Let’s see if he can get those long awaited cargo jets to land.

There have been close to two dozen cargo jets that have landed here for tech stops and trial landings and take offs and 3 agreements in principal with 5 more agreements in place with other cargo carriers. Most were waiting for the tank farm to be done and some other services to be in place.

It has been slow in coming but it would be nice if you so called intelligent people actually did some research before opening your mouths to moan and bitch.

Dearth – thanks for telling it like it is. Progress doesn’t happen overnight. The airport expansion is a long term project with global implications in regard to growth in the PG economy. Anyway you look at, the PG Airport is good news story.

Les Waldie is a class act and is a doer. He like Jim Blake have very strong work ethics.

Thank you to Jim for his dedicated service and passion for the airport and the community.

Don’t know where dearth got the facts? There has been the antinov in here twice that other Russian vodka burner in here around the Olympics and the Asian air line that I’m sure the airport payed a lot of there fees to try to get them to come here. That’s it. Why has no one reported on these contracts that are in place and as long as the tank farm sits in pieces and not ready to sell fuel it’s going to be very difficult to convince these carriers to even look at the airport. I hope this business starts to happen but for right now this project is looking like the field of dreams.

Maybe I couldn’t find it on the PG Airport website, but I see nothing about 8 agreements in place.

I am sure all the critics saw the downturn of the economy, readjusted their portfolios and made millions and post on 250 from their exotic island domain.

Can Dearth back up his statements with facts??? I doubt it.

The Airport Manager is on record stating that the biggest block to airlines landing here is the NavCan charges. They have had meetings with the Feds, and NavCan, and NavCan has stated categorically that they will not be changing their fee structure.

As a matter of interest, the NavCan charges were in effect when the Airport Authority decided to build thE runway, and so they were fully aware of the costs.

To now state that the NavCan fee’s are a roadblock is just a way to weasel out of a bad situation.

Agreements in principle mean nothing.

Like the little old lady said in the hamburger shop. WHERE’S THE BEEF??

Who made this decision? Who is the airport board accountable to?

The decision for the Airport Expansion was made by the Board of Directors, and Management of the Airport Authority. They are accountable to the Federal Government, who owns the airport and leases all the facilities to the Airport Authority.

The business plan was approved by the Federal and Provincial Governments who contributed approx $11 Million dollars each. The Airport Authority borrowed an additonal $11 Million from NDIT, and the City of Prince George kicked in $6 Million.

So the total cost of the expansion was roughly $40 Million dollars.

There has only been one 747 that landed in Prince George that required the length of the new runway. The Russian jet that landed and took off could have done so on the old airstrip, and in fact did so a number of years ago.

So to date, we have one 747 landing, that for all intents and purposes was directed to Prince George more for a PR exercise than for any functional purpose.

All the Management people, and the Chairmen of the Board, who were involved in this decision have now left. The two main players were Steig Hoag, and Jim Blake included.

Will we ever get any planes actually making tech stops here, or any cargo facilities??? I seriously doubt it. This type of venture was looked into by the Airport Authority in Calgary a number of years ago, and they came to the conclusion that it was not a viable venture. Prince George seems to have ignored the Calgary advice, and went ahead with it.

We have now been waiting for some 5/6 years for some planes. The first ones were supposed to start arriving in 2007/008, however they never materialized. Every excuse that can be used has been used.

1. The slowdown in the world economy
2. The slowdown of manufacturing in the Pearl River Delta.
3. The need for upgraded fueling facilities.
4. The need for some Cargo terminals
5. The need for NavCan to reduce their
fees, so that we can be competitive with Anchorage Alaska.

The list goes on, however the fact of the matter is, we have yet to see any concrete evidence of any planes actually coming to Prince George.

We are now having to pay for this facility through the Airport Improvement Fee’s that are $18.00 per person everytime you fly out of Prince George. This fee will be increased to $20.00 per person in January of 2014.

