The Victoria International Airport (YYJ) has slipped into 11th place among Canada’s busiest air transport hubs despite welcoming a record-breaking volume of passengers in 2018.

 

Kelowna International Airport (YLW) has nipped at the heels of YYJ’s traffic counts for years, and thanks to a significantly busier December than originally forecast, the Okanagan airport has officially overtaken YYJ as British Columbia’s second busiest air hub and Canada’s 10th busiest.

 

Despite celebrating the arrival of its first-ever first two millionth passenger in one calendar year on December 19th, YYJ’s December passenger activity of 166,410 arriving and departing travellers wasn’t enough to overtake Kelowna’s 210,926, a figure more in-line with peak summer travel activity than a typical December. That banner month was enough to seal YYJ’s fate and push YLW ahead in the ranks.

 

YLW celebrated the arrival of its two millionth passenger (also for the first time in a calendar year) just a day behind YYJ on December 20th but ended 2018 with 2,080,372 compared to YYJ’s 2,048,627.

 

Kelowna’s census metropolitan population in the 2016 census fell well short of Greater Victoria’s (194,882 versus 367,770 inhabitants, respectively), but its airport serves roughly 11 passengers for every inhabitant. Victoria International's ratio is half that at 5.5 passengers per local inhabitant.

 

The proximity to two major international airports have a profound affect on Victoria International’s passenger volumes, where would-be passengers opt to head for Vancouver International Airport or Seattle-Tacoma International Airport in lieu of departing from Victoria. Despite the travel time involved, considerable savings can be had by skipping on YYJ and catching a flight from further afield.

 

Kelowna’s loss of passengers to other airports is significantly less of a factor. Also serving as a regional airport to the entire south-central region of the province, it has the ability to draw passengers from communities such as Vernon and Kamloops. And its status as a winter recreation destination will continue to grow, further increasing reliance on air travel to the region.

 

Nevertheless, Victoria International has embarked on a nearly $20 million terminal expansion that will double the square footage of the lower departures area by 2020. With two million passengers arriving annually and a growth rate that could see 2.5 million travellers by the second half of the next decade, the need for expanding the facility has arisen. Future work will see the build-out of surface parking lots south of the terminal, a realignment of the road network, and additional improvements to the terminal. C

 

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