Empty Flights

The summer is slowly winding down and the old routines are starting up again. Margot is back in school for her 6th and last year at École élémentaire catholique Saint-François-d'Assise (in person!), my work is starting to develop hybrid in-person work plans, and autumn is just around the corner.

Since I'm still working from home I took the opportunity to visit my family in Newmarket and Toronto, Ontario. The flight from Ottawa to Toronto is actually very short: just 1 hour.  It used to be a commuter flight for business travelers.  However, this time, my experience was very different. For one, it's all masks, all the time. But I'm used to that now from my recent trip to Alberta. The biggest change I noticed this time was that there was no one on the plane!

It was pretty lonely back there in seat 10D

I stand corrected, there were six passengers on my flight (although I think was an airline employee). Toronto Island Airport, where I landed, was even more surreal. There was nobody there! And that includes outside the airport too. Normally the entrance to the airport is wall-to-wall taxi cabs waiting to pick up passengers.  This time? Not a single cab!

 

Just me at Billy Bishop Airport

 

Now it may be that all of this is due to the fact that Porter Airlines, which is the main airline flying out of that airport, has only restarted flying. However, I'm curious if short haul business travel will ever come back again. I used to travel for work a lot but those days seem like a distant memory now. Another sign as to just how much the Coronavirus has changed things?