Comments 1,601 to 1,650 of 1,845
EAA Chapter.
This airport is a main reason that I am a flier today. I went up on an EAA Young Eagles flight at the age of 16. There is a great EAA chapter on the field that is stuck in time. It is like walking into the 1940's going in there. Great people and great projects. A tribute to the romance of aviation. Definately worth a stop!
Great place for practice.
We use this airport quite a bit for practice work. No landing fees for single engine, easy MF to help with radio work. Very quiet area and is just about 3-5 minutes from Rockliffe. Nice long runway and a decent place to park and eat.
Gatway to the North.
With all of the expansion going on north of this airport it's amazing how desolate it is. Still has a cute terminal and small town feel with capacity for real air traffic.
Windy City.
They don't call it the windy city for nothing! One of the few places you could land a Cessna in reverse ;)
Used to fly out of here on Time Air's Dash 7's and Dash 8's in the early 80's. Was a great time to fly.
I would have loved to do my initial training here but alas it's too far from Ottawa! :)
new fuelling system now includes jet a fuel
new fuelling system includes jet a and avgas available as of dec 1/07
re: north
It's just a bit further south than Alert (CYLT), which is the most northerly permanent airport in the world.
north
its very north...i think its on top of the world! =P <3
Touch and Go
Just did a touch and go on a x-country from Buttonville. After reading these comments I wish I stayed and checked out the terminal. Maybe next time.
Sunday afternoon, was pretty busy. 3 or 4 people doing their thing in the circuit.
Fuel
As of Friday 1 November 2007, 100LL fuel at Pepco (Esso) was CAD 1.344/liter + tax. There is a callout charge between 5pm and 8am, but no extra charges during the day.
Pepco (Esso): (705) 335-0872
No fees
According to the airport manager (by phone, Thursday 1 November 2007) there are no fees for private aircraft, not even for overnight parking.
Airport: (705) 335-2611
Paint Shop
We took our club's Dakota here to get painted. They did an excellent job, and the plane looks beautiful now.
Supply / demand
I'm not defending the costs of landing a 747... yes it's outrageous. But, having been into Pearson in a light plane once, I would say that the landing fee is fair - especially outside of peak hours ($75). I'm sure the landing fee is set to keep us little guys from joyriding in the area and becoming a hazard to the more serious traffic which is lined up on approach. Certainly the $75 (or $200) is not a money making proposition.
I do agree, though, that there are a lot of better alternatives nearby. CYTZ in an awesome little airport. Approaching the city over the water, with the skyline just of your shoulder is really amazing.
re: IFR
I came into Rockcliffe a few weeks ago with a 1,000 ft AGL ceiling and good vis underneath (daylight), and it was no problem transitioning from the Gatineau VOR/DME 09 to a visual landing at Rockcliffe.
No food
There is no food available at Baie-Comeau except for some junk-food vending machines and a coffee machine. There is a room that used to be a cafeteria -- it still has tables and a microwave -- but there's nothing served there any more. Staff told me that the nearest food is in town, about 18 km away (I think).
Fees
Baie-Comeau has both a landing fee and a terminal fee. The security guard collects it, before she or he lets you back onto the field through the locked door. I think that they're around $15 each, but they were waived for my Hope Air flight. You pay for gas from the FBO inside the terminal near the checkin desks, so you can't just stay outside to avoid the fees.
Using the mandatory frequency
Baie-Comeau is a mandatory-frequency airport, with a remote transmitter run by Mont-Joli; however, unlike other MF fields, Mont-Joli does *not* want you to make any traffic calls on the MF (they chastized me over the radio when I announced that I was taking the runway for departure) except what they ask for.
WoW!
Wow, I am the first to leave a comment!
re: St.Catharines airport
Its a great place to visit......See ya
St.Catharines airport
The airport is only a 10 munite drive from the Falls (niagara falls) there are also helicopter and aircraft flights over the falls every day. The airport is served by a Flight service station and there are motels and hotels in close proximety. Niagara region is also a wine region so wine tours are common. Niagara on the lake is one of the most beautiful towns in canada and is located a 5 minute drive from the airport.
