WWW.WINGSMAGAZINE.COM March/April 2015 | WINGS 15T
he November announcement
of a memorandum of agree-
ment signed by Air Canada
and Air China to stimulate
growth in air traffic between
the two countries could mean Montreal
is a step closer to getting its long awaited
non-stop Montreal-Beijing route.
“We congratulate the two carriers for
signing this agreement and bringing us
one step closer to a direct flight between
Montreal and Beijing,” said Michel Leb-
lanc, President and CEO of the Board of
Trade of Metropolitan Montreal. “Having
this flight is a priority for the business
community, and today we are closer to
achieving our goal.”
The board of trade is also part of a wider
initiative to increase more direct flights
overall and ensure existing ones con-
tinue. This involves raising awareness in
the business community to help increase
passenger load factors on long-haul direct
flights from Montreal. It’s part of “I See
Mtl,” a project launched in November by
Montreal business leaders of 180 formal
commitments to revitalize the city. Join-
ing the board of trade are Aéroports de
Montréal (ADM), Tourisme Montréal and
Montreal International, whose mandate
is to attract foreign direct investments,
international organizations and interna-
tional strategic workers as well as pro-
moting the competitive and international
environment of Greater Montreal.
“Aéroports de Montréal is pleased with
the Montreal business community’s de-
sire to offer concrete support to our devel-
opment efforts in air service,” said James
Cherry, president and CEO of ADM. “Our
efforts have paid off in recent years, be-
cause Montreal-Trudeau is the Canadian
airport that has most improved its ser-
vice. Montreal-Trudeau offers 130 direct
destinations, including over 75 interna-
tional destinations, compared with 30 a
decade ago.”
Those figures were contained in a study
by KPMG-SECOR to evaluate Montreal’s
air service in comparison with other
North American cities and to identify po-
tential areas of development. Part of the
study looked at the number of people trav-
elling from Montreal to other cities via an
intermediary airport, because Montrealdid not have a direct flight to those cities.
“We knew about the number of people
travelling to places like Seattle, Denver
and Baltimore,” said Cherry. “But we were
surprised to learn that a lot of Montreal-
ers travel to San Diego.”
And San Diego was one of eight cities
that had the minimum required demand
to justify a daily frequency. But only three
had a sufficient level of demand through-
out the year to provide a minimum level of
profitability. Apart from San Diego, they
are San Jose and Beijing. Four others,
Rome, Barcelona, Lyon and Athens could
support seasonal service, while Beirut
could be profitable, but cannot currently
be served for national security reasons.
While Montreal is busy trying to at-
tract new flights, it is being blindsided by
Plattsburgh International Airport, which
is spending US$55 million to accommo-
date mostly Canadian travellers at what
Air Canada president Calin Rovinescu
has called, “Quebec’s fastest-growing
airport.” Not surprising as about 85 per
cent of Plattsburgh’s 150,000 passengers
last year were Canadians, overwhelm-
ingly Montrealers and part of an esti-
mated 4.5 million Canadians to fly out ofcross-border U.S. airports
a nnua lly.
Plattsburgh, just over an
hour away by car, expects to
double the 150,000 figure in
less than 10 years and most
coming from Quebec, ac-
cording to Garry Douglas,
president and CEO of the airport and of
the Plattsburgh North Country Chamber
of Commerce.
The facility bills itself as Montreal’s
U.S. airport and Douglas calls Platts-
burgh Montreal’s U.S. suburb. And a lot
of the signage at the airport is bilingual.
Surprisingly, Cherry isn’t losing any
sleep over Plattsburgh’s initiatives, claim-
ing they’re small potatoes. “We’ve had far
more growth of passengers travelling to
the U.S. from Montreal than from Platts-
burgh and Burlington (Vermont) com-
bined. It’s a zero sum game for us. Some
people living on the South Shore (closer
to the U.S. border) may use Plattsburgh
or Burlington, but very few people from
downtown or the West Island use those
airports.”
Burlington is actually a bigger threat
than Plattsburgh, because it has more
flights and airlines than Plattsburgh, in-
cluding Delta and JetBlue, but it’s a good
two-hour drive from Montreal, Cherry
pointed out. | W“The board of trade is part of a
wider initiative to increase more
direct flights overall and ensure
existing ones continue.”
| By Brian Dunn
Increasing its range
Making new connections will help grow Montreal’s business community
AT THE
GATE
Brian Dunn is a Wings writer and
columnist.