Edmonton City Council voted Wednesday afternoon to close the City Centre Airport in stages after years of fierce debate over the issue. The final vote was 10 to three.
The closing is set to be done in two phases. First, the runway behind NAIT will be shut down, ending scheduled flights.
Medevac and private flights will continue for now on the other runway. And the change will allow the city to begin remediation of the land and will eliminate some building height restrictions downtown.
The second phase will consist of shutting down the other runway and transferring medevac flights to the Edmonton International Airport.
At this point, no timeline on the second phase has been nailed down. Edmonton Mayor Stephen Mandel insists that Wednesday's decision is firm.
"The motion is quite clear, it says closure and so closure there needs to be more of a schedule," he said.
Mandel wants to see the first runway shut down in the coming months.
The initial plan is to have the land developed over the long term to build an environmentally friendly neighbourhood. The focus will be on transit, sustainability and high density.
Once the first strip has been shut down the city will immediately begin an environmental assessment and come up with a plan for the development.
Eventually, an international design competition will be held to determine what the new development could look like. The design plans will have to be submitted by November but it's expected the entire piece of land could take 23-28 years to fully develop.
With files from Bill Fortier
