1 February 2007
Trains to Join Planes at Airport?
Winnipeg Manitoba - Winnipeg Airports Authority Inc. is
considering an idea to build a rail cargo terminal on Richardson Airport's western fringe to create the country's first direct link
of air and rail traffic.
Such a move would also be a step towards a larger goal of turning the airport - and the city - into a national hub for air, rail, and
road cargo, Barry Rempel, president and chief executive of WAA, the company that manages the airport, said this week.
Businesspeople interested in transferring cargo from planes to trains triggered the plan by approaching the airport last year. Now,
airport officials are speaking with Canadian Pacific Railway, Rempel added.
The CPR Carberry line, the railway's main route to western Canada, runs past the airport's northern boundary. The CPR Glenboro line,
a spur currently used to transport grain, splits from the Carberry line and runs south along the airport's western boundary before
turning towards Portage la Prairie.
"Obviously, there's a lot of work that still has to happen, in terms of opening up the west side of the airport for rail
development," Rempel told the Free Press. "The important piece is there have already been nibbles of interest in people
looking to set up the kinds of business that would be appropriate for airport development because of the potential of that rail
spur."
The presence of two important rail lines on its doorstep, gives the airport a competitive advantage over many others across the
country, Rempel said.
Going up, up, up
"Most airports don't have the direct access to things like the CP main line for the transportation of goods and services because
historically airports grew up a long way from anywhere that had those kinds of services," he added.
"In fact, historically it was all about where do you bring the road and rail together. (Before that), it was where do you bring
water and rail together, then roads."
While many airports have been built far from other transportation routes, Richardson finds itself in the middle of a network of rail,
truck, and bus traffic, close to Winnipeg's major industrial area and relatively close to the downtown itself, Rempel said.
Last year, a company seeking to transport propellers used in wind-power turbines, approached Rempel to find out how to
transfer the propellers from airplanes to trains.
His interest piqued, Rempel approached CPR about the possibility of building a facility that would answer such a need.
A CPR spokesman said the company didn't have a formal plan on which to comment but added CPR would remain open to further discussions.
Grown considerably
Inter-modal cargo shipping has grown considerably in the last 20 years but few facilities have involved rail and air.
One reason, said Barry Prentice, a member of the University of Manitoba's Transport Institute and a professor of Supply Chain
Management, was the difference in how the two modes operate.
Most businesses use airplanes - much like trucks or even buses - to deliver goods quickly and on precise schedules, Prentice said.
Trains, on the other hand, are valued for their size or for the large quantities of goods they can carry.
Still, joint air and rail cargo facilities have sprouted in the United States, Prentice said, because businesses prefer to have
several shipping options near their offices. Facilities at Fort Worth, Tex. and Huntsville, Ala. have been two successful examples of
such a combination.
Prentice welcomed the latest efforts to set up a similar facility at Richardson Airport.
"There's always been the notion of an inter-modal container shipping port to be set up there. So, any talk like
that, as far as I'm concerned, that's good news," Prentice said.
And yet, Prentice and other observers said the challenges facing such a project were considerable.
The cost of a facility - and who would cover it - remain unanswered, Prentice said. Moreover, he said the railway was likely content
with its Weston rail yards northeast of the airport and might not want to move many of its operations to a new site.
The land west of Richardson airport is also largely empty. Not only would any new project require the installation of essential
services such as roads and sewers, it stands to involve not only the City of Winnipeg but also the Rural Municipality of Rosser, which
abuts the airport, a point that troubled Winnipeg Coun. Bill Clement.
"That's not a simple thing to negotiate," said Clement, chairman of the city's public works committee. "The city
doesn't typically provide sewer and water services to enhance development in a municipality." Rempel said a 2003 airport
development plan was approved by the council of the time and more importantly was put on file by the civic bureaucracy.
The airport, which handled almost 3.4 million passengers in 2006 - a record for its 44-year-old terminal - recently
completed construction of a new 1,559-spot parking garage, and has plans to build a new passenger terminal.
It is also in negotiations to bring Winnipeg's downtown bus station to a spot on the airport grounds.
Richardson also handled more than 150,000 tonnes of cargo last year and Rempel said the efforts to create a multi-mode
hub are meant not only to grow that figure but to recapture the city's past eminence as a crossroads for transporting goods - albeit
in a 21st century way.
Businesses - and jobs - would be attracted to such a hub, Rempel maintained.
"This is all about recreating Manitoba as the centre of transportation and distribution for our country," he said.
"We're in the middle of the country, we have all modes in close proximity to each other and we can make it
happen."
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