Air carriers against new terminal costs
Doug Ashbury
Northern News Services
Yellowknife (Apr 06/01) - The organization for the North's air transportation industry wants a new terminal fee axed.
"There's never been a terminal fee before. "We want them (the new terminal fees) gone," said Northern Air Transport Association president Teri Arychuk, who is also a part-time owner of Yellowknife-based Air Tindi.
Arychuk said NATA wants the federal government to work with the Government of the Northwest Territories to find another option.
Effective April 1, 2001, the GNWT implemented a general terminal fee. Under the fee schedule, aircraft owners have to pay from $17 to $110 every time they use the NWT's larger airports.
The former amount covers Twin Otters and Beech 99s and 100s, while the latter is to be paid by Boeing 737 and 727 owners. Beavers, Turbo Beavers, Caravans and Beech 90s are among aircraft for which there is no new fee.
For some companies, like First Air and Canadian North, the fees will translate into several hundred thousand dollars per year.
The terminal fees are on top of landing fees. And for airport-based carriers, the fee is on top of the rent paid to the airport.
Carriers will have to look at passing this new fee on to the customer, Arychuk said.
The Nunavut Government has put the new fee on hold in the territory, said Arychuk, adding the new fee was among topics discussed at NATA's 25th annual meeting held in Yellowknife last week.
Arychuk said the association is also continuing to press its case about a federal government proposal calling for fire response people and equipment at all airports.
"Whether it's a Twin Otter or a 737, industry operators are trained to handle fire and evacuate aircraft," Arychuk said. "The expense (would be) immense."
As well as the cost of equipment and staff, in the North there would be additional costs of transporting the equipment to each community.
