CBC Misses the Big Story

What happens when a young reporter from the City meets a slick well-practiced “Rural” lobby group hunting for cheap leases on a Billion dollars of government land?  It’s a classic scene with all the right virtue signalling of farming, the environment, and food security. A warm fuzzy setup covering the warts of a Big Money ask. […]

Attack of the McMansions

Toronto’s Housing inequalities are stunning and well known. Few would disagree that, thanks to decades of constant population growth, the Greater Toronto Area is in the worst housing crisis in its history. Yet paradoxically there are neighborhoods in downtown Toronto that have fewer people in them than they did 20 years ago thanks to upsizing […]

Ending the “Build Pickering Last” Strategy

On March 5, 2020, Transport Canada released the Pickering Lands Aviation Sector Analysis (the Study). It was much awaited, and hopefully will be the definitive study on the need for and timing of a new commercial airport in Pickering, Ontario. Its message is simply, “The question is now when, not if, a new airport should be built”. […]

Pickering Airport in a Post-Pandemic Toronto

Right now the Canadian economy is crashing under the fear and anxiety created by a global pandemic. Under today’s conditions, communal vehicles – buses, trains and planes – are breeding grounds for the virus. Until today, the number one method of communal travel between provinces and internationally was air travel. Post-event, how will the pandemic change […]

KPMG Report Reaffirms Need for Pickering Airport

By:​​ Mark Brooks, Phil Lightstone. The long-awaited Pickering Lands Aviation Sector Analysis (the “KPMG report”) has recently been released and pro airport supporters are celebrating. The report goes beyond just reaffirming the need for a new airport in Pickering to support the Greater Toronto Area. It clarifies when and in what form the new airport should be developed. […]

Pickering Airport Featured in COPA Magazine

The Canadian Owners and Pilots Association (COPA) is featuring an article from The Friends of Pickering Airport ( a sub group of COPA flight 44) in the April edition. Great timing as the just released KPMG report has recommended a path to building out Pickering Airport. The 491 page KPMG report is suggestion building an […]

Canada’s Carbon Neutral Aviation Challenge

A big change is under way in the world of commercial aviation. As of January 1st, 2020, all international aviation growth is going carbon neutral. Domestic Canadian aviation will follow step. For Pickering Airport, a new international airport to be built just east of Toronto, it means that all of its flights can be carbon […]

Trees and Pickering Airport

by Ted Nickerson Trees and aviation do not normally need each other, but trees could soon be a contributor to developing a low-carbon / carbon-neutral Pickering Airport. In 2017, Canada’s aviation emissions accounted for 21 megatonnes (1 megatonne = 1 million metric tonnes) or 3% of total emissions, with domestic air travel accounting for 1%, […]

What is the real goal of a biased Pickering Airport Troll Poll?

Last week a local Durham newspaper appeared to run a poll with a leading question underneath a letter from a local pro-airport supporter. It’s the sort of biased online survey that has become the staple of divisive politics around the world. A selectively worded poll with a leading question and leading answers. It can be […]

Three-Part Harmony of the Pickering Lands Aviation Sector Analysis

A monumental decision is in the works. Sometime this year Transport Canada will change the Eastern Toronto’s region’s access to aviation forever. This is the federal agency now managing the Pickering airport lands east of Toronto for the Canadian tax payer. The decision that needs to be made is if, when, and in what form […]