Canada working with air industry partners to reduce wait times at Canadian airports

Toronto Pearson International Airport. Image credit: Unsplash

An update was issued on July 15 jointly by the Minister of Transport, Omar Alghabra, the Minister of Health, Jean-Yves Duclos, the Minister of Public Safety, Marco Mendicino, and the Minister of Tourism and Associate Minister of Finance, Randy Boissonnault, on progress being made by the Government of Canada and industry partners to reduce wait times and congestion at Canadian airports.

Alghabra’s continued ongoing collaboration with senior leadership at airports and airlines of all sizes across the country to ensure help reduce delays and keep travellers moving.

This week alone, Alghabra met with the leadership of London, Windsor, and Winnipeg airports.

The latest data includes

80 percent of passengers in Canada’s airports were screened by CATSA within 15 minutes, despite higher passenger numbers during the week of July 7-13; Since the beginning of May, Calgary International Airport and Toronto Pearson International Airport made gains, with 85 percent and close to 80 percent of passengers screened within 15 minutes, respectively; about 75 percent and 68 percent of passengers at Vancouver International Airport and Montreal Trudeau International Airport, were screened within 15 minutes, respectively; less than 2 percent across all airports are waiting more than 45 minutes to be screened.

Latest highlights include

Over 100 percent of summer target levels have increased in the number of screening officers at Toronto Pearson International Airport and Vancouver International Airport are now, efforts to increase screening staff levels at all airports continue.

A new information resource has been developed by the Canadian Transportation Agency to help passengers experiencing flight cancellations, delays or lost luggage issues during their travel.

Travellers arriving at Toronto Pearson International Airport or Vancouver International Airport can now save time by using the CBSA Declaration optional feature in ArriveCAN to submit their customs and immigration declaration in advance of arrival. This feature will be expanded to other airports in the future, including Montreal-Trudeau International Airport this summer.

On July 19, 2022, for fully-vaccinated travellers arriving by air to the four largest airports across the country – Vancouver, Calgary, Toronto and Montreal mandatory random testing will resume, offsite.

There will be no testing conducted inside airports without disrupting the flow of passengers through airports.

The Government of Canada and air industry partners continue to add significant resources and streamline processes to ease congestion and help keep travellers moving, including: ArriveCAN improvements

#Canadianairports; #Reducewaittimes