill into the lake? And if the Toronto Port Authority did get permission from City Council, Transport Canada, Environment Canada, and possibly several other agencies, to extend the runways where would the billions of dollars needed to do it come from?
Anyone trying to build Toronto City Centre Airport into a jetport would face effectively insurmountable legal and practical obstacles, which probably explains why nobody advocates doing it. Indeed, even the notion of Toronto City Centre Airport as a jetport hardly exists outside the fears raised by “Community Air” and allied groups.
On the other hand, the Rouge River Valley and some of the last decent farmland does face a non-imaginary threat. The GTAA has plans, right now, to build a jet-port in the old Pickering Airport site. Destroying Toronto City Centre Airport would provide added impetus to build Pickering, and nobody hold a veto on jets there. 8000 children of colour in Malton face very real, very present noise and pollution. It seems absurd to me to ignore the real problems with aviation pollution in favour of exaggerated fears of what might, in an extremely unlikely situation, come to pass.
Posted by
John G. Spragge on 09/06 at 07:09 PM
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By the way, Mr. Townsend: have you any references to back up your claim that the residents of San Diego do not, “by and large”, like having a jet airport on their waterfront? I certainly don’t advocate expanding Toronto City Centre Airport; but I can’t find any references on the web to any poll of people in San Diego about their airport, and I prefer to have references for statements about what people want.
Posted by
John G. Spragge on 09/06 at 07:13 PM
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RE: “The Toronto Port Authority did not run ‘rough shod’ over anything … blah blah”
Suffice it to say that the TPA, ever the innovator in dirty politics, maneuvered a devious mayor Lastman to browbeat a weak-kneed city council to remove a key plank of the tri-partite agreement restricting a fixed-link to the island airport. Choose your poison. I’d say ‘riding rough shod’ is an apt way of putting it. This kind of TPA shenanigan springs from an arrogant intolerant attitude towards anything that gets in its way, evidenced by the recent brazen launching of a totally unwarranted $6.8-million lawsuit against the civic gadflies who have dared to criticize its efforts to reindustrialize the Toronto waterfront. This action is par for the course for this unbridled and unaccountable public agency.
Let’s not fool ourselves. The TPA will not hesitate to maneuver again to achieve its own ends regardless of any agreement, including as circumstances favour it, opening the way for jets and extended runways at the island airport.
Posted by on 09/06 at 09:07 PM
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None of your adjectives change the reality: that the Toronto Port Authority, wishing to improve the safety and value of a public asset they manage, approached the Toronto City Council and requested a change in the tripartite agreement. When the Toronto City Council agreed, then changed its mind, the Toronto Port Authority abided by the city’s decision, and the federal government picked up the tab. I’d say that indicates, as clearly as anything can, that the people of Toronto can say no to anyone who suggests extending the runways, assuming anyone ever does.
Meanwhile, while exaggerating the infitessimal chance than anyone may ever even suggest extending the runways, or that someone will put up the money to do it, or that some city council may give them permission, you ignore the real and existing issues. The GTAA wants to build an airport in Pickering, and they can do it. Eight thousand children of colour in Malton live directly downwind from Pearson, with regular noise spikes from jet takeoffs and landings.
Those two concerns exist as present facts, not as imaginary nightmares. Speaking of facts, you you have a reference for you claim about the feelings of the people of San Diego?
Posted by
John G. Spragge on 09/06 at 09:48 PM
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RE: “I can’t find any references on the web to any poll of people in San Diego about their airport, and I prefer to have references for statements about what people want.”
You sure haven’t been looking very hard. The San Diego waterfront airport has been the subject of heated public debate and study for years. A past mayor even wrote and published a book on the subject.
Posted by on 09/07 at 06:10 AM
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RE: “None of your adjectives change the reality … blah blah”.
Your sugar-coated views of the TPA are hardly a surrogate for “reality”. And sure the TPA “abided by the city’s decision’, kicking and screaming all the way! They brazenly displayed a blatant disregard of municipal process by deliberately accelerating start-up construction activities for the bridge during the last mayoralty election, after it was clear public sentiment was strongly against it. Then they had the unmitigated gall to demand public funds compensation for dismantling costs! This loose cannon of a government agency even has the impudent effrontery to use public funds for a media blitz in a vain attempt to justify its own existence! This “wishing to improve the safety and value of a public asset they manage, etc” is sheer nonsense. The TPA has no social conscience whatsoever. It’s rife with private interests out to make a quick buck at public cost.
Posted by on 09/07 at 06:13 AM
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John, don’t waste logic and fact on Spraggy. The best way to deal with people like him is to point out that their position is so blatantly ridiculous that only a moron would believe for a moment that it had any validity.
