OAG Travel News

One of the largest gatherings of air service professionals took place last week in Montréal, Canada.  Although I was not able to attend the conference, my thoughts naturally turned to Canadian air service.  Ranked by physical size, Canada is the second-largest country in the world.  Its air service is also robust, as detailed below.

Busiest Airports
There are a total of 231 airports in Canada with scheduled commercial air service, and the five busiest airports account for nearly 50 percent of Canada’s total flights.  With over 1,000 daily flights, Toronto’s Pearson International Airport (YYZ) is the busiest in Canada. The following airports round out the top five:
- Vancouver International Airport (YVR) – 600 daily flights
- Montréal-Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport (YUL) – 475 daily flights
- Calgary International Airport (YYC) – 460 daily flights
- Edmonton International Airport (YEG) – 260 daily flights

Provincial Air Service
80 percent of Canada’s total air service is concentrated in four provinces – Ontario, British Columbia, Québec and Alberta.  Canada’s other nine provinces account for the remaining 20 percent of the country’s air service.

Top Airlines
Eighty-eight airlines provide service to, from and within Canada.  Not surprisingly, over half of Canada’s air service is on two Canadian-flag carriers – Air Canada and WestJet.   Accounting for slightly less than three percent of Canada’s total flights, United Airlines ranks as the country’s largest non-Canadian-flag carrier.

Domestic vs. International
Nearly 80 percent of Canada flights are domestic – flights from one Canadian destination to another.  The remaining flights are international, with the United States ranking as the top non-Canadian destination country with over 80 percent of total international flights.  The remaining international flights carry Canadians nonstop to over 50 countries worldwide.

Top City Pairs
Canada’s top domestic city pair in terms of total daily flights is Vancouver – Calgary.  Fifty-five daily flights link these two cities.  Other top domestic city pairs include:
- Montréal (YUL) – Toronto Pearson (YYZ) – 53 daily flights
- Calgary (YYC) – Edmonton (YEG) – 50 daily flights
- Toronto Pearson (YYZ) – Vancouver International (YVR) – 49 daily flights
- Vancouver International (YVR) – Victoria International (YYJ) – 47 daily flights
- Vancouver Harbour Water Airport (CXH) – Victoria Harbour Airport (YWH) – 46 daily flights
- Toronto Pearson (YYZ) – Ottawa (YOW) – 43 daily flights
- Calgary (YYC) – Toronto Pearson (YYZ) – 41 daily flights
- Edmonton (YEG) – Vancouver International (YVR) – 35 daily flights
- Montréal (YUL) – Québec City (YQB) – 32 daily flights

In terms of the top ranking international city pairs, they include Toronto – Chicago O’Hare, Toronto – New York LaGuardia and Vancouver – Seattle/Tacoma.

Next week I’ll examine the air service of the world’s largest country – Russia.

Source: Official Airline Guide (OAG) Schedule Tapes; data is for total flights for June 2009 only, unless otherwise noted.

Original article by Laura Jackson