Base closures?

[exspy]

The largest is Suffield........

This exact issue was a topic of debate about thirty years ago in the 'letters to the editor' section of Sentinel magazine.  It actually started with a discussion over the size of Borden vs Gagetown.  Ultimately two things were revealed.  Gagetown was bigger than Borden and Suffield was bigger than Gagetown, in total area.  But the biggest Base in Canada was at that time, and may still be, CFB Cold Lake due to the inclusion of the Primrose Lake Air Weapons Range.

Suffield may be larger than Gagetown but, because of its division into three distinct areas one of which is a nature reserve, I don't recall if its available training area is greater than Gagetown's.

Cheers,
Dan.

 

[GAP]

Appeal boosts Kapyong costs
$2M a year to maintain barracks during legal tussle
By: Mia Rabson Posted: 6/11/2010
Article Link

The federal government will be stuck paying $2 million a year to maintain the buildings at the abandoned Kapyong Barracks site while it appeals a court decision requiring it to consult with First Nations before selling the land for new development.

The appeal hearing is scheduled for Tuesday -- more than a year after Justice Douglas Campbell ordered the government to halt the sale of the land until it had properly consulted with two First Nations, Brokenhead and Peguis, on their treaty land entitlements.

Norman Boudreau, lawyer for the bands, told the Free Press he doesn't expect this dispute to end with this appeal no matter the outcome.

"It is a case that is ripe for the Supreme Court," Boudreau said.

When asked to explain the appeal, Defence Minister Peter MacKay's office deferred to department officials. They did not respond to the Free Press by deadline Friday.

So far, it has cost about $2 million a year to maintain the 41 buildings at the Kapyong site, most of which are empty -- and all of which will likely be demolished once the land dispute is sorted out.

Since the base was abandoned in 2004, the bills have come to between $10 and $12 million. When Ottawa agreed to sell the land in 2007 to Canada Lands Company, the price tag was $8.6 million.

Meanwhile, in Ottawa, the government just reached a negotiated settlement with First Nations over a land claim on another abandoned military base.

That claim, involving the land occupied by the former Canadian Forces Base Rockcliffe, was settled in September with Ottawa agreeing to allow the Algonquins to participate in the redevelopment of the site with the Canada Lands Company.

CLC is the Crown corporation that buys and redevelops surplus federal land. It planned to redevelop the sites in both Winnipeg and Ottawa -- considered prime real estate -- into innovative eco-communities with a mix of housing, business and green space.

The land claims in both cases caused CLC to close up shop on the redevelopments until a settlement was reached.

Rockcliffe was finally vacated in 2005. Kapyong has been empty since 2004.

Boudreau said the two claims are not the same, noting the federal government has always agreed to negotiate with the Algonquins on their land claim, which includes 3.5-million hectares in and around Ottawa.

"The government has not even recognized a duty to consult on Kapyong," Boudreau said.

That's why the Algonquins did not have to go to court to halt the sale of Rockcliffe like the Treaty One First Nations in Manitoba did.

In the years since the judge ordered the consultations, not a single discussion has taken place between Ottawa and the First Nations because of the legal claim and appeal.

Ottawa has argued the bands gave up their claims to surplus federal lands by accepting financial compensation.
More on link

 

[mover1]

I'll admit that 15000 is more then I expected, I dug around the CTC and 3 ASG page, as well as Wikipedia and found no numbers to substantiate for CTC.

You may well be correct.  :'(

Its to be expected. With a little more time in and a broader prspective of the CF your gen knowlege of the CF out side of the combat arms will increase. Just remember to listen to your Sr. NCO's because they "will" be correct.  ;D

 

[SupersonicMax]

E.R. Campbell,

Your plan may well be a very good plan from an Army perspective, however doesn't make much sense from an Air Force perspective.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

E.R. Campbell,

Your plan may well be a very good plan from an Army perspective, however doesn't make much sense from an Air Force perspective.

You just can't hang your hat on that Max. You have to tell us why you think that.

P.S. - Don't forget to read and digest Edward's other comments, not just the first post like :stirpot:

 

[SupersonicMax]

Keep
• Comox – expanded, if we can
• Lloydminster NEW! – replaces Edmonton & Winnipeg & Moose Jaw;
• Halifax – expanded replace Greenwood.

Get Rid Of:
• Moose Jaw;
• Winnipeg;
• Borden;
• Trenton;

I modified your initial post to reflect my perspective.

