Alright let's stop the toxicity now. I'm very much Team Edmonton and Team EIA but IanO's criticism of occidentalcapital is valid. First of all, let's get it out of the way that YYC is not the end-all-be-all driver of Calgary's economy that propelled it ahead of Edmonton. That is very much the oil headquarters there, which only exist in Calgary because the first oil deposits in Alberta were found in the Turner Valley area nearby and then as more oil companies popped up over the century, they simply set themselves up where the oil headquarters already were. Those head offices and their lucrative business travellers are the reason why YYC became so successful in an era of the hub-and-spoke model being pre-eminent in aviation. Bigger trends in the overall oil economy whose benefits were mainly felt by the Calgary head offices are the main reason Calgary surpassed Edmonton and more international flights were a spinoff from that. Edmonton did put up decent competition with Wardair and the international flights before, but our lack of a unified airport hub and oil head offices simply didn't work in our favour. However, I will concede that in recent years, despite the 1million+ size of the city, Air Canada and Westjet have been shafting us.
Now play nice everyone.
@EdmTrekker I'll echo this words, to an extent.
In recent years, especially after the last oil crash, YYC has been one of the big drivers of Calgary's economy (and it became so for the reasons mentioned + proximity to Alberta's biggest tourist draw).
In all fairness, Edmonton did a very poor job keeping the head offices that we had (Telus and Shaw, I'm looking at you!!!) and an even worse job attracting new companies, especially in the last 2/3 decades and, even if we acknowledge that the provincial government has had a hand in making this worse, Edmonton is also a victim of it's own inferiority complex and lack of leadership.
To your point, I agree that some here, and not just Ian, have a somewhat downer perspective, but I honestly believe that it comes more from being successively disappointed by what has (not) happened/improved over the span of many years, not a lack of care for Edmonton (much on the contrary).
We may all disagree, from time to time (and I still disagree with
@IanO most of the time), but we all need to keep it civil and acknowledge that we all love and believe in Edmonton, and it's potential, and want to see the city succeed.
