Hangar and terminals
Introduction
Toronto City Center Billy Bishop Airport (Toronto/City Center Airport) (IATA: YTZ, ICAO: CYTZ) is a regional airport located on the Toronto Islands in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The airport is often referred to as Toronto Island Airport and was previously known as Port George VI Island Airport and Toronto City Center Airport. The airport's name honors Billy Bishop, the Canadian flying ace of World War I and Air Marshal of World War II. It is used by civil aviation, air ambulances and regional airlines using turboprop aircraft. In 2018, it was ranked as the ninth busiest airport in Canada and the sixth busiest airport in Canada serving the United States.[5][3][4].
Conceived in the 1930s as Toronto's main airport, construction of the airport was completed in 1939 by the Toronto Harbor Commission (THC). At the same time, the THC built Malton Airport as an alternative, but nearby Malton (today Toronto Pearson International Airport) became Toronto's main passenger hub, leaving the island's airport for general aviation and military purposes. During the 1940s and 1950s, several political leaders proposed an expansion of the island's airport to allow scheduled passenger airlines and reduce annual operating costs. Malton was sold in 1962 to the Government of Canada in exchange for an expansion and improvements to the island's airport. After expansion, civil flights increased to a peak of over 200,000 flights annually in the 1960s. Although regional airlines were introduced in the 1970s, the annual number of flights declined and closure was discussed. In 1983, a 50-year tripartite agreement between the government of Canada, the city government of Toronto and the Port Commission, which limited noise and prohibited the use of scheduled airline aircraft, allowed airport operations to continue. In the 1990s, in an era of government cost-cutting, questions about the airport's future arose again due to its annual deficit. At the same time, redevelopment was taking over the north of the airport and several studies suggested that the airport was incompatible with development.
In 1999, the new Toronto Port Authority (TPA) (renamed in 2015 as "PortsToronto") replaced THC. The TPA's mandate was to make the port and airport self-sufficient and determined that the airport needed to expand to end the annual subsidy. Although an airport expansion was and is politically controversial, the TPA has worked with new regional airline Porter Airlines since 2003 to increase the airline's scheduled flights. Under the new financial model, carriers pay landing fees and departing passengers pay airport improvement fees to the TPA. Porter launched in 2006 and passenger volume increased to the point that airport operations became self-sustaining in 2010. In 2010, Porter opened a new terminal. In 2015, a pedestrian tunnel to the airport was opened,[6] after a previous plan to build a bridge was cancelled.[7].