Since moving to Canada 20 years ago, I’ve flown through Toronto’s Pearson Airport dozens of times. And every single time, I dread the experience. Pearson is plagued by many of the problems familiar at Canada’s large airports: outdated infrastructure, confusing signage, lacklustre amenities and long baggage waits. In AirHelp’s 2026 ranking of 279 airports worldwide, Pearson placed 263rd, falling 61 spots from the previous year. It even made global headlines in 2022, when it briefly experienced the most delays of any airport in the world. In its crowded terminals, I’ve often given up trying to find something as simple as an empty seat beside a working outlet. Passport control after an international arrival on a busy day would be my nominee for Dante’s tenth circle of hell.
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Pearson’s problems are serious enough that the airport is now spending billions just to bring its aging systems and terminals up to speed, and billions more will likely be needed to get there. Clearly, something has to change. In September, Prime Minister Mark Carney took action, announcing something he'd hinted at for nearly a year: the federal government will open Canada’s four biggest airports, in Calgary, Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver, to private operators.
There is no denying that private investment can help deliver much-needed improvements to our airports. But handing them over wholesale to private companies isn’t the only way to attract that capital, and I don’t think it’s the right one. Instead, Ottawa should bring in more private money and expertise without giving up public control of critical transportation infrastructure. And yes, there’s a way to do both.
Carney is selling his idea as a win-win: Private operators would bring the capital and business savvy needed to modernize airports and improve the passenger experience, while also unlocking billions for other infrastructure meant to strengthen Canada’s economic sovereignty.
But I’m not buying it. The problem is that airports are natural monopolies. Travellers in cities like Calgary or Vancouver don’t have the option of using another major airport if fees rise or service deteriorates. The same goes for airport staff, who may have limited recourse if wages are suppressed or working conditions worsen. Placing their operations under the control of companies primarily accountable to investors makes us vulnerable to many of the risks that come with profit-seeking private monopolies.
By the early 1990s, taxpayers were contributing $135 million a year just to keep the airports running.
Historically, the government owned and operated Canada’s major airports, with taxpayers covering costs that airport revenues did not. The issue was that those revenues didn’t cover the full cost of operating the system, and Ottawa was also responsible for making up the rest. By the early 1990s, taxpayers were contributing $135 million a year just to keep the airports running, and neither the airports nor the government was investing much into improving them.
The government responded by transferring day-to-day management to local, not-for-profit airport authorities while maintaining public ownership of the land. Twenty-three of Canada’s largest airport currently operate under this model, and they collectively pay the feds about $500 million a year in rent. Any surpluses are reinvested into airport operations and infrastructure.
Unlike private companies, airport authorities cannot raise capital by selling equity stakes to investors. To finance new terminals, runways and other infrastructure, they rely on borrowing and airport improvement fees charged to passengers. Canada’s airports have invested more than $30 billion since the 1990s, much of which was financed through those fees. At Toronto Pearson, departing passengers currently pay a $40 airport improvement fee.
Airports such as Heathrow, Frankfurt and Dubai have invested billions to become commercial centres, with hotels, restaurants, offices and industrial space.
Federal rent adds another burden. The government can collect up to 12% of an airport’s gross revenue, but that money doesn’t have to be reinvested in aviation. John Gradek, a McGill University lecturer in aviation management, says this leaves airports facing major capital needs while limiting their ability to modernize. He points to airports such as Heathrow, Frankfurt and Dubai, which have invested billions to become commercial centres, with hotels, restaurants, offices and industrial space generating revenue beyond passenger charges. Private investment could similarly help develop underused Canadian airport land. That’s vital for the broader economy given that air transportation accounts for nearly a third of the value of Canada’s non-US cargo traffic.
In his September announcement, Carney called the new arrangement covering the country’s four biggest airports a “long-term concession” and confirmed that his government would retain ownership of the underlying land and assets. But according to David Macdonald, a senior economist with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, the long lease terms involved mean this arrangement is tantamount to a private-sector sale. The concessions would run for 50 years, and could potentially be extended to 99. For generations of travellers, the companies running these airports could effectively become the face of Canada’s most vital aviation infrastructure.
Privatization "doesn’t necessarily translate to better service or cheaper prices for the travelling public if the operators just pocket the profit.”
Gradek estimates the four concessions could generate a one-time payment of $40–$50 billion for the federal government. With airports outside those four needing an estimated $15-$20 billion in upgrades, he says, the proceeds could help modernize regional airports across the country, including those in the North.
Despite those alluring figures, Carney’s plan has drawn criticism from unions representing airport workers, which warn that privatization could worsen wages and working conditions while shifting the focus from public service to shareholder returns. Macdonald shares those concerns. Private operators, he says, could outsource work, reduce unionized employment, or trim staff. “From a business perspective, that can produce an operation with higher revenues and lower expenditures,” he says. “But that doesn’t necessarily translate to better service or cheaper prices for the travelling public if the operators just pocket the profit.”
Private operators could design terminals in ways that maximize commercial activity, rather than moving travellers through as efficiently as possible.
With few realistic alternatives to major airports, travellers may also be forced to absorb higher fees and be nickel-and-dimed in creative (and arguably, predatory) ways. The UK offers a glimpse of how that can work: at Heathrow and other for-profit airports, drivers can be charged simply to drop someone off at the terminal. There’s also a troubling parallel between this privatization scheme and Ontario’s Highway 407, which was leased to private investors for 99 years in 1999. The deal produced a large upfront payment for the province, but tolls have since risen steadily while the asset has generated billions in private revenue.
Accountability could weaken, too. While safety and security would remain federally regulated, private operators would be less exposed to public pressure over issues such as service quality and affordability, and could more easily disregard it than governments or public authorities.
The profit motive could also subtly reshape how airports run. For example, private operators could favour routes that generate the highest returns while reducing service on less profitable connections, potentially leaving Canadians who depend on them with fewer options. William Morrison, a professor of economics at Wilfrid Laurier University’s Lazaridis School of Business and Economics, notes that for-profit airports may also have an incentive to focus on passenger “dwell time,” or how long travellers remain in a terminal before their flight.
I favour a middle-ground approach: open the existing not-for-profit model to far more private investment without handing over the keys entirely.
When all is said and done, modernizing Canada’s airports will require billions of dollars, and that money has to come from somewhere. That’s why I favour a middle-ground approach: open the existing not-for-profit model to far more private investment without handing over the keys entirely.
The government itself has already laid out ways to do this. A 2025 Transport Canada policy statement outlined three avenues for attracting private capital while keeping non-profit airport authorities in control.
In this schema, the non-profits would sublease airport land to private investors for developments, which could range from cargo facilities to energy projects. The non-profits could also contract private firms to provide services, like facilities operations and maintenance. They could create for-profit subsidiaries that can attract equity investment, or enter joint ventures with pension funds and other institutional investors. In each case, the airports remain non-profits, but they and their travellers get the benefit of the profit motive.
Those for-profit subsidiaries offer perhaps the most promising route. Private investors could finance or operate new terminals, hotels, shopping centres and other facilities, sharing the risks and returns of individual projects while the not-for-profit authority retains overall control.
Passengers would still shoulder much of the cost of running and improving our airports through these avenues. But I would rather those revenues flow through a not-for-profit system whose mandate is to reinvest them in infrastructure and improved service, instead of through operators whose entire raison d’etre is to deliver returns to shareholders. Canada needs private capital and expertise. It doesn’t need to give up public control to get them.
