Manchester International Airport (MAN)

About Manchester International Airport

Manchester International Airport is located about 8 miles south-south west of Manchester’s city centre in the Greater Manchester area. It is the UK’s 4th busiest airport, but it is also the largest of the UK’s airports outside of the London area. In 2006 the airport handled more than 22.1 million passengers.

Parking at the Airport

There are four parking options at Manchester International Airport. They are Short Stay, Long Stay, Premier and Shuttle parking.
Manchester International Airport’s short stay car parks are the official on-airport Multi-Storey Car Parks (MSCP) for customers departing from all of Manchester Airport’s terminals. Each car park is directly next to the terminal you are travelling from and only a few minutes undercover walk to the check-in desks. The short stay car parks are ideal for stays of up to 24 hours. There is now a ‘No Waiting’ restriction on all roads around the terminals at Manchester Airport – so all pick-up activity must now take place in the designated short-stay car parks.
The airport’s long stay car parks are the official on-airport car parks for customers departing from all of Manchester Airport’s terminals. Each car park is conveniently located for your terminal and serviced by a regular courtesy transfer bus. Terminal 1/3 Long Stay serves terminal 1 and 3. Terminal 2 Long Stay serves terminal 2.
Manchester’s Premier car parking is a parking option that offers a valet service combined with a fast transfer to the terminals. After arriving at the car par, unload your luggage and board one of the transfer buses that run every 10 minutes for the short ride to your terminal. Your car is then parked for you and will be waiting for you when you return.
The Shuttle Park at Manchester Airport is the best value on airport car park. It offers convenient, secure value parking for all terminals. Situated on the other side of the runway it is just a short bus trip from the terminals.
The Premier and Shuttle parks must be pre-booked, but the short stay and long stay car parks have a turn up and park policy or can be pre-booked if required.

Facilities and Services

Manchester International Airport has services to over 200 international scheduled destinations across the world. There are three passenger terminals at Manchester all of which have passenger facilities which include airport information; baby change facilities; Business Lounges; car hire; currency exchange; fax; Internet access; lost property; prayer rooms; postal services and facilities for passengers requiring special assistance.
The terminals also offer an excellent range of high street retail and catering outlets including Boots; Burger King; Costa Coffee; Dixons; HMV; Spar; Starbucks; Thorntons and Waterstones.
Manchester International Airport has many executive lounges, located in each of the terminals. Some are available to any type of passenger for a small fee, whereas others are exclusive lounges operated by airlines for their premium passengers.

Getting To The Airport

By road - Manchester International Airport has its own dedicated link from the M56, which takes vehicles directly into it. The M56 has interchanges with the M60; M6; and A56.
By rail – The Station - Manchester International is at the heart of the airport and has walkways connecting it to all of the terminals. It offers fast, frequent train services linking the airport with over 100 destinations across the North of England and beyond.
By bus/coach - For those travelling by coach, services run daily, and all coaches arrive and depart from The Station. National Express Coach Services have a ticket desk in The Station that is open daily. Local buses that operate on a daily basis, including weekends and Bank Holidays, also call at The Station.

History of Manchester International Airport

Manchester’s first airport wasn’t built until 1928 even though the city had seen various temporary aerodromes spring up to handle increasing air traffic in the vicinity since 1910 when the first recorded flight from London to Manchester took place. In 1926 plans for a more permanent airport for the city were made resulting in the construction of the first Manchester Airport.

In 1928, Barton near Eccles was chosen to be the site of Manchester's airport. However Manchester City Council was keen to establish a municipal airport immediately, so a temporary airfield was built at Wythenshawe, which opened for business in 1929. The following year the aerodrome at Barton was completed and opened.

Discussions opened with KLM in 1934 on a Holland-North of England service. Barton was considered unsuitable for larger aircraft and the necessary improvements too expensive, so land at Ringway, south of Manchester, was designated for a new airport. Building work at Ringway commenced the following year and the new airport was officially opened on 25th June 1938. Interestingly up until the outbreak of war in September 1939, Ringway had handled 7,600 passengers, the equivalent of a summer morning's work nowadays at Manchester!

Civil flights were suspended for the duration of the war and the airport was used as an aeroplane manufacturing centre. The runway and airport facilities were enhanced with three new runways and ten new hangars. After the war normal passenger services resumed in 1946 and by the following year the airport was handling more than 34,000 passengers a year. In 1949 extended terminal facilities were opened in the converted wartime building.

In 1951 the main runway was extended to 1,798 metres. Sabena (Belgian Airlines) operated the first scheduled flight to New York in 1953 and in the following year the airport recorded its millionth passenger, since re-opening in 1946. A new £2.7 million terminal, the first in Europe to incorporate a pier system in which passengers remain under cover until ready to board the aircraft, was opened by HRH, the Duke of Edinburgh in 1962. A further runway extension was made in 1969, which enabled aircraft to take off with a full payload and fly non-stop to Canada.

An inter-continental pier capable of handling Boeing 747s opened in 1974. Unlike other piers, it featured travellators, waiting lounges and air conditioning and for the first time, air bridges connected passengers directly to the aircraft. The runway was extended again in 1981 taking its total length to 3,048 metres and attracting long haul operators to destinations throughout the world. Manchester Airport celebrated its Golden Jubilee in 1988 and the following year HRH, the Princess of Wales opened the Domestic Terminal, which included its own check-in and car park.

In 1993 Terminal 2 was opened by HRH, the Duke of Edinburgh, doubling Manchester Airport's terminal capacity to around 20 million passengers a year. The railway station was opened in May, providing direct links to many towns and cities in the North of England. In 1995 Manchester Airport’s annual passenger figures reached 15 million.

Work started on a £60 million Integrated Public Transport Interchange in 2000 and the government gave the go ahead for a £289 million Metrolink extension to the Airport. Manchester’s second runway opened in 2001 Having previously purchased Humberside International Airport and subsequently acquiring East Midlands and Bournemouth Airports, Manchester Airport has now become the second largest airport operator in the UK.