The 80-Year Tunnel at Billy Bishop Airport

Access to the Toronto Islands has been a concern since the 19th century.

Toronto has grown and changed in many ways over the centuries, but there is one thing that Torontonians today share with Torontonians of the past- debate over access to the Toronto Islands.

From the 1880s to the 1930s, Hanlan’s Point offered a resort-like atmosphere for Torontonians, functioning as a “public playground” with an amusement park and stadium. People loved the area and its beaches. It was considered important that there should be easy, rapid, and cheap transit so that Torontonians could use the island as a summer getaway.

Proposals in the late 19th century included linking the islands to the mainland via streetcar (using a swing bridge) or a tunnel. However, neither of these ideas took form. At the time, some island residents and visitors argued trolley cars would spoil this island. It was important for them that the island remain a quiet, peaceful, and rattle-free zone.

An underwater tunnel to the proposed island airport was considered essential.

Toronto continued to grow and develop at the turn of the 20th century and the decades that followed. As aviation technology improved during this time, small airfields popped up around the city. The advancement in flying technology and its greater use as a mode of transportation following the First World War sparked the desire for a larger city airport. 

In 1929, the Toronto Harbour Commission proposed a city airport on the western edge of the Toronto Islands, where Billy Bishop Airport now stands. It was this proposal that allowed a fixed link to the island to be more seriously considered. The island airport was a strong feature in the debates surrounding the approval and construction of a fixed link between the mainland and the islands. The proposal focused on a tunnel underneath the western entrance to Toronto Harbour, designed to accommodate both cars and pedestrians.

Supporters of the tunnel argued that it was an integral feature to the construction and operation of the future airport. The tunnel would allow easier movement of supplies, vehicles, and people to and from the proposed airport, in addition to providing access to the rest of the island for Torontonians to enjoy. Getting approval for the island airport tunnel, however, was not so simple.

The proposed tunnel faced opposition at the federal and municipal levels, resulting in seemingly endless debates.

Like today, much of the development of Toronto, specifically the waterfront, was very contested. Some supported the tunnel, but not the airport; others supported the airport, but not the tunnel. Many supported both. Others, neither. 

The proposed tunnel was heavily debated in the House of Commons on April 17, 1935 as part of a bill to provide money for various relief works across the country. While many Conservative Members of Parliament supported the tunnel project and argued for its importance to the island airport and the island as a whole, Liberal Members of Parliament were not convinced. Many argued that this project was not essential to Toronto, and that there were better uses for the requested $1,000,000 than a tunnel that only a few hundred people would use.

After seven hours of debate and “silly answer[s]”, Bill 63, including the proposed tunnel, failed to pass in the House of Commons. However, the debate continued and a Liberal’s motion against the tunnel was ruled out of order in May 1935, allowing the bill to pass.

Locally, opposition to the tunnel voiced concerns of increased vehicle traffic on the islands — an outcome many island residents and local politicians, especially Councillor Sam McBride, wanted to avoid. Much like in 1894, increased traffic was considered incompatible with the islands’ image as a public playground for Torontonians.

These concerns, in addition to the expenses that the airport tunnel would cost the city, had drawn out long debates in City Council. They debated well into the early hours of August 8, 1935. Eventually, when a vote was taken at 2:30 am, the proposed tunnel was supported by a vote of 15 to 7.

After months of debate, the tunnel was approved for construction; however, it was never completed.

In May 1935, two years before the construction of the airport, Prime Minister R.B. Bennett approved the construction of the tunnel to make the city airport feasible and to bring more employment opportunities to Toronto. Plans were quickly put into action following federal and municipal approval of the tunnel. On October 8, 1935, construction of the airport tunnel began. Construction was well underway by late October, with long ditches hollowed out for the tunnel and steel pilings and crib bedding installed. 

Although construction of the tunnel had already begun, changes in government renewed opposition to its completion. This time, those who opposed the tunnel won with newly elected Prime Minister William Lyon McKenzie King halting construction on October 29, 1935. By December of that year, the tunnel project was officially cancelled and construction was to be reversed at a large cost.

Completed construction of a tunnel to the island airport would take another 80 years!

Over the years, a fixed link between the island airport and the mainland was proposed but continually overlooked.

With the cancellation of the island airport tunnel project in 1935, a cable ferry that crossed the 121-metre channel was the only way to access the island airport from the mainland. Unfortunately, the ferry was often out of service, usually because of severe weather or mechanical malfunction. 

One famous example happened in June 1942, which involved the namesake of the island airport himself: Air Marshal Billy Bishop. It took Bishop longer to get from the island airport to the mainland than it had taken for him to fly from Montreal to Toronto. One of the ferry’s cables snapped, stranding the ferry in the middle of the channel for two hours! Ironically, Billy Bishop had opposed the proposed island airport tunnel, previously advising the Department of Transportation that a cable ferry service to the airport was sufficient.

