Construction of the new CA$12 million (US$10.6 million) Air Cargo Logistics Facility at John C. Munro Hamilton International Airport in Ontario can’t come soon enough for Cargojet as it heads toward the start of a new contract which will double its business. Ground was broken earlier this month for the new building, which will be a major upgrade over current facilities.
“The Hamilton airport has never had a proper cross-dock facility,” says Jamie Porteous, Cargojet’s executive vice president. “We’ve been working out of old hangars and old terminals and it’s long overdue. Hamilton is our hub and the new facility will more than double the size of our existing capacity and we will be able to handle cargo more efficiently.”
Beginning on April 1, 2015, Cargojet will begin a seven-year contract for domestic air cargo network services for Purolator and mail for Canada Post. Kelowna Flightcraft, headquartered in Kelowna, British Columbia, currently has the contract.
About half of Cargojet’s volume is courier-type business, with UPS being one of its largest customers. Porteous says the other half is typical freight forwarder cargo and persishables. The new cargo facility, due to open during the second quarter of 2015, will provide cool chain facilities in Hamilton for the first time, he says.
Cargojet is rapidly expanding its fleet to handle the new business. By the end of the year, the company will have 22 aircraft, primarily 767s and 757s. Cargojet will initially take half the space of the 77,000-square-foot facility and may eventually take more than that, Porteous says. Canadian and provincial governments are providing CA$8 million (US$7.1 million) of the building’s cost, while TradePort International Corp., which operates airport, is contributing CA$4 million (US$3.5 million).