Located in the South Okanagan of British Columbia, the town of Oliver (population 5,000) basks in the sunshine of Canada’s only official desert. It’s a tourist destination for those in the province’s colder climes as well as those from across Canada and nearby states in the US Pacific Northwest. Visitors come for the summer heat, the golf, the lakes, and the many wineries.

Oliver unabashedly markets itself as “Canada’s Wine Capital.” Tourism to its 40 wineries and associated high-end restaurants is vital to the Oliver economy.

●

The Oliver Municipal Airport was opened in 1937 and supported Allied forces during the Second World War. For decades it has supported general aviation. The Town of Oliver, the owner and operator of the Oliver Municipal Airport (CAU3), realized the airport could do more to serve its residents and surrounding communities. In the summer of 2023, the Town contracted to develop an airport master plan to ensure CAU3 was used to its full potential.

The Airport

The Oliver Municipal Airport has a single 3,355-foot paved runway. Airport activity includes two commercial helicopter businesses, air ambulance transfers, law enforcement, and search and rescue. The Province also uses the airport as a staging base for helicopters and personnel responding to wildfires.

The Town wants the airport to continue to serve as a social, emergency, economic, and environmental asset to Oliver and the wider region. Within the Town’s official community plan, the vision for the airport is “to become the premier regional airfield for the South Okanagan providing excellence in services and facilities available to air travelers and aircraft operators and to become recognized as a model for convenient access, cost effectiveness and effective partnerships with the Town’s residents and businesses.”

The Town’s goal of increasing air traffic at the airport faced several obstacles. Tourism in the Okanagan, and Oliver specifically, was hard hit during the pandemic and the subsequent recovery has been slower than hoped. Natural disasters such as fires and floods, extreme weather, landslides, road closures, airspace closures, and provincial emergency orders have all hurt tourism and slowed the return to post-COVID volumes.

Because the airport lands are leased from a Provincial Crown corporation, they must be used for airport uses only. There are also economic restrictions and environmental considerations as the lands are home to or near several species of protected and endangered plants and animals.

The Challenge

OEI developed a master plan that focused on aeronautical, social, and economic opportunities. After consulting a complete array of stakeholders—airport tenants, BC Air Ambulance Service, the Osoyoos Indian Band, current users, local businesses, and BC Wildfire Service—the team created a master plan with a 10-year horizon to its land use and infrastructure plans.

The OEI Team prepared an economic impact analysis of site employment and activity that considered economic output, direct, indirect, and induced impacts. The long-term environmental impact was also identified, as were noise impacts and mitigation strategies.

The final project includes a land use plan, a capital plan, an analysis of opportunities, and recommended responses.

Developing the master plan involved:

• Reviewing existing plans and strategies for the airport,
• Evaluating the airport’s role and mission (i.e., updating its local and regional priorities),
• Assessing the regulatory requirements,
• Exploring ways to minimize the airport’s carbon emissions,
• Researching opportunities for unused lands within the airport’s boundaries.

The work was comprehensive, covering everything from operations and the competitive market of nearby certified airports to future infrastructure requirements, changes to airport governance, and recommendations on applying for funding for airport capital assistance from senior levels of government.

The master plan included economic research and analysis and financial recommendations.

Of particular interest were the ideas OEI generated for the airport to connect to local and regional business development opportunities. These included concepts to develop new package tourism products using small air charters; flight-seeing tours for visitors who arrive by car but wish to see the countryside and wineries from the air; making the airport more attractive to visiting itinerant pilots; developing ways for Oliver Airport to take part in the Okanagan’s many regional destination tourism plans; and building business partnerships between the airport and the local Osoyoos Indian Band.