Tuesday’s Headlines

9 comments

1. Oh God, the pandas…. sometimes having four dailies and the national TV networks HQ’d in Toronto is probably not a good thing. You build up steam for the election campaign, the next day the reporters have nothing to report on, so you latch onto some panda gossip. Argh.

   In any event, count me a panda-skeptic. But this has nothing to do with Ford – this is just because from what I can see, other cities have better deals and Toronto’s does not look all that financially attractive. I have no problem with the zoo investing some public dollars in their attractions if it keeps the zoo fresh, drives attendance and merchandising, and produces some sort of return but these figures look tough.

   Sad that only the –satirical– reporter actually dug her head out of the sand and realized Toronto is not the only city in North America to look into a panda exhibit. Hey news reporters, try doing a little research to provide context next time. Atlanta, DC, Memphis and San Diego have pandas. How were they licensed and housed? What happened to their attendance over five years? For example, Atlanta paid $570k per panda per year in a 2009 renewal, so why is Toronto at $1M? Atlanta’s attendance also went from 660,000 to 1.1M when the pandas arrived, but then dropped off afterwards. How would their numbers work in the Toronto business model? Do these zoos charge extras for their pandas? If no cubs are born, how does that change projections?

   There is too much sniping about Ford and gravy trains — instead we should be talking about what other places have done and will it work here. If the numbers work, fine. If not, go rebuild the zoo monorail instead. Then move on to other news.

2. I am really looking forward to seeing these pandas. This visit of a signature animal should rival even the lenovo dragons that came by 15 years ago.

3. I’m always amazed at how little there is to do at Pearson’s T1. Seems like if you’re waiting for a flight, your options are usually limited to Starbucks, the crappy no-name bar, the tiny no-name bookstore, or the no-name cafe that sells a couple of pre-made bagel options and won’t deviate.

   That place is probably the only spot on earth that would instantly get 1000% better with a simple Jack Astors.

4. The bar in the international pier, by the Richard Serra sculpture, is one of my favorites. I put it in my book!

5. ..That said, you do have to love the Star comments section, where Miller gets the blame for Pearson’s suckiness. Presumably things will improve under Ford (in an independantly run building in Missisauga).

6. Hey, I’ve been stuck in that out-building that serves the little Jazz Dash-8s, that has one lousy cafe, requires a bus connection, and is actually within the City of Toronto!

   But otherwise, Pearson isn’t that bad. They finally started to provide free wi-fi (something that most airports don’t offer) and T1 has some great pieces of public art.

   Airports that I truly despise are CDG in Paris (really crappy selection of food deyond security, and requires going up and down stairs to access these or the washrooms) and MEX in Mexico City, which requires you to retrace your steps as you go through immigration to end up in the same concourse you were in, if you are connecting flights. Plus MEX still allows smoking in its food courts.

   Pearson’s amongst the best, though it needs a public transit train to the airport, something even CDG offers (the RER); and a private link doesn’t cut it.

7. Ha – I was working on engineering plans for Pearson in 1998, so I laughed at the Miller comment on the Star also. That said, Pearson is nice and swoopy architecture-wise but not nearly as shop-rich as its peer airports. There are a couple reasons for this:

   1) Pre-clearance for the US clobbers the potential retail market, splitting it in half. Very few other airports have to deal with this kind of weird dichotomy within one terminal. It makes it very tough to put a decent anchor store like Indigo, say, in the terminal because now they either have to run two branches (at double rent) or serve only domestic/international or US traffic. When you go to a US airport, this is not a problem since everyone is at the same clearance level – none – since clearance will happen wherever they land (or not at all, if domestic). Preclearance is a very Canadian problem that hurts the enjoyment of Canadian airport facilities.

   2) Due to a small and immature market, Canadians have fairly uncompetitive retail choices to begin with so no one is really hungry to get into airport retail other than the usual newsstands and cafes. Go to a large US airport and you are likely to see Best Buy vending machines with iPods and such. A number of US airports have made their shopping more consciously mall-like, with Gaps and Body Shops and such, some with promises of same-pricing-as-outside-the-airport. Pearson has a few mallish shops now but it’s no Pittsburgh or Dallas.

   Anyone else have systemic reasons?

8. Rather than the balkanization of airlines by alliance (where AC and its pals gets Terminal 1 and Delta and others are banished to T3) perhaps a consolidation where all US flights originate from one terminal would create critical mass for a decent retail area. That said, I don’t think many people mind the lack of retail on the Island, they’re too busy surfing and drinking the free coffee…

9. Mark, doing what you suggest would make connections between domestic and US flights a lot more difficult.