Statistics Canada (StatCan) released a report recently that revealed virtually no traffic growth for the month of December, 2018 compared to December, 2017, at Canada’s small airports. StatCan defines a small airport as a certified aerodrome having neither a Nav Canada control tower nor a flight service station.

Takeoffs, landings or simulated approaches (all ‘movements’ for StatCan purposes) at the 123 airports for which data was available in both years totalled 36,020 for the month of December, 2018 vs 35,902 for the month of December, 2017, representing a slight increase of 0.3 percent.

StatCan has data available for 130 airports for December, 2018, and from it identifies 10 airports that account for 39 percent of December, 2018’s aircraft movements: Moosenee, Ont. (2,143), Goose Bay, N.L. (1,897), Trois-Rivières, Que. (1,820), Red Lake, Ont. (1,608), Peterborough, Ont. (1,587), Island Lake, Man. (1,134), St. Theresa Point, Man. (1,098), Pickle Lake, Ont. (1,087), Barrie-Orillia-Lake Simcoe Regional, Ont. (1,024), and Comox, B.C. with 943 movements (Comox’s airport is in fact CFB Comox, home of the RCAF’s 19 Wing, which operates its own control tower, and restricts civilian traffic to mainly airlines).

December, 2018 numbers gathered from 111 airports also revealed 28,569 itinerant movements (flights between airports), with Moosonee and Goose Bay airports reporting the most (2,127 and 1,897 respectively).

As for local movements (taking off and landing at the same airport), 6,530 were reported in December, 2018 with Peterborough being the most active with 1,246 movements.