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GUELPH — Ontario Premier Doug Ford said Thursday he believes his government will ultimately be successful in its push to expand Toronto’s island airport to allow jets to land, but he is not indicating how he’ll achieve that.
The land that Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport sits on was governed as a tripartite agreement formerly between the city of Toronto, the federal government and the Toronto Port Authority, which is a federal agency, but the province took over the city’s role earlier this year.
Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government rejected Ford’s proposal last month following a consultation largely opposed to the idea of jets.
Carney has said that the results of the federal consultation were clear, but that he is not permanently ruling out allowing jets at the airport because “forever is a long time.”
It is unclear if Ford is viewing those comments as an opening, but he made it clear Thursday that he is not abandoning his vision.
“As we move forward, I truly believe we’re going to convert that airport,” he said at an unrelated press conference in Guelph, Ont.
“Let the people decide. Let the market decide. If people don’t like it, they aren’t going to have planes there. But guess what? Every single person knows that airport will be a phenomenal success.”
Ford said an expanded island airport would boost the economy and give passengers more convenient travel options and lower fees. He has asked for more polling to be conducted, he said.
Sources who were granted anonymity because they were not authorized to share internal discussions have previously said Ford and Carney had a handshake deal in which the province supported Carney’s high-speed rail plan in exchange for federal support for the airport expansion.
Carney has said he did not tell Ford he would greenlight the project.
When asked Thursday about the Alto high-speed rail project between Quebec City and Toronto being championed by Carney’s government, Ford was not definitive on whether he supports it.
“Let’s see how we move forward,” he said.
“I always believe in working with different levels of government, but I’ll tell you one thing, my eastern Ontario caucus and the people out in eastern Ontario, they’re losing their minds about Alto right now.”
Eleven members of Ford’s caucus from eastern Ontario issued a joint statement days after the federal government nixed the Billy Bishop expansion, questioning the viability of the Alto project and saying the federal government was ignoring local concerns.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 13, 2026.
Allison Jones, The Canadian Press