I think it is time that the Airport Authority made a definitive statement about where this project actually is, and whether or not we are in fact ever going to get any business. Its not good enough to be making statements like, COULD, SHOULD, MIGHT, MAY, ETC; when dealing with tax dollars.

If the project is a BUST then lets stand up and say so, and get on with the business of running the Airport.

If Dearth has some facts. Lets hear them.

One cannot research a thing if the information is not publically available.

If it is not available, on can manufacture it like Dearth.

Or, if it confidential information one can break that confidentiality such as Dearth may have done.
——————————–

I would assume that those who are putting the tanks in, one of these days, will do so very quickly if they have some contracts to make it worth their while, Until then, it gets a “when we get a round tuit” level of priority.

Alsonoreal push to have put the road in on time to get it paved prior to winter. Not worth the extra money to put a push onto it.

Palopu wrote :”the slowdown of the word economy”

Does not seem to have stopped PG ….. we are going as strong as ever .. ;-)

If you look at the revenue projections for the Airport from 2013 to 2016 you will see they are projecting 1.5%, per annum.

This amount would come from increases in leases, parking, restaurant, airport improvement fee’s etc;

The increase would be subtaintially more if they were expecting to have 3 or 4 large body cargo jets landing and taking off at the PG Airport on a daily basis.

Soooooo. Their own figures indicate **no significant growth** for the forseeable future.

passengers park cars, cargo in transit does not

passengers eat at restaurants, cargo in transit does not

passengers pay airport improvement fees, cargo in transit does not

passenger sevices lease space, cargo in transit does not.

.

Everything I listed about the airport is publicly available and all was printed in the Prince George Citizen and CKPG news all of it was obtained through those 2 sources.

Cargo (and planes) in transit pay a landing and take off fee based on the gross weight of the plane on take off.

My guess is that this fee would generate approx $2500.00 (more or less) per plane per take off. If we had three cargo planes per day, arriving and leaving 7 days per week this would generate approx $3 Million dollars per annum in additional revenue for the Airport. In addition the oil companies would make substantial money on selling fuel.

That is what it is all about, however it seems getting the three planes per day is a hell of a lot harder than anybody suspected when they came up with this idea.

The fact that there is only a 1.5% forcasted increase in revenue for the Airport for the next three years, indicates to me that they have no firm commitment for any planes, or it would be reflected in their forcasts. Wouldnt it????

The increase in the Airport improvement fee from $18.00 to $20.00 in 2014 will generate an additional $400,000.00 per year. Most of the AIF Money will go to pay off the Airports loans to build the runway in the first place.

So at the end of the day, we could be out some $40 Million dollars, plus interest on the NDIT loan, and be the proud owners of a huge runway that is not being utilized, but costs big money to keep clear of snow, ice, etc;

My position on this runway is clear. It was a bad idea, never should have been built, a complete waste of tax dollars, and wasnt very well thought out. Those people who were involved have never taken any responsibility for this unmitigated financial disaster. That includes the Aiport Authority personel, the City of Prince George, the Liberal Government, and the Federal Government.

Can we afford to waste tax dollars like this???

If its not a waste then at the very least give us some actual FACTS as to when we can expect some return on our investment.

Enough hyperbole, WHERES THE BEEF????

Dearth. There may have been a few agreements in principle signed somewhere in China however so what???? Where’s the planes.

Your statement that two dozen cargo jets have landed here for tech stops is totally wrong. It never happened. There is no indication on the Airport Authoritys website that this happened, nor have I ever seen anything in the local papers, or on ckpg that would indicate that it happened.

So give us some references to the articles in the Citizen and we can look them up in the archives and see for ourselves.

I rarely post here, if ever.

The airport is generally a good news story.

But the issue being raised by several people is that it is ANOTHER one of these good news types of stories hyped by some Mayor or some business people as yet another way to bring the boom times back to Prince George.

And the fact is they are OVERHYPED by a long shot. The proof is in the pudding and the pudding NEVER gets put in front of the Citizens of the City.

