More complaints about Windsor flight connections

Yet another complaint about Toronto to Windsor air service. A friend last week, returning from Western Canada, had her Windsor flight cancelled, necessitating a train ride home. “We were fifteen hours longer getting home because of Air Canada.” This is the third time this has happened," she said. “It took me less time to fly from India than it did from Victoria.” Well, I’ve suffered flight cancellations too – always from TO to Windsor and never the other way around – also, over the past three decades. The first time, in the 1990’s, I hitched a ride home with famed (now deceased) Windsor Police detective Neal Jessop, who was also on the flight and rented a car and we made it back to Windsor in the dead of night. The second, more than 10 years ago,  I was stuck at the nearby Holiday Inn in Milton and shuttled very early back to the airport for the first flight next morning back to Windsor. And, in December 2022, my SO and I, returning from Italy, had the last flight of the day cancelled. That is, to Windsor. Air Canada would put us up in a hotel but for one night only, when the next available flight was two days away! So I spent almost $300 out of pocket for a car rental. (I forget whether AC provided compensation but unlikely since they offered a hotel voucher but for one night!)…..I know people who refuse to use Windsor Intl Airport because of all-too-frequent flight cancellations. I still use the airport. I’m a fairly frequent flyer and most of the time the connections work. But I know people who adamantly will not use YQG (branded Your Quick Gateway) because they can’t trust flights departing or arriving on time or at all. In 2022 I wrote a story for my companion website WindsorOntarioNews.com. I found there were even travel agents who refuse to book through Windsor airport: ‘Al Valente, owner of Valente Travel, said he “purposely” does not fly out of Windsor because he can’t depend on flights not being cancelled. “It’s pretty sad to say because I love to support Windsor and the airport but we have to be honest with our clients and just say it's unreliable,” he said. Maria Voros of Complete Travel said she was heading to Europe but flying out of Detroit. “Why? Because I don’t want this happening to me,” she said. “Half of the time they don’t go, they cancel the flight.” Airport CEO Mark Galvin said most of the time there are no flight problems. But there can be bumps. “It’s very fluid, you have a day where everything is totally on time, even a flight’s 10 minutes early, and then the next day you might have two or three delays.”’ Said my friend: "I truly get the feeling that Windsor International Airport is a “joke title”.  Our Border City is not taken seriously as a hub of industry, technology, etc.  Proof of the pudding is the lack of connectivity by air, both coming and going."  

- Ron Stang, Windsor Ontario Canada, a frequent traveller