If you really want to help those 8,000 kids in Malton go after the GTAA. Where is your track record there?
Posted by on 09/07 at 07:46 AM
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re: 24
I have already answered this nonsense, so I’ll just point out, again, two things:
1) If you have to resort to crude, meaningless ad hominem, you don’t have an argument.
2) Neither the GTAA, nor for that matter the TPA, creates the demand for airports; they simply fill it. To “go after” the GTA (or for that matter the TPA) for doing their job does them a manifest injustice. As long as we choose the freedom and prosperity that air travel makes possible for us; as long as the policy makers we elect pursue goals, such as world’s fairs, that require air travel, then we, not the people who run the airports, have an obligation to behave justly.
Indeed, suggesting that I “go after” the GTAA simply compounds the hypocrisy inherent in the attacks on the Toronto Port Authority. When cornered, you refuse to address the ethical issue: the “twenty-first century economy” (and world’s fair Toronto’s mayor wants) require air travel; air travel produces pollution; we have an ethical obligation to minimise the pollution and share the burdens fairly. Instead, you pass the buck. Let me make this as clear as possible: I don’t go after the GTAA because they don’t promote the “twenty-first century economy” that requires air travel; you do. They don’t demand the advantages of an economy and society based on the freedom to travel, then decline to share the resulting pollution; you do.
Posted by
John Spragge on 09/07 at 03:01 PM
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“John,” I rest my case. You only worry about the 8,000 kids in Malton when it serves your transparent agenda on the waterfront. Does the depth of your hypocrisy have no limit?
Posted by on 09/07 at 03:32 PM
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John Townsend
Let’s not lose sight of the key issue here. TPA apologists like Spragge deliberately soft-pedal the prospect of jets at the island airport, invoking the Tri-partite Agreement as the reason it’s not possible. That the TPA has made a mockery of this agreement (i.e. the bridge ban reversal) doesn’t seem to penetrate. TPA has shown its true colours. It can’t be trusted as a custodian of public interest, a simple fact that Spragge et al just can’t seem to assimilate.
Posted by Larry Palmer on 09/07 at 03:46 PM
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Re the San Diego Airport issue: please post a link.
Posted by
John G. Spragge on 09/07 at 04:06 PM
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“Martin”: Calling me a hypocrite will not do a thing for the children of Malton (or anywhere else). Neither, for that matter, would it do anything for the children of Malton if I did decide to “go after” the GTAA. If Porter Airlines succeeds in redirecting passengers from Pearson to TCCA, the children of Malton will benefit.
Larry Palmer: the idea that that the TPA “made a mockery” of the tripartite agreement because they and the federal government abided by because Toronto City Council’s request doesn’t fail to penetrate; it just fails to pass the laugh test. Because the TPA abided by the agreement, that proves they won’t abide by it in the future?
As for the “public interest”, Mr. Palmer, the public interest does not consist only of the interests of people who live downtown. People who want the advantages of a “twenty-first century economy”, while someone else endures the resulting pollution, will find any authority which operates an airport near them an offence to their sense of entitlement. But the TPA does served the interests of kids in Toronto who need a new heart, they do serve the needs of people in the North who need to travel for medical treatment, and they do serve the interests of the children of Malton.
Posted by
John Spragge on 09/07 at 04:58 PM
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RE: “I rest my case… blah blah”.
What case? You have no case … just myths and distortions.
Posted by on 09/07 at 06:33 PM
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RE: “That the TPA has made a mockery of this agreement (i.e. the bridge ban reversal) doesn’t seem to penetrate”.
How prescient … the response you got confirms it. This Spragge character either has a reading or a comprehension problem … probably both.
Posted by on 09/07 at 06:41 PM
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Mr. Townsend:
re 30: Did you notice that you just told someone who agrees with you about Toronto City Centre Airport that he has “no case”? Do you have a serious analysis of how his opinion differs from yours, or did you just not read what the post said, or who wrote it, with any attention? If you do have a difference of opinion with “Martin” (the person who wrote that he rested his case), please explain it. And you did respond to a post without paying attention, given your habit of posting boilerplate arguments, how do we know you’ve given serious thought to anything you’ve posted here?
re 31: No matter how fervently you state your case, no matter how you insult those who disagree with you, you can’t make sense from nonsense. The TPA has abided by the tripartite agreement. They haven’t built a bridge, even though they obtained the consent of the city council to do so. After Toronto’s voters (a minority of Toronto voters) elected a mayor who pledged to cancel the bridge, the TPA killed the project. Bottom line: no bridge crosses the Western gap at Bathurst Street, because the TPS and the Federal government abided by the tripartite agreement.
