Good morning from Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport! My name is Alex, and today,
I’m finally taking a flight with Porter Airlines!
Porter is easily one of the most unique Canadian airlines, operating a fleet
of Dash 8s out of Billy Bishop to various destinations in Eastern Canada and the US.
Billy Bishop Airport itself is also quite unique.
Located very close to downtown Toronto on Toronto Island, the airport is accessed
through this pedestrian tunnel, or a short ferry, which wasn’t running today.
Since their launch in 2006, Porter has capitalized on this convenience, and now flies 29 Dash 8-400s,
offering what they call “refined and exceptional service” on their flights.
And so, with last year’s news that Porter would be expanding their fleet to include the Embraer
E195-E2 flying out of Toronto-Pearson, Ottawa, Montreal, and Halifax, I knew it was about time
I gave them a try. So, I grabbed a relatively cheap ticket and booked this flight to Ottawa.
Billy Bishop Airport is named in honour of Canadian World War I flying ace William Bishop,
and already, it’s super impressive. Checking
in was pretty straightforward online, and I got a printed boarding pass pretty quickly.
It was pretty quiet this morning, with only two departures from the
Canadian side of the airport, and security was super quick.
After that, it was down another escalator, and I was also really impressed with this waiting area!
The whole place basically has the feel of a big airline lounge,
and there are some places to grab a bite to eat.
Granted, it did help that it was pretty empty today anyway, but I really like this airport!
Another part of what makes this airport so unique is that its longest runway
isn’t even 4,000 feet long! Of course, that’s still doable for Dash 8s,
but the -400 models are the largest planes you see flying into here. That’s partly why
Porter hasn’t really gone any further west than Ontario. There was talk about extending
the runway to accommodate larger aircraft like the CSeries, but… that’s a whole ‘nother topic.
Waiting over at Gate 2 for this flight to Ottawa is our Dash 8 for today,
one of Porter’s many Dash 8-400 models registered as Charlie Golf Lima Quebec Kilo.
This Dash 8-400 was delivered in April of 2009,
making it around 13 years old at the time of the flight.
So, without further ado, let’s go see what Porter’s onboard experience is like!
My seat for today is 3A, designated by Porter as a “Premium” seat.
The legroom here is, although I don’t make it look very good,
is actually not the worst I’ve ever had on a Dash 8!
I do like the fact that there’s all of this free space underneath the seats,
although the window seats do lose some floor space anyway to the curvature of the fuselage.
The headrests don’t move, but they do have these nicely branded headrest covers.
3A also has this pretty solid engine view with two windows.
There’s also a seatback pocket underneath, which looks to have an… actual in-flight magazine in
it! Haven’t seen one of those in a while, and I’ll check it out once we’re in the air.
As you can tell outside, it’s one of those classic Eastern Canadian winter days, and I had a feeling
we wouldn’t be seeing much of downtown Toronto on the climb out. Nevertheless, here’s our
departure from Billy Bishop, deicing, taxiing, and making a very powerful takeoff from runway 08.
As we climb out of the weather into some beautiful blue sky, here’s a look around the cabin.
These seats all come with a solid, yet pretty lightweight tray table,
which doesn’t slide, but has a place for a cup and a tablet.
In the seatback pocket, Porter had their safety card for the Dash 8-400,
…An air sickness bag,
…And an actual in-flight magazine, which had some super interesting articles
and plenty of information about Porter, as well their upcoming expansion.
The seatback pocket itself is a decent size, durable and could fit a water bottle.
Now, one of the things that Porter prides themselves on is their on-board service, and
so I was definitely curious to see just how much they’d have to offer on a short flight to Ottawa.
“...And ladies and gentlemen, just a quick update here from the flight deck, we have been told by
the air traffic controller in this sector that we can expect our flight to be off and on quite
bumpy, so due to that we aren’t going to be able to perform any in-cabin service unfortunately.
But luckily this is quite a short flight and we’ll have you on the ground here in Ottawa
in probably about 30 minutes or so. We appreciate your patience.”
Yeah, so that didn’t quite happen, which was a shame to say the least.
I was really looking forward to those Porter glasses, but of course,
safety comes first, and we ended up getting tossed around quite a bit.
Porter’s Dash 8-400s seat 78 passengers in the usual 2-2 layout. However, just two years ago,
their cabins looked a bit different, with 74 seats and a bit more legroom instead.
In March 2020, Porter ceased operations temporarily,
a pause which ended up lasting a year and a half. In that time though, they had apparently
redone the cabins on their entire Dash 8 fleet, replacing those older seats with these newer,
and lighter, slimline ones, along with LED lighting throughout the cabin.
That did also mean the addition of an extra row, which puts Porter’s Dash 8-400
cabin right in line with Air Canada Express and WestJet Encore’s 78 seats.
I wish I had tried them out before that refit took place just to compare,
but either way, these seats were fine for this short flight.
It did also help that I had a free seat next to me, as did just about everyone in the cabin.
It may have just been my choice of flying on a random February morning,
but there were only 20 passengers on board.
It’s also worth mentioning that the very first row on Porter’s Dash 8s
may have the best legroom of any Dash 8 operator!
Interestingly, they also have a small closet in the front
for passenger jackets, which is a very nice touch.
Pretty soon though, we headed down through the clouds once again, into some
clearly icy conditions.
And, to our wonderful cabin crew’s credit, they handed out water bottles and snacks to
everyone as we descended, which was super nice of them to make sure we didn’t leave empty-handed.
I’ll give my final thoughts on the whole Porter experience after landing,
so here’s our arrival onto Ottawa’s runway 07.
Well, that was Porter, and I gotta say, as a Western Canadian, I’ve been missing out!
This was a really enjoyable flight - from the convenience and relaxing
atmosphere of Billy Bishop Airport to the friendly service on board,
I think Porter just became one of my favourite airlines.
Comfort-wise, well, with Dash 8-400s, I think you just have to manage your expectations a bit. But,
the idea of Porter translating what they do so well with their hospitality and service on
board to a larger, even more comfortable plane, has me very excited for the E2s.
It is a shame that they couldn’t have expanded upon the existing Billy Bishop
operation with larger planes, but I think they can make it work out of Pearson.
Of course, having said that, Pearson can be… hectic at times,
so I’m also curious to see how Porter will make this split airport operation work,
and how they’ll bring the Porter experience to at least a small part of Pearson.
Regardless, I think they have a very exciting future ahead of them,
and I can’t wait to fly with Porter again!
Thanks for watching this long-awaited trip report with Porter, and I’ll catch you next time.