Red Deer is getting a control tower

[Lotro]

NAV Canada announced on social media yesterday (but not on their corporate website?) the following:

We’re changing service at #RedDeer, Alberta in response to @flyreddeer ’s growing traffic – transitioning from aerodrome advisory services to air traffic control services by August 2021. Learn more: http://bit.ly/334h2m1

CATCA the Canadian Air Traffic Controller Association (ATC Union) was close behind with this tidbit:

Big news! The Red Deer Airport will become CATCA’s 44th control tower. We hope to be fully open & operational by August 2021. / La 44e tour de contrôle de l’ACCTA sera aménagée à l’aéroport de Red Deer. Elle devrait entrer en activité effectivement d’ici août 2021.

I'd heard traffic was bananas at Red Deer, but I'm surprised to see a tower opening. NAV Canada has been closing towers (YSB, YKZ) and I'm a little surprised by this move. I would have expected an announcement about a remote camera based tower. Of course, a lot can happen in 2 years including a traffic drop off or a camera announcement.

Anyone know what's making Red Deer so busy?

[5x5]

Very high volume of training flights.

[KissPlusOne]

International students crashing into each other...

[CanadianBird]

2 busy training schools (Skywings and Montair), Airspray Aviation, Buffalo airways, and the local General Aviation community.... Granted, it's no Springbank, but it can be heavily congested with student pilots.

[FishermanIvan]

Blows my mind that YKZ doesn’t have a tower anymore but Red Deer does.

[7ECA]

Check out the CADORS for YQF, it's a freaking gong show with the FSS. I can only imagine how much fun the controllers will have for the first..., what am I saying, they'll all be out on stress leave in the first few weeks.

[youhavecontrol]

I am more relieved than I am surprised. I haven't flown there in nearly 10 years since my training, but it was a favorite place to go. When I saw the CFS updates since Montair moved in, I thought "NOPE." Maybe a tower will make it more bearable to fly into now. Super busy FSS stations are almost worse than useless, especially when you add ESL to the mix.

[Lotro]

Blows my mind that YKZ doesn’t have a tower anymore but Red Deer does.

Why?

Traffic at Buttonville was wayyy down before the tower closed. Looks like 3,000/mth (36K/yr), I'd guess that Red Deer is pushing more than that.

https://buttonvilleflyingclub.com/resou ... 3-2018.pdf

Air traffic movements at Red Deer in 2018 were 79,617, up from 47,555 in 2016. Light aircraft accounted for 95% of airport air traffic in 2018, 70% of which were Cessna 172s

http://www.navcanada.ca/EN/products-and ... nt--EN.pdf

Brampton seems alright with no tower (I hear they don't want one), they boast 110,000/year.

https://www.bramptonflightcentre.com/co ... formation/

It sucks that the tower in YKZ closed, I used to fly out of that place when it was busy, but it isn't as busy anymore. Maybe busy shouldn't be a requirement for a tower?

[charrois]

Great news! Red Deer had more movements this past year than Villeneuve (the main Edmonton-area training airport with a control tower), and recent changes to their airspace and procedures were clearly more of a confusing "hack" to try and improve significantly worsening safety issues over the past few years as traffic has grown, than a real effort to fix the problem "properly" with a tower and hopefully controlled airspace.

[goingnowherefast]

Hopefully this is a trend. There are other very busy MF airports in Canada that are a complete gong show in need of a tower.