Comox:  As stated, not much room for expansion.  What else would you put there?

Replace Moose Jaw and Winnipeg with Lloydminster. 

Moose Jaw: You need a base that can accomodate 20+ Basic Trainer and 8+ Advanced Jet Trainer and a significant amount of traffic.  Lloyd is not even close to having the requirement to handle this with its lone 5700' runway (FWIW, Phase III Hawks need 6000' of runway as a minimum).  In Moose Jaw, they have 2 parallel runways that continuously operate simultaneously and it is sometimes dicey in the circuit.  And I didn't talk about the issues related with NAVAIDs (they only have 1XNDB and RNAV(GPS) approaches none of which the Hawk is able to execute).

Winnipeg: As stated, 435 Sqn is based out of Winnipeg for a very good reason: its location.  It is central to some of the most remote places in Southern Domestic Airspace.  Moving it 1000 NM west will have a significant impact on SAR times in Nunavut, Northern Manitoba and Northwestern Ontario.  Also, 1 Cdn Air Div is there.  Moving it to some other place would be costly and unnecessary.  One last thing, Winnipeg is responsible for 3 CFFTS in Portage.  Not a big deal, but some other bureaucratic problem.

Borden:  As stated, 427 Sqn being a CANSOFCOM unit, 400 Sqn is the only Tac Hel unit in Ontario belonging to 1 Wing.  Also, less of a concern if we strictly think of money is the historical aspect of it.  It is the birth place of the RCAF.

Trenton:  The heart of Air Mobility in Canada.  With all the money invested into the place, it doesn't make any financial sense to move it.  I agree the location may not be ideal, but that's IMO the only viable option at this time.  Edmonton would have been great, however some genious decided to put up building on the massive runway.

We also cannot forget that even though our fighters have Cold Lake and Bagotville as Main Operating Bases, they also have Deployed Operating Bases and Forward Operation Locations.  Getting out of those locations would have a SIGNIFICANT impact on our NORAD operations and capabilities.  I don't believe it would be smart to forward deploy armed jets on an operational mission to a busy civilian airfield, therefore we have a need to keep those military airfields open.

That was my take.

Cheers,

 

[Edward Campbell]

Max: you are, almost certainly, right. As I said, I was offering a soft target (well stirred excrement) at which people were invited to shoot.

My personal preference is fewer, bigger and, whenever possible, joint bases or 'clusters' (e.g. Wainwright/Lloydminster), collocated, for the Army, with large training areas. But that's just a personal preference. There are good arguments for more, smaller bases to give the Cf better visibility across the country.

As someone else said, if we close more bases it will be a political decision made for political reasons - but a base does have costs.

 

[The Bread Guy]

My original thread title was going to be "Let the "which base to keep" cage match begin!", but it appears waaaaaaaay too early in the process for that level of alarm. DRDC's produced a paper with a ranked list of CF bases - with detailed explanation of the factors leading to the list - to start the discussion for the Strategic Review process for 2010 (PDF) <<previous link has been updated to bring you to a copy of the full report via Dropbox.com>> - from the Abstract:

This report presents a methodology developed by the Defence Research & Development Canada Centre for Operational Research & Analysis for the Assistant Deputy Minister for Infrastructure and Environment organization to support its decisions on potential infrastructure divestments as part of the departmental Strategic Review process for 2010. The approach was directed to consider major infrastructure sites and to produce a prioritized list of those sites that reflects their inherent ‘value’ to the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Forces.

The study developed seven individual measures of effectiveness (MOEs) to capture ‘value’, covering three general classes: operational impact, infrastructure condition and efficiency, and economic impact. The operational impact MOEs were based on subjective ratings of relevance by a group of subject matter experts. The other MOEs were based on available data within the department and from available census data.

A rank ordering approach was adopted to enable all MOEs to be placed onto a common playing field. The MARCUS methodology was employed in producing a final consensus prioritized list of infrastructure sites. A sensitivity analysis was also conducted on the set of MOE weights applied. This prioritized list provided a starting point for potential divestment discussions as part of the Strategic Review process.

Executive summary attached, including the ranking of bases, as well as a visual of the chart - let the data bashing begin 

- mod edit to add new link to summaries -

 

[Halifax Tar]

Wow... I didn't think we would see this again to be honest...

If I read this correctly CFB Trenton would be the last base to be closed while "Europe" (?) would be the first ? Or is it a top to bottom list of most bang for our buck ?