FBO Notes
The Petro-T FBO also offers free parking if you fill up with them. The 100LL is 10 cents cheaper if you self-serve. Nice lounge. First ramp off Twy D.
Spectrum Airways
A great family business which includes a maintenance facility with energetic and helpful mechanics. One of the best places I've overnighted with my plane.
Hills
There are lots of hills surrounding the airport -- there's nothing scary, but you do have to be on top of things. The grass runway was in fairly good shape (a little bumpy, but no holes), and there are nosewheel planes based at the airport, so they obviously maintain things (taildraggers can handle much rougher ground than nosewheel planes). I like the airport, and I plan to stop there again, though I might not want to try outclimbing the hills with my family on board on a hot summer day. The runway is good and long (over 3,000 feet), so that's not an issue.
Fuel from Air Killarney
I called Air Killarney (705-287-2242) -- they're not based at the airport, but they advised me to call when I land. According to the woman I talked to, it takes only five minutes for them to get out to the airport to fuel a plane.
Fuel and maintenance
Available from Almaguin Aero Maintenance (Ron and Vera Cooper), 705-386-0011.
CYPQ - Peterborough
Spent the weekend with relatives. Parking = $8.00/night. Friendly FBO. Beautiful runway for an a/p of this tfc volume.
Home of Canadair
Cartierville was the site of the Canadair (now Bombardier) factory. There is still a major Bombardier plant here, but the airfield is now a golf course and residential development. Hundreds of aircraft were built here to be ferried to England in World War II.
There is at least one known case of an airliner bound for Dorval (now Trudeau) which landed here by mistake in the 1960s.
A STOL experiment
This was the site of a experimental airport set up as a federally funded research project in the 1970s to research the economic feasibility of short take-off and landing air service in downtown airports. Air Transit was an an airline operating shuttle flights from downtown Montreal to downtown Ottawa (at Rockliffe, CYRO) using specially modified de Havilland Twin Otters (series 300) that had improved spoilers and sophisticated avionics. The approach and take-off path were quite steep, as they had to clear the Victoria Bridge to the east and the power lines to the west. The crews were provided by Air Canada.
I flew once from here to Ottawa. The arriving terminal in Ottawa was the building which is now the entrance hall of the museum. I guess the economics didn't work out, as the STOLport concept didn't catch on.
It's too bad that this airport wasn't kept as a downtown GA field, as it conveniently located and isolated from residential areas by freeways, factories, and the St-Lawrence river. It's now the site of movie studios and a technology park.
Birthplace of bush aviation in Canada
This airport (actually, the co-located hydrobase) was where Canadian bush flying started... in 1919! It is still a busy field for small GA aircraft.
Two runways, one of which has an approach over the lake which is used as a hydrobase. There is a restaurant at the treshold of this runway, which also is the docking area for floatplanes. Fuel is available. Excellent aircraft maintenance facilities, including a good engine overhaul shop.
re: Rockcliffe Flying Club visit, 25-27 August 2007
Unfortunately, the big low-pressure system canceled the trip, especially since most of the pilots were VFR-only.
Landed at night
I only did a few touch and goes at this airport, at night.
ARCAL works as published ;)
Home!
My home airport...where I learned to fly and my father flew from for many years before me.
Car rental
The car rental company/companies in Stratford are closed Saturday afternoon and all day Sunday, so if you need to rent a car on the weekend, you might be better flying to the bigger airports at London (YXU) or Waterloo (YKF), and then driving 30-40 minutes.
Hotels hard to get in the summer
With the Stratford Festival (Shakespeare, etc.), we were unable to book hotel rooms two days before for a club flight from Rockcliffe.
FBO information
The FBO is Huron Flight Centre, 519-542-6599. I was unable to reach anyone by phone on a Saturday afternoon, despite several tries.
Nothing
There's nothing there, so it's a great place to make an unlikely pit stop between Penticton and Prince George when the weather is down at Williams Lake and you've had too much coffee for breakfast.
re: Nice Grass Runway
Thanks for the info -- I've moved the longitude a bit to the west, to the other side of the road.