I notice you still haven’t posted a link of any kind to coverage of the story of the San Diego airport.
Posted by
John G. Spragge on 09/08 at 03:09 AM
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RE: “Did you notice that you just told someone who agrees with you about Toronto City Centre Airport … blah blah?”
No I didn’t notice, because he didn’t say that. Can’t you read?
Posted by on 09/08 at 07:08 AM
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I find it funny that John Spragge says he has no connection with Porter or the Island Airport when he’s a pilot and earned his “wings” there.
You can read about this and some links I found about him on the comments to the post I’ve linked under my name.
Posted by
Joe (BikingToronto) on 09/08 at 09:01 AM
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It’s great to see partisans arguing past each other with great heat but little illumination. I love the internet.
Airports are noisy. Simple fact. I live in downtown Toronto and can’t leave the windows open at night because the helicopters buzz so low over the city – an open window picks up the noise like an old-fashioned ear trumpet, and aims it straight into my bedroom. A helicopter overhead is thunderously loud. So are airplanes of all sorts.
Also true is that a downtown airport will have some benefits. More interconnections are always valuable to a city, and the GTA is shortly going to find that Pearson is inadequate for its population. Do the benefits of the airport outweigh its very real cost? Are there other alternatives?
In San Diego, the US Marine Corps recruit training facility is directly under the airport flight path. Outdoors on that Marine base, all conversation would have to cease roughly once per minute for 15 seconds, every time a jet took off or landed. The noise pollution could only be described as “extreme”, which is why the land wasn’t desired or useful for anyone except the Marine Corps.
I’d hate to see that become true of the Toronto waterfront.
Posted by on 09/08 at 10:56 AM
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Anon:
Sorry for the air traffic noise levels you experience. A responsible realtor would have warned you about that before you purchased your home. And if the noise problem started after you moved in, you have even more reason to reconsider where you live.
Like everyone each of us, you’ll have to weigh the benefits of living downtown with the disadvantages. But don’t demand that the downtown environment change to suit you and your neighbours.
Toronto (and every other thriving urban community) goes to great lengths to attract non-residents and their dollars, without which there would be no city for us to live in and argue over.
I’d also hate to see Toronto City Centre become a jetport. But a fully functioning prop airpot and heliport is no more of an inconvenience than the CN Tower, and less so than the barricade of condo towers now going up across our waterfront.
Posted by Diane on 09/08 at 12:07 PM
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To answer some comments in order, by number:
33. The poster who signs their posts simply as “Martin” wrote, in post #9, that ”...the island airport is not a good fit for Toronto’s plans for a revived harbourfront in a 21st Century economy.” In other words, he has made it clear, over several posts, that he opposes Toronto City Centre Airport. In that, if nothing else, he has a clear position. That Explains why, when John Townsend, who also opposes Toronto City Centre Airport, told “Martin” he had no case, I found it puzzling. People who agree about a major issue can take issue over smaller things; but Mr. Townsend mentioned neither the larger opposition to Toronto City Centre Airport, which he shares with “Martin”, nor did he mention a specific disagreement. Which raises the question: has Mr. Townsend had enough respect for this forum, and its participants, to keep track of who believes what? Or did he breeze in here, post a boilerplate argument (he’s posted exactly the same thing about San Diego to a number of other web logs), spread around some abuse, and depart? His odd reactions, plus his failure to post any kind of link to back up his claims about San Diego, unfortunately suggests he hasn’t taken this discussion, or anyone in it, seriously.
34. Joe, you shouldn’t believe all the stuff journalists write. I have a pilot’s license, but I didn’t earn it (or do any flight training) at TCCA. I do not currently do any flying out of Toronto City Centre airport at all, and while I have friends at Toronto City Centre Airport, I have no professional relation with Porter Airlines that would enable me to know the maintenance schedule of Porter Airlines. In any case, it doesn’t matter. If Bob Deluce posted the things I have said, it wouldn’t make them any less true, and it wouldn’t make the effect of Porter Airlines any less beneficial. By the way, your link doesn’t work; you can link to the discussion you and I had here.
35. It bears repeating that the helicopters which “buzz low” over the city, particularly at night, almost all have patients or critical medical supplies aboard. The commercial (airline) flight paths out of TCCA do not go over the city; they turn south over the water. And having (digitally) recorded the sound levels at Pearson and TCCA, I can tell you that the turboprop aircraft on the waterfront do produce far less noise than the jets which fly over Malton and Rexdale.
Posted by
John G. Spragge on 09/08 at 03:19 PM
