Lethbridge: Alberta’s airline hub of yesteryear

Written by Ian MacLachlan and Bruce MacKay

Friday, July 31 2009, 10:38 PM

Tens of thousands attended last week’s Alberta International Air Show, evidence of local interest in aircraft and aerobatic flight while the Lethbridge Herald editorial of July 29 showcased the pioneers of Lethbridge’s aviation history. In observing Canada’s Centennial of Flight, we would like add a third dimension to the planes and the people who fly them. We want to draw attention to the lower profile but no less important aviation infrastructure that played an influential role in the development of Lethbridge. Growth in commercial aviation in the United States during the 1930s prompted Canada to protect domestic airspace, pre-empt American airlines from expanding into Canada and reinforce the tenuous east-west links of Confederation. Accordingly, Trans-Canada Air Lines (TCA) was created as a Crown corporation in 1937 with a mandate to operate a transcontinental passenger service from Montreal to Vancouver which began on April 1, 1939. While TCA was responsible for flying the aircraft, the federal government was responsible for creating the aviation infrastructure which became known as the “Trans-Canada Airway,” the system of airports, navigational aids and meteorological services that were required to sustain a scheduled passenger air service. The Trans-Canada Airway was built and maintained by the federal Department of Transport; it owned no planes, operated no flights and sold no tickets. Yet it provided the basic network of 19 principal airports, each with two or more paved runways, light beacons to mark obstructions and radio transmitters to support the first generation of radio direction-finding apparatus. Between major terminal airports where passenger traffic and refuelling were expected, secondary or “hundred-mile airports” were built at locations such as Cowley to provide lighted all-weather airfields for emergency landings. The Trans-Canada Airway tended to follow the railway because rail access was essential to support construction and deliver aviation fuel. In crossing the Rockies, the Trans-Canada Airway followed the Crowsnest Pass on its way to Vancouver because the mountains were about 1,000 feet lower than the Kicking Horse Pass and the operational ceiling of 1930’s aircraft was limited. The more southern route was preferable in other respects as well: it was shorter, the weather was better and “aerodromes” for emergency landings had already been built in places such as Fernie, Cranbrook and Trail. Thus Lethbridge, with a population of 13,500, became an important junction point with non-stop service to Vancouver and Regina while Calgary and Edmonton, with populations of about 100,000 each in 1931, were bypassed and linked to the Lethbridge hub by a feeder route. In 1938, TCA built the distinctive brick-and-steel hangar which still stands at Lethbridge County Airport as an artifact of the time. For nine years, from 1939 to 1948, Lethbridge was the airline hub of Western Canada, handling all east-west transcontinental air passenger traffic. It was also the main port of entry for scheduled air traffic originating in Salt Lake City, a key link on the north-south “pine-to-palm” route from Southern California to Alaska. From 1941 until 1950, Lethbridge was Alberta’s only international airport! Geography conferred a locational advantage on the city that gave it a central position in the airline network, yet Lethbridge was never able to parlay this centrality into a competitive advantage. In 1948, TCA acquired North Star aircraft which could fly higher with a longer range than the older Lockheed Electras. Thus the Lethbridge hub became obsolete and unnecessary as the transcontinental route shifted north. Geography was destiny in the creation of aviation infrastructure but sadly for Lethbridge, its locational advantage ebbed away as aircraft technology evolved. Ian MacLachlan teaches in the Dept. of Geography and Bruce MacKay is the co-ordinator of the Liberal Education program at the University of Lethbridge.