Nice Grass Runway
I landed here once to practice some soft field landings. Well maintained. The landing strip is west side of the road. (the plane cursor is marking the east side)
First Visit
This was my first time to Burlington.. it was a busy airport, a few people during circuits. Unicom girl was helpful and I later found out was cute as hell.
Nice terminal with windows all around so you can see activity on all the runways.
I couldn't find a pilot registry to sign or anything...
Renovating
New hangars and restaurant open. Home of the Collingwood Classic Aircraft. Eden Flight Inc flying SportStar advanced ultralights.
True grass roots aviation
This little airport is one of the nicest, and friendliest places to fly in/out of in the country. An active COPA wing operates here and there is always an interesting mix of ultralights, homebuilts and general aviation machines of all types - some real classics.
There is a certified ROTAX service center located here, and the Jabiru Canada agent is based here too (or was until recently - has Gord moved to his Lancaster home airport now?) ...
Shell FBO very helpful
Last year I had to overnight unexpectedly due to a problem with my aircraft which took me a couple of days to sort out. The operator of the Shell FBO also owns a motel and he was very helpful - providing me with an excellent room rate and a car rental on short notice at a great price.
You can't ask for better service than that!
World's highest landing fees
This is the world's expensive airport -- http://www.cbc.ca/money/story/2005/11/15/gtaa-051115.html
If you're a private pilot, you can get dinged with a landing fee close to CA $200 even in a light plane, and that's before ramp fees, parking, etc. If you're an airline passenger, your share of the obscene landing fee (over $13,000 to land a 747, vs around $3,000 at other Canadian airports) is tacked onto your ticket price.
The high fees have nothing to do with the fact that the airport's busy -- it has about the same traffic as Philadelphia Intl (PHL), which had no landing fee for light aircraft when I visited in 2003 and charges around US $2,000 for a 747 to land. Something's just broken somewhere, and nobody will take responsibility for the problem.
If you're coming to Toronto, use CYTZ (downtown), CYKZ (northeast), CYOO (east), CNC3 (northwest), or CZBA (west). CYTZ has a landing fee of around $10 for a light plane (watch the ramp fees at Porter, though!), and the others have no landing fee at all.
Fantastic GA airport
This airport is possibly the nicest GA airport I've ever been to. The Kingston flying club has free tie-downs, and they sell fuel at some of the cheapest prices in Ontario when they're open. For odd hours, the Esso has reasonable prices too. Also a very scenic airport, and very straightforward uncomplicated procedures. Highly recommend visiting Kingston.
Visited for the first time the other day
The airport is very scenic, especially at night. The ramp and fuel prices are tough to swallow though. The airport closes at 11pm, and the last ferry runs at midnight.
Rockcliffe Flying Club visit, 25-27 August 2007
The Rockcliffe Flying Club from Ottawa to PEI on the weekend of 25-27 August 2007. I expect that everyone will be planning to land here at YYG.
Taxi
The airport is a short taxi ride north of downtown Charlottetown -- it's been a few years, but I don't remember it being too expensive.
Rates and fees
Here's the schedule of rates and fees for the airport:
Druxy's on site
There is a Druxy's (deli chain) in the FBO. The food isn't too bad, standard deli stuff like smoked meat sandwiches, bagels, and salads. Not gourmet, but it's better than Subway, and it's easy if you're stopping at Buttonville.
Not open to public
This airport is in an ideal location, right in the middle of metro Toronto near the end of a subway line, but unfortunately it's not normally open to the public. It's a former military field, long used by Bombardier for flight testing. The closest public airports are Buttonville (YKZ) to the northeast, City Centre (YTZ) to the south (right by downtown), and the very busy and expensive Pearson (YYZ) to the west. Oshawa (YOO) and Brampton (CNC3) can also be useful for the extreme ends of Toronto.
Stopover.
🔗 Wed, 21 Nov 2007
— @viennatech at Brandon Municipal Airport, Canada
Those who remember flying on CP or Canadian might recall the Brandon stopover. Generally was a stop, unload, wait 30 minutes then go type of thing. Was quite normal to stop here on the way from Calgary to Toronto.