All about London Stansted Airport

General Information 

London Stansted Airport is located near the village of Stansted Mountfitchet. It has one main passenger terminal. Three passenger satellites have departure gates; one is connected to the main terminal by an air bridge and the other two by the Stansted Airport Transit System people mover. The terminal building was designed by Foster and Partners with input from structural engineer Peter Rice, features a "floating" roof, supported by a space frame of inverted-pyramid roof trusses, creating the impression of a stylised swan in flight. The base of each truss structure is a "utility pillar", which provides indirect uplighting illumination and is the location for air-conditioning, water, telecommunications, and electrical outlets. The layout of the airport was originally designed to provide an unobstructed flow for passengers to arrive at the short-stay car park, move through the check-in hall, and go through security and on to the departure gates, all on the same level. From 1997 to 2007, Stansted had rapid expansion of passenger numbers on the back of the boom in low-cost air travel, peaking at 24 million passengers in the 12 months to October 2007, but passenger numbers declined in the next five years. Passenger totals later increased, and in 2016 recorded an annual increase of 8.0% to 24.3 million, and numbers have since continued to rise.

Transportation

• Trains

A Class 745 train operating the Stansted Express at London Liverpool Street

Stansted Airport railway station is situated in the terminal building directly below the main concourse.

Services to London are on the Stansted Express train to and from London Liverpool Street in Central London. This service operates every 15 minutes and the usual journey time is between 45 and 53 minutes. Liverpool Street is served by the Central, Circle, Hammersmith & City and Metropolitan lines of the London Underground network, alongside the Elizabeth line, offering access throughout London. The Stansted Express also calls at Tottenham Hale, for the Underground's Victoria line and connections to various destinations in North London and the West End. Some Stansted Express services also call at Stansted Mountfitchet, Bishop's Stortford and/or Harlow Town en route to London Liverpool Street.

CrossCountry operates an hourly service from the airport to Birmingham New Street, via Cambridge, Peterborough and Leicester. Greater Anglia operates services to Norwich via Cambridge.

• Buses and coaches

Scheduled express bus or coach services run to and from Stratford (45 minutes), Victoria Coach Station (75 minutes), Liverpool Street Station (55 minutes), and Portman Square via Golders Green (70 minutes) and Paddington Station (105 minutes) (all in London), costing about half the train fare, but taking longer. The bus station is next to the terminal building. National Express runs direct coach services to the airport from Luton Airport and Heathrow, and also from Birmingham (11 a day), Oxford (8 a day), Norwich (10 a day), and Cambridge (11 a day).

Stansted is also the start of the hourly X30 coach service to Southend-on-Sea via Chelmsford and London Southend Airport and the hourly X10 coach service to Basildon via Chelmsford, both operated by First Essex.

Local bus services operate to nearby communities, including the 510/509/508 (Harlow to Stansted via Stansted Mountfitchet, Parsonage Lane and Takeley, respectively), 7/7a (Bishops Stortford to Stansted), 133 (Braintree), and 6 (Saffron Walden), operated by Arriva.

• By Car

Stansted is connected to northeast London and Cambridge by the M11 motorway and to Braintree, Colchester, and Harwich by the A120, which is dual-carriageway until Braintree. The road distance to London is 37 miles (60 km).

As of October 1996, the airport has 2,500 short-stay parking spaces within walking distance to the terminal. In addition, as of the same month, the airport has over 8,000 long-stay spaces located near the M11 motorway and A120 junction. A courtesy bus service links the long-stay spaces to the terminal. The airport also offers mid-stay parking, closer to the terminal than its long-stay spaces. Stansted Airport also offers valet parking and a meet-and-greet service, which is similar to valet, but marketed more at the leisure-traveller market, both are run from the short-stay car park.