TRANSPORTATION REPORTER

Toronto's once-sleepy downtown airport, where Porter Airlines Inc. has enjoyed a monopoly on scheduled service for the past three years, is attracting attention from Air Canada Jazz and other carriers.

Several airlines are keen to add flights, said the Toronto Port Authority, which oversees Toronto City Centre Airport (TCCA), located on an island just minutes from the downtown business core.

"Although Porter Airlines is currently the only scheduled commercial carrier to operate from the TCCA, the TPA has recently received expressions of interest from several parties regarding new scheduled commercial services at the TCCA," said the port authority's acting president, Alan Paul, in a statement yesterday.

While Mr. Paul declined to name the carriers, Air Canada Jazz has indicated that it is seeking to return to the island airport by mid-2010. At least one U.S. airline is also said to be examining its options.

Jazz had operated at the commuter airport for 16 years, before it was forced to leave in 2006 by City Centre Aviation Ltd., a terminal operator controlled by Robert Deluce, the president of privately owned Porter.

Porter launched operations on Oct. 23, 2006, with just two Bombardier Q400 turboprops providing service between Toronto and Ottawa. The regional carrier now has 15 planes and a network of eight cities in Canada and three in the United States. Mr. Deluce plans to add three more aircraft next month and another two by next April.

He said Porter now has about 100 daily slots - takeoffs and landings - or nearly 50 round-trips. By next April, it forecasts that it will be using 120 slots a day, compared with a maximum of 10 daily slots used by Jazz in early 2006 for its Toronto-Ottawa route.

Toronto-based Porter is flying an average of 2,200 passengers daily, or roughly the number of travellers carried by Jazz in one month, just before it left the island airport in February, 2006. Mr. Deluce said Porter hopes to fly an average of 4,400 passengers a day by late 2010, with Philadelphia and Washington targeted as the next U.S. destinations.

A residents group called Community Air, which is opposed to expansion at the island airport, argues that a "tripartite agreement" signed in 1983 by the port, the City of Toronto and the federal government restricts the number of daily slots to between 120 and 167, depending on how certain noise guidelines are interpreted.

The port authority, a federal agency, said it has yet to determine "the number, and specific mix, of daily commercial flights that can be accommodated at the TCCA."

Port authority chairman Mark McQueen said the island airport "is an attractive gateway to Toronto and our process will determine if the TPA can capitalize on these expressions of interest over the coming months."

Jazz has been in a legal fight with the port authority for more than three years, questioning its jurisdiction. Halifax-based Jazz, which flies regionally on behalf of Air Canada, operates from Toronto's Pearson airport.