Council to gain some insight into state of Airport Ferry related financials tonight with May Variance report

Airport Ferry revenues
make for part of the May
Variance report to be
reviewed tonight at Council

City Council members may gain a bit more background on the challenges facing the Prince Rupert airport coming out of COVID times, as the City's Financial Officer delivers her variance Report for the month of May at this evening's session.

As part of her report to Council this evening, CFO Corinne Bomben will outline the impact of the extended suspension of air service to the community, with the projections for airport ferry revenues among part of her notes for Council. 

In her report, included as part of the Agenda package for tonight, Ms. Bomben also outlines how if the normal flight patterns return by September any financial shortfall should be limited to the 100,000 dollar mark, with the shortfall to be funded by money received by the City through the COVID Smart Restart reserve.

The City had budgeted revenues of $550,000 from the airport for 2021, however owing to the suspension of air service, the actual revenue stream to May was listed at $47,500. That number taken from prior to the resumption of Air travel to the city in late June.

During the same period to may, the City had listed spending on the Airport Ferry of $760,847 from  a budget of $1,436,153.

The report also notes of the status of Capital purchases related to the Ferry Dock and the site of the proposed relocation of the dock to the Prince Rupert waterfront at Rupert Landing near the Kwinitsa Station museum.

Air Canada suspended service to the Prince Rupert Airport in January, the Digby Island Airport received its first flight since the start of the year in late June, Air Canada plans to expand on its current schedule to offer a weekly schedule of near daily flights in August.

Just over an hour or so to the east, the Terrace Airport, which remained open during the COVID period of the last seven months released its latest passenger totals, with the airport seeing a jump in levels of 3,000 passengers from May to June, with 24,000 passenger making us of the Terrace facility in the month of June.

Tonight's Council session will provide an opportunity for the council members to explore further financial themes on the Prince Rupert airport with the CFO. 

It could also give some on council an opportunity to suggest that officials from the Airport, or the Airport Authority be invited to make a presentation to Council at a future council session, providing for a more detailed overview of the challenges and ambitions for the Prince Rupert Airport as it comes out of the COVID period.

Such an opportunity to speak to themes of Airport operations in a public venue would provide a more complete overview of the current status of the Airport and what initiatives the civic officials may have in mind in generating more use of the airport.  As well as to what the status may be of trying to bring alternative air carriers to the community to provide for more frequency of flights in and out of Prince Rupert.

You can explore more themes on aviation in the Northwest from our archive page here.

More notes on tonight's Council session can be found from our Preview feature here, while a wider overview of past Council discussion topics is available for review here.