High rise condominiums. Wood innovation centres. Rail centre. Air cargo centre. Oil down the Nechako River. Where are they?

As a friend in Calgary said: “That’s the trouble with Prince George. Something is ALWAYS going to happen that will change everything. And time after time, NOTHING ever does.”

And now people don’t believe the stories or the hype anymore.

In the meantime, we drive on potholed roads, on streets cleaned of snow far less quickly than they used to be, with medians and parks whose lawns don’t get cut anymore, with streets that get cleaned of winter dirt in June!

How many jet engines did each plane that landed here have?

4 per plane would be 6 planes …… ;-)

There were two landings and takeoffs to get the helicopters and bring them back.

Were they tech stops? Technically they stopped … and technically they may have had to refuel … but maybe they refueled in Calgary or Edmonton …..

I mean why the heck would we care? … The runway is not used to any reasonable capacity …. reason? Simple, the full palette of services are not available. They never were ….. the real question is why not.

The PG airport could be a good little regional airport and market itself accordingly, but it always seems to be trying to be something it’s not.

“And now people don’t believe the stories or the hype anymore.”

Thanks for that wise comment Rob.

I suspect part of it has to do with people in the community being too anxious about those stories about the streets being paved with gold.

Well … the truth is they never were, the hype of the mid seventees may very well be part to blame since the hype in those days was that this city would have more than 200,000 people in it by the turn of 2000 which was then 35 years down the road and totally believable by everyone in the government who was doing the hype ……

Does this guy get paid from the proceeds of the Airport Improvement fees or is he not considered an improvement?

Darn, I was hoping Dearth came back with some info. I can remember the one Southern Air 747 that was brought here as a promo. The airport manager then stated Southern took some heat back in the states for stopping here. I called this idea an opeum pipe dream, building Mirabel West. As I said, I hope I’m wrong, but I haven’t had to look up any crow recipes yet.

Take it as you will I spent about week going through the news at the library and at the citizen and publicly available archives through CKPG and no I did not keep any index or ID numbers so shoot me. Take some time and look through them yourself.

As to the numbers

Prince George has since the 1970s a designated emergency landing strip for all large aircraft and only 1 of 5 landing strips in BC designated as such and only 26 airstrips in Canada have been designated as such.

21 cargo jets have landed here since 2011 iti is not a lot but they were testing Runways and turn around time

3 747s have landed here in the past and the Anatov has been here 4 times

2 carriers have expressed serious interest in building warehouse facilities at the airport

Prince George is in the direct flight path for North/south flights of all major airlines and cargo carriers

A carrier in Germany is very interested in running a seasonal flight from Germany to PG For passenger flights and was scheduled to start last yr but pulled out last minute due to executive depiction on their part also 2 Chinese charter carriers have expressed I Teresa in seasonal flights to here as well.

Again All of this is available through public media go search it out.

Yawn ! The con trails you see in the air are planes already loaded on their way to their destinations. No reason to stop here at all.

One 747 was the Southern Air promo,
One 747 was here to pick up Chinese people staying at our old jail,
What was the third ?

Oh yeah! The Chinese people at the jail. That was before the runway was extended so it doesn’t count.

Dearth. How is it that you are the only person in Prince George that is aware of the 21 Cargo jets landing here since 2011??

This must be the best kept secret in Prince George. What was the name of the companies doing this testing???

Was is JAL, Korean Airlines, China Air, Lufstanza, Fed Ex????

There may have been some testing done by NavCan or some other Federal Agency, however I seriously doubt it was done by Private Airlines, or with 747 Wide Body Cargo Jets.

What kind of Cargo Jets are you talking about???

21 Cargo jets …… so what kind of planes? …. 727?

Purolator 727 cargo plane – Halifax Airport

http://planesandchoppers.com.s3.amazonaws.com/7416.jpg

Promotional video, endorsement for YXS airport current and future capacity by a client…..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhE-f9vuVnM

727’s! I remember those! CPAir used to fly them into PG all the time when the runway was short.