Woop answerd my own question with some reading:

7.
The objective of this study from the Strategic Review perspective was to rank the major infrastructure sites on performance and relevance.

Ref: Pg 17, Para 7

 

[brihard]

Fingers crossed... *PleasecloseMeaford PleasecloseMeaford PleasecloseMeaford*  ;D

 

[Sub_Guy]

Comox ranks ahead of Greenwood, who knew? 

 

[Halifax Tar]

Comox ranks ahead of Greenwood, who knew? 

I think there are somethings I agree with

 

[Edward Campbell]

And see here for an earlier discussion of bases that might be closed.

 

[Infanteer]

Funny how the parameters show places like Yellowknife and Alert providing more "output" than Suffield or Wainwright.  I think almost every Task Force that went to Afghanistan would disagree - that's alot of white space they're counting out.

 

[Edward Campbell]

Funny how the parameters show places like Yellowknife and Alert providing more "output" than Suffield or Wainwright.  I think almost every Task Force that went to Afghanistan would disagree - that's alot of white space they're counting out.

Alert, like its sister stations, is unique and should not even be on that list at all. To say that Alert has less "operational value" than Trenton or Ottawa is just plain silly, and indicates that the "six core missions" in the Canada First Defence Strategy (which were used to determine "operational value") are either wrong or terribly misunderstood by the SMEs. But, in fairness, Alert's mission is strategic and the CF is a tactical (and sometimes wishes to be an operational) level organization which has little understanding of and less expertize in strategic matters.

The PCO will decide if and when Alert closes - until then DND must keep it running, at whatever cost; the military SMEs' views on the matter are of no consequence to anyone who matters in Ottawa.

 

[McG]

Funny how the parameters show places like Yellowknife and Alert providing more "output" than Suffield or Wainwright.  I think almost every Task Force that went to Afghanistan would disagree - that's alot of white space they're counting out.

I think a missing factor in the assessment, something that should have been weighted just behind the two operational roles, is the institutional support role.  Ranked high were those locations from which we conduct operations or station deployable formed units.  Lower on the list were those locations where we generate the capabilities found in operational units (ie, those locations with training establishments, CSS hubs that support training domestically, and other capability development faciliites).

Even with that missing criteria added, the assessment has one critical flaw.  There is no apparent assessment of the portability for the capabilities housed at the various bases.  Halifax and Esquimalt scored high because those are where the bulk of the Navy can be found - those are probably fair assesments because if either base is closed we do not have the option of moving ships to remaining bases inland.  At the same time, Edmonton sits high on the list because it is home to 1 CMBG (there should also be points for the depot, but I am skeptical that they were awarded).  However, I would suggest that 1 CMBG is more portable than MARLANT and if Edmonton were to close then we could move 1 CMBG to Suffield, Shilo or Wainwright without sacrifice to either assessed operational role.  While the relatively portable base in Edmonton is getting high points, those lowly ranked training bases that I mentioned earlier have an essential and very non-portable asset: space.  The Army needs great big areas to train in.

 

[McG]

As a follow-on, in looking at the eleven bases ranked RED I see three that I know are non-portable (Meaford, Suffield and Wainwright) and two that I strongly suspect to be portable.  From St Jean we could move everything from the CMR campus to Kingston and then everything from the CFLRS campus to Borden or Shilo.  From Toronto we could move the staff college to Kingston.  I do not know about the portability of the DRDC in Toronto and I suspect a small ASU would still be desired by the Army.

 

[SupersonicMax]

MCG,

My understanding is that the RMC campus is already at max capacity and CMR was re-opened to increase the training capacity.  Moving it to Kingston would only create an other problem, which is an infrastructure problem at RMC.

 

[dapaterson]

CMR was a big P political decision.  Arguably, we could meet the full needs of the CF's officer corps from DEO or ROTP (Civvy U) and come in much cheaper than RMC; DEOs have the added bonus of not accumulating 4 years of pensionable service before we can begin their training in earnest.

Retention of RMC/CMR is driven by politics of the big and small P variety, not out of military necessity.

 

[McG]

My understanding is that the RMC campus is already at max capacity and CMR was re-opened to increase the training capacity.  Moving it to Kingston would only create an other problem, which is an infrastructure problem at RMC.

The facilities may have been maxed, but RMC has built a new residence since CMR opened, there is space for new facilities if required, and CDA could move its offices off the penisula (to base proper) in order to free-up buildings already at the campus.