Transport Committee on Dec. 6th, 2018

[Gagan Sikand, Liberal, Mississauga—Streetsville, ON]

Thank you very much.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Monsieur Aubin.

[Robert Aubin, NDP, Trois-Rivières, QC]

Thank you, Madam Chair.

My thanks to the witnesses for joining us.

Madam Chair, before I ask questions, I would like to make a comment for your consideration.

In his opening remarks, the witness referred to four documents he had submitted. However, I have learned that those documents are currently being translated. Because of their volume, they are not available in French.

When we plan our list of witnesses, we should ensure that witnesses only appear once the documents are distributed to everyone in both languages. If I had had all the documents in French, my preparation and my questions would have been significantly different. I probably would have found the answers to my questions in the documents and could have probed further. However, that's impossible.

Could we ensure that we receive the documents in both official languages before hearing the witnesses in committee? It would be much appreciated. I leave that for your consideration, Madam Chair.

I will now turn to you, Mr. Boud. You have already answered one of my questions in your opening remarks. You said that it seemed difficult to apply the conclusions of Helios' report for Toronto Pearson International Airport to each of the airports. There must still be some features that apply to all the airports you have studied.

Would it be fair to say that there can be two types of recommendations: recommendations for all the airports that are experiencing the same problem related to the surrounding communities and recommendations specific to each of the airports?

[Nick Boud]

There is certainly a common thread through the solutions that are out there. We do not have to reinvent solutions with every airport we go to, but just because a solution is right at one airport, it may not be immediately transferable to another airport. That is, flight routings into Vancouver have the option of coming in over the water, but that is not a solution that is available to Toronto Pearson. Yes, you can look at flight routings and try to make use of industrial corridors or rural areas, but it is not immediately transferable.

Keeping aircraft higher certainly is something that is probably achievable at a lot of airports, and it reduces noise, but again, you have to look at the local environment to see what obstacles are there, be they man-made obstacles or mountainous terrain, before you can conclude whether that solution is applicable in that area.

The distribution of residential communities around the airport again has an impact on what solution is right. If you look at the best practices report or the Toronto independent airspace review, when they're translated—and I appreciate one of them is a sizable document to translate—you will find that there is a common thread through there and you will be able to find elements that could be taken and considered for other airports, but bespoking them is still required.

[Robert Aubin, NDP, Trois-Rivières, QC]

You have worked internationally on these issues. Do you think the committee could target one, two or three airports that could be leaders in noise reduction? Among the top airports, would there be a Canadian airport? When it comes to noise reduction, are Canadian airports at the back of the pack?

[Nick Boud]

I don't believe there's one or a small number that you should look at. Hence, when we undertook the best practices piece of work for the GTAA, we looked at 26 international airports, because it is from taking that broad view that you start to get the multiplicity of the flavours of solutions that are out there.

Schiphol in Amsterdam has made a huge effort to minimize noise in communities and swaps runways so many times a day that it becomes boggling for other airports to consider, yet they do not have a night ban. They have more night flights than Toronto Pearson. It really does need a look across a broad number of airports to pick up the different best practices that can then be applied.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Monsieur Aubin, we're short on time.

[Robert Aubin, NDP, Trois-Rivières, QC]

I'll be brief. Is the international standard of 55 decibels achieved by a number of airports?

[Nick Boud]

Fifty-five is the standard that the European Union asks airports to report against. It is not a mandated standard that has to be achieved. It is a benchmark to measure the population affected, but it is not something that has to be achieved.

[The Chair, Liberal, Judy Sgro]

Thank you very much. We'll move on to Mr. Maloney.

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

Mr. Boud, thank you for joining us today. You and I have met on several occasions. You know I represent a riding, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, that is very much affected by air traffic noise and volume at Pearson Airport, so it's an issue close to my constituents' hearts.

You've been commissioned previously to do a study for both NavCan and the GTAA, and in the course of doing those studies, you reviewed what's referred to as ideas five and six, which very generally, from a high level—no pun intended—dealt with the direction of traffic on a regular basis. My constituents were concerned about redirecting traffic flow from east-west to north-south and the conclusion from your studies and the decision reached by the GTAA was that they weren't going to increase the north-south air traffic.

I have that right so far, haven't I?

[Nick Boud]

In general.... We looked at weekends and night flights.

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

Weekends and night flights, that's correct.

From a very basic level, and I know this because my brother's a pilot with Air Canada, it's safer for planes to land and take off going into the wind. Is that correct?

[Nick Boud]

Yes, as a basic rule.

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

As a basic rule, and the winds tend to go east-west, so that's a big reason why that happened.

I want to move on to night flights. A formula is used at Pearson in how many flights are allowed to come in and out of Pearson, and I believe the formula is based on an annual basis, as opposed to a per night basis. As a result of that, on any given night, depending on winds and other things, there could be a much higher volume of night flight traffic coming in. Isn't that correct?

[Nick Boud]

That's correct.

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

The night flights are also governed by the rules that apply to runway usage and whatnot.

[Nick Boud]

Yes, there are preferential runways.

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

You talked about the commercial aspect of night flights and the fact that most of it is arising because of passengers. Is it realistic, in your view, to ban night flights altogether at Pearson airport, factoring in the surrounding area and the available alternatives?

[Nick Boud]

Anything is possible, but there would be a significant economic impact because of it.

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

You said one size does not fit all. For example, if you're talking about European airports, if you ban night flights in one large centre, you probably have another large airport two hours away, give or take, that you can divert some of that traffic to. Is that a fair comment?

[Nick Boud]

Certainly in Germany, traffic is relocated from Frankfurt to Cologne and aircraft have been relocated because the aircraft doesn't just do the one flight. Overall, that has had an impact on Frankfurt's business.

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

Which takes me to my third point. Your options are limited in Toronto because you don't have other large airports nearby available to you. You said communities tend to grow up around airports, and that's exactly what's happened around Pearson, because when Pearson was put there, Mississauga and Brampton weren't anywhere near the size they are now, and they've developed those cities close to the airport, which has partially contributed to the problem.

I was in Edmonton this summer, and I was impressed by the fact that they had a very positive relationship with the surrounding communities and business community, and it's because they don't have that build up around the airport. We have the Pickering lands, which were secured many years ago, and there's a lot of space around that.

Wouldn't it be sensible to put an airport there, given the opportunity to develop a situation where you don't have that problem?

[Nick Boud]

Building a new airport and moving the whole of the business is a significant undertaking. It has been done by some cities. It is not just the airport you need to consider relocating, generally a huge amount of other infrastructure is required, and the development tends to grow towards that airport, but it is not impossible to do.

[James Maloney, Liberal, Etobicoke—Lakeshore, ON]

I have one quick follow-up. You don't have to move the whole of business. You're creating a second office. You're not shutting one down and moving it to another place. You're creating an alternative.