There are few international airports like Victoria’s. Where else do they bother to landscape along the tarmac leading to the aircraft, insist on local companies for their departure lounge restaurants and cafés or most startlingly have a chief executive officer on hand to greet passengers and field their concerns and complaints?
Welcome to YYJ. That’s Victoria International in a nutshell.
The airport’s newest renovation is a major expansion of its lower departure lounge. During a media tour, chief executive Geoff Dickson was at turns guide and complaints department when an arriving frequent flyer used a chance meeting to suggest tweaks to improve what she said is a “great little airport.”
“That’s what people like about the size of the airport. It’s still small and intimate enough to have those conversations, yet it’s growing,” said Dickson. He said her suggestions were good and that he would pass them on to the airlines who could enact them.
That kind of interaction is important, he said. “Airports are stressful places and the more you can do to make it easy, well that’s what we strive for. We certainly gained some valuable insight during a simple conversation. You can learn so much just through conversations with our guests.”
Dickson hopes that doesn’t change, despite the fact the airport is starting to grow beyond its “great, little” label.
It is in the midst of a $19.4 million renovation that when competed will see its departure lounge more than double in size, add new refreshment and washroom facilities and create a massive basement storage and office space.
The airport is also in the midst of a $7.1 million apron expansion to provide expanded aircraft parking and recently completed a $6.2 million upgrade to its parking lot, giving it an additional 525 stalls, for a total of about 2,600 spaces, including long-term, short-term and overflow.
It’s all about trying to stay ahead of the growing demand for access to Vancouver Island.
“Typically we try and build just ahead of the demand curve,” said Dickson, who noted in this round of renovations it made more economic sense to do multiple stages at once rather than space them out.
“This should look after our needs down there [the lower departure lounge], because we can scale up the density of our seating, for the next 10-15 years.”
The airport has been feeling a bit of pressure brought on by a buoyant Island economy and more visitors. That has translated into massive passenger numbers through the gates.
“When we looked at traffic five or six years ago we thought we might hit two million passengers in 2020-21. We did that in 2018,” said Dickson.
As a result, the airport brought forward some of its infrastructure projects, such as parking, ahead of schedule.
The most recent project is the first of three phases to improve the departure area.
The first phase, which was unveiled last week, included adding more than 1,700 square metres to the lounge area, another 500 seats, and a new café and bistro — Saanich-based Fresh Cup.
It also means dedicated gates for each sitting aircraft so there will no longer be multiple aircraft boarding from the same gate and in most cases less of an outside walk to the aircraft.
“The aircraft haven’t moved but the building has grown out into that space,” said Scott Cunningham, the airport’s director of facilities.
The drive behind the expansion was the change in aircraft.
Dickson said the carriers who use the lower gates have switched, due to demand, to 74- or 78-seat Q400 aircraft from the previous 35-to-50-seat Dash 8 100 and Dash 8 300 aircraft.
“Your pulses of people, when you have five or six aircraft on the ground, is pretty significant,” he said.
But with the expansion, the lounge will still feel open even with a crush of people deplaning. Previously, the lower lounge had a capacity for about 200 seated passengers, but the spacious combined lounge area can now handle more than 600.
The airport has also added a swing gate, which means they can use it to load passengers from the ground or via a ramp.
The new café fits with the airport’s philosophy to maintain a local flavour.
“We’re the right size of airport, we don’t need to have the mega-national brands, we like the local flavour,” said Dickson, noting Victoria’s Spinnakers opened a location behind security in 2014.
Jim Townley, president of Fresh Cup, said the location is like their Vancouver spot inside a grocery store and will suit the airport, while offering an experience for travellers, coming or going.
“We intend to do some cool stuff here,” said Townley, noting in time they will offer coffee-infused alcoholic beverages. “Right now we are focused on the coffee and giving people a good coffee and food experience.”
With the first phase of the departure lounge complete, attention will turn to the next two phases that will see a new washroom block established, the creation of a 10,000-square-foot basement area for offices and storage and when that’s done an expanded facility for Spinnakers.
The washroom block will get guidance from the Rick Hansen Foundation and Changing Places, to offer the latest in accessible amenities including adult changing tables and hoists to help get adults out of chairs.
“Often people don’t think of that, but it’s an uncomfortable reality for many people, especially when they’re travelling,” said Cunningham.
He said there will also be conventional washroom facilities and gender-neutral facilities.
In addition, they will add a unique feature for those who travel with dogs and support animals — a pet-relief area on the aircraft side of security.
Cunningham said that will eliminate a huge headache for people who travel with pets who previously had to leave the departure area, go outside and then pass through security again whenever their animals required a relief break.
Dickson said those phases are to be completed next spring.
“The art of airport management is really lining up the steps and trying to stay ahead,” he said.
The next moves may revolve around ride-sharing and mapping out staging areas for companies like Uber and Lyft, if they decide to set up shop in Victoria.