In the following decades, various agencies proposed a fixed link to the islands as part of expansion and redevelopment plans for both the airport and the islands as a whole. These, notably, even included the Toronto City Planning Board and the Toronto Harbour Commission in 1951. Similarly, an airport tunnel was considered integral to the success of the new STOL (Short Take Off and Landing) flights, which began at the island airport in the 1980s.

Despite the repeated vulnerability of the ferry to the weather and frequent malfunction, proposals for a fixed link were never adopted.

In 1983, the Toronto Harbour Commission, City of Toronto, and the federal government signed an agreement which mandated the island airport’s expansion.

The 1983 Tripartite Agreement limits the operations and expansion of the island airport and did not allow for the construction of a fixed link. This, however, did not stop further proposals. The need for a fixed link was reframed as a matter of safety for the island airport in 1993. However, the recommendation was not supported because the City did not want to amend the agreement, which was only one decade into its 50 year validity.

Unfortunately, the island airport was losing money, from a peak of $400,000 in 1987 to roughly $100,000 a year in 1999. Luckily, a City Council vote in November 2002 supported the airport’s new business plan and the construction of a bridge. With the Tripartite Agreement amended, government support given, and finances secured, it seemed like the fixed link was a sure thing. But if history was any indication, constructing a fixed link was tricky business.

City Council held firm in their support of the bridge despite community opposition. A crane was set up onsite during the last week of November 2003 in preparation for the construction of the bridge. This was the furthest any proposal of a fixed link to the island airport had gotten since the 1935 tunnel. Unfortunately for the island airport and supporters of the bridge, the events of 2003 mirrored those of 1935.

The bridge was a feature in the 2003 mayoral elections, with David Miller running on a platform opposing the bridge. He won the November election and called for another vote on the bridge in December 2003. This vote withdrew its support of the bridge. The City used public opinion, reflected by David Miller’s victory, to convince the federal government to withdraw their support for the bridge as well. As a result, the bridge project was cancelled. By 2005, regulations had been added to the Tripartite Agreement to once again prohibit the construction of a fixed link to the island airport. Opposition to the bridge had succeeded once more and then CEO of the Toronto Port Authority, Lisa Raitt, promised that “‘You will never hear about the bridge again.’”

In 2009, the Toronto Port Authority announced the intention to build a pedestrian tunnel from the mainland to the island airport.

Operations at the island airport had begun to take off again in the 2000s with the implementation of the airport’s new business plan. Traffic at the airport had increased significantly, from 29,000 in 2005 to over 1.1 million in 2010, stretching the capacity of the ferry to carry passengers to the island airport. As a result, Toronto Port Authority introduced the new 200 passenger and 15 vehicle Marilyn Bell I ferry and furthered plans for a pedestrian tunnel. The project was to be funded through private financing and the relatively new Airport Improvement Fee.

By 2010, the pedestrian tunnel had political and local support. In 2011, the 1983 Tripartite Agreement was amended again, this time in relation to the pedestrian tunnel. Once again, a fixed link to the island airport was approved. However, unlike previous proposals, this project was successful.

Construction of the ground breaking tunnel project began in 2012 and was completed in the spring of 2015. It took place over several stages of excavations and installations, such as waterproofing and steel reinforcement. Its design has six elevators on the mainland to transport passengers 100-ft down to the tunnel. The tunnel itself has a series of moving sidewalks to quickly move passengers to the island airport. The south-end of the tunnel allows pedestrians to use one of the longest escalator systems in Canada, a 153 step staircase, or two elevators to resurface to the terminal level.

Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport’s Pedestrian Tunnel is considered to be the first known underwater pedestrian tunnel that connects to an airport. It opened to the public on July 30, 2015, allowing quick and reliable access to the airport at all hours. Finally, after 80 years, a tunnel to the island airport was complete!

The tunnel today is an integral feature of the island airport, 89 years after it was first proposed.

Opponents of the tunnel, beginning in 1935, had argued that the airport tunnel was not worth the expense and would only benefit a few hundred people. Today, Billy Bishop Airport welcomes up to 2.8 million passengers a year from far and wide. The pedestrian tunnel dramatically improves passenger flow and experience, with approximately 90% of passengers opting to use the tunnel connection. 

This method of access between the airport and mainland is an integral feature of the airport and waterfront that helps connect Toronto to the rest of Canada and the world through fast and simplified travel to the terminal. It takes only 6 minutes to cross the 853-ft long tunnel, contributing to the airport’s status as one of the most walkable, bikeable airports in North America. 

Although the island airport has received its fixed link, public discussions of a fixed link to the rest of the Toronto Islands still occur, reflecting debates that occurred over the decades since 1894. Some hope that connection to the island can be achieved at the narrow crossings at the east or west ends of the island to allow for easier and cheaper access to the island facilities, while others argue that such connection is in opposition to the quiet park space and recreational activities that the islands offers. The history of the island airport tunnel reminds us how access to the Toronto Islands has been, and continues to be, shaped by debate.