Airline & Holiday Information

Manchester Airport is the UK’s busiest airport outside of the London area when talking in pure passenger numbers.
Located just off the M56 and A583, Manchester airport lies just south of Manchester City it’s self and opposite Ringway.

Manchester Airport was originally named Ringway Airport when it was opened on the 25th June 1938, during World War II the airport was known as RAF Ringway, a declaration of war brought an end to all civil flights in 1939, and work proceeded in the building of a new Royal Air Force Station.

The Airport was officially opened on the 25th of July 1938, the first scheduled flight was a KLM flight to Amsterdam on a Douglas DC-2 Aircraft. In its first year 4000 passengers came through the terminals of Manchester Airport which was then known as Ringway due to the parish it laid in.

After the end of World War II the airport saw rapid expansion the first Trans Atlantic flight flew on the 28th of ~October 1953 to JFK airport in New York. In 1958 Ringway was handling 500,000 passengers a year.

In 1972 Ringway airport was renamed Manchester International Airport, in a bid to attract more long haul flights the main runway was extended to 10,000ft from 7,000ft, in 1988 Manchester international Airport was handling 9.5 million passengers annually and celebrated its Golden Jubilee.

Manchester Airport 1971

The ever increasing number of passengers travelling through Terminal 1 was starting to take its toll, so in 1993 Terminal 2 opened with a airport railway station which connected to the UK’s rail network which allowed even more passengers to travel direct into the airport.

Terminal 2 only handles international flights, with 16 gates located in T2 15 of those have air bridges and one where you’ll walk along the runway. Terminal 2 and Terminal 1 are connected by the Skylink which also has long travelators to save passenger’s a 10-15 minute walk. Skylink also connects to Manchester airports railway station.

Skylink Manchester Airport

In 1997 planning was approved for Manchester’s second runway to be built, work commenced in 1997 and was completed in 2001 at a cost of £172 Million and was the first full runway to be constructed in the UK for over 20 years, 23L/05R the technical name for Runway Two.

Terminal 1 deals with all the UK internal flights, and it can handle around 11 million passengers annually, which has been greatly expanded since it first opened in 1962 when it could handle a capacity of 2.5 million passengers.

Manchester Airport fly’s to over 190 destinations via 65 tour operators / carriers, the airport offer more destinations compared to some of the biggest airports over in the US such as New York, Dallas and Chicago.

Car parking at Manchester Airport is fairly well equipped, Short stay car parks can be found next to T1,2,3 and are usually multi storeys. The parking is pretty expensive at around £2 for 30 minutes and close to £30 for 24 hours. When parking for a arrival it will usually cost you around £6-£8 depending on your time of arrival. It can take international flights around 1 hour from point of landing to coming through the arrival gates in the lounge, so don’t worry about turning up to early for a flight.