Manchester Airport. How can it be so bad?

[Dog Star]

RammyMP said:

I’m flying from Manchester to Spain for a long weekend in May, I went to book my car into the airport car park, cheapest was £65 for 3 nights. That’s double what it was pre covid.

Last time I went away with work was January 2020. Week parking using the T1 meet and greet was £68.

Last week they wanted £104.

I got a taxi.

Absolute disgrace.

[StreetDragster]

£5 to drop off now too, they would charge you for the air you are breathing at Manchester if they could.

Hateful airport, liverpool is much better but the flights i need don't go from it.

[ChocolateFrog]

Manchester has always been crap.

I remember my parents bhing about it 30 years ago.

Not been for quite a while but I doubt it's improved since my last visit.

[anonymous-user]

StreetDragster said:

£5 to drop off now too, they would charge you for the air you are breathing at Manchester if they could.

Hateful airport, liverpool is much better but the flights i need don't go from it.

Tossbags they are i 'dropped' the kid off Friday am at T1 i don't think the wheels stopped turning on the car and that quick I'm surprised the ANPR even had time to reach the exit barrier. £5 for 30 seconds between in and out.
Then the joy of collecting on Sunday evening, minimum £6 charge absolute anchors they are.

The 'new' terminal 2 seems to have been designed by a blind person who's never used an airport before. Even in a quiet January period there were queues at the totally inadequate toilet provision both male and female.

Worst most soul destroying part of any trip now is Manchester Airport. It used to be one of the highlights.

[popeyewhite]

ChocolateFrog said:

Manchester has always been crap.

I disagree. Many years ago when it was called Ringway Airport you could go there for an afternoon out. Walk straight through to the gates and watch the 'planes taking off with a cup of tea. So about 40-50 years ago . Many. many more people travel now, and Manchester wasn't designed for that many...but the owners only care about filthy lucre, same as most things nowadays.

[Silverage]

We’re on the east side of the country, so travelling over to Manchester was always a pest with the vagaries of the M62 and then there was the utter misery of the airport awaiting you.

We’ve just been over to France for the weekend and we used Birmingham and it was a revelation. Much easier to get to and a far nicer experience once there.

[Andy_290]

Had an absolutely extraordinary experience at MAN last night, returned into T1 from Jordan, landed at 21:00ish, collected luggage and was in the car on the way home less than 25 minutes later. The place was deserted.

[CrutyRammers]

Been using it for 20 years or so, it definitely seems to have got worse over the last 5 or 6. And the parking cost increases are properly taking the piss.

[Sheepshanks]

RammyMP said:

I’m flying from Manchester to Spain for a long weekend in May, I went to book my car into the airport car park, cheapest was £65 for 3 nights. That’s double what it was pre covid.

I just looked back at my last trip pre-Covid and I paid £53.99 for 8AM one day to until 5PM the next (T1 multi-storey). IIRC for short trips it's doesn't make any difference which car park you use.

It should be a 40 min drive for me but it's so uncertain on the M56. It's annoying that the train from a village a couple of miles from my house sweeps past the airport but doesn't call in - I'd have to go to Piccadilly and get the train back to the airport making it a 2hr trip, which is just bonkers.

[Deep Thought]

I was through it weekly a few years back for 2.5 years.

Fast track, hand luggage only and lounge access were the only things that made it bearable, and it was still pretty crap at times.

I cant imagine its improved since then.

[paulguitar]

Deep Thought said:

I was through it weekly a few years back for 2.5 years.

Fast track, hand luggage only and lounge access were the only things that made it bearable, and it was still pretty crap at times.

I cant imagine its improved since then.

It's been terrible for as long as I have been regularly using it (since about 2002) but I'd say it's significantly deteriorated in the last three or four years.

[Monkeylegend]

StreetDragster said:

£5 to drop off now too, they would charge you for the air you are breathing at Manchester if they could.

It is £7 now at Stansted, £25 if you are more than 15 mins, and £10 for up to 30 mins in the short term car park and £18 for an hour.

I remember in the not to distant past when drop off was free along with 30 minutes in the car park.

[Shnozz]

paulguitar said:

Deep Thought said:

I was through it weekly a few years back for 2.5 years.

Fast track, hand luggage only and lounge access were the only things that made it bearable, and it was still pretty crap at times.

I cant imagine its improved since then.

It's been terrible for as long as I have been regularly using it (since about 2002) but I'd say it's significantly deteriorated in the last three or four years.

Indeed. I have the "benefit" of all those things Deep Thought listed (and no parking to worry about). It's still utterly dreadful.

And for the poster who suggested that they felt comforted by security taking so long; it's simply inefficiency rather than offering a thoroughness that is absent in other airports, IMHO. I see no evidence that they are conducting their searches to a greater depth than anywhere else. The only other airport where I can think of its remotely close to in being a stshow is Dublin, albeit they have improved from the swarm queue approach of about 10 years ago where everyone converged in a triangle formation towards security.

[Deep Thought]

Shnozz said:

paulguitar said:

Deep Thought said:

I was through it weekly a few years back for 2.5 years.

Fast track, hand luggage only and lounge access were the only things that made it bearable, and it was still pretty crap at times.

I cant imagine its improved since then.

It's been terrible for as long as I have been regularly using it (since about 2002) but I'd say it's significantly deteriorated in the last three or four years.

Indeed. I have the "benefit" of all those things Deep Thought listed (and no parking to worry about). It's still utterly dreadful.

And for the poster who suggested that they felt comforted by security taking so long; it's simply inefficiency rather than offering a thoroughness that is absent in other airports, IMHO. I see no evidence that they are conducting their searches to a greater depth than anywhere else. The only other airport where I can think of its remotely close to in being a stshow is Dublin, albeit they have improved from the swarm queue approach of about 10 years ago where everyone converged in a triangle formation towards security.

Yeah maybe i became immune to it, but certainly those three things - and the same arrival and departure times each week probably made it more bareable.

Its not something i recall looking forward to.

And yes, inefficiency of security was the main issue - and no consistency. You could go one week and walk straight through and go the next and be there 45 minutes.

[paulguitar]

Deep Thought said:

Yeah maybe i became immune to it, but certainly those three things - and the same arrival and departure times each week probably made it more bareable.

Its not something i recall looking forward to.

And yes, inefficiency of security was the main issue - and no consistency. You could go one week and walk straight through and go the next and be there 45 minutes.

The whole security thing is a bit of a farce anyway. Waiting forever so that some pensioner or tracksuited Sharon can be berated by security for not having their perfume in a bag.

When was the last time someone hijacked a plane using a bottle of perfume?

[Louis Balfour]

paulguitar said:

Deep Thought said:

Yeah maybe i became immune to it, but certainly those three things - and the same arrival and departure times each week probably made it more bareable.

Its not something i recall looking forward to.

And yes, inefficiency of security was the main issue - and no consistency. You could go one week and walk straight through and go the next and be there 45 minutes.

The whole security thing is a bit of a farce anyway. Waiting forever so that some pensioner or tracksuited Sharon can be berated by security for not having their perfume in a bag.

When was the last time someone hijacked a plane using a bottle of perfume?

That isn't the point. If things are in plastic bags they cannot be weaponised. Fact.

[paulguitar]

Louis Balfour said:

That isn't the point. If things are in plastic bags they cannot be weaponised. Fact.

You mean:

FACT.

Very important to capitalize that sort of statement.

[Deep Thought]

paulguitar said:

Deep Thought said:

Yeah maybe i became immune to it, but certainly those three things - and the same arrival and departure times each week probably made it more bareable.

Its not something i recall looking forward to.

And yes, inefficiency of security was the main issue - and no consistency. You could go one week and walk straight through and go the next and be there 45 minutes.

The whole security thing is a bit of a farce anyway. Waiting forever so that some pensioner or tracksuited Sharon can be berated by security for not having their perfume in a bag.

When was the last time someone hijacked a plane using a bottle of perfume?

What bemuses me is all the signs that say you must have all liquids in the one plastic bag and they must be less than 100ml the whole way in, theres signs everywhere, and still there will be a load of Karens who think that didnt actually apply to them who'll then take up a security officers time as she hunts through her bag for spurious liquids.

[paulguitar]

Deep Thought said:

What bemuses me is all the signs that say you must have all liquids in the one plastic bag and they must be less than 100ml the whole way in, theres signs everywhere, and still there will be a load of Karens who think that didnt actually apply to them who'll then take up a security officers time as she hunts through her bag for spurious liquids.

Absolutely, the fkwittery seen time after time at security makes a bad situation much worse.

[Deep Thought]

paulguitar said:

Deep Thought said:

What bemuses me is all the signs that say you must have all liquids in the one plastic bag and they must be less than 100ml the whole way in, theres signs everywhere, and still there will be a load of Karens who think that didnt actually apply to them who'll then take up a security officers time as she hunts through her bag for spurious liquids.

Absolutely, the fkwittery seen time after time at security makes a bad situation much worse.

Yup. I've seen the conveyors blocked right up so no more people can get through because the security staff are having to search peoples bags for stuff that 95% of the time should have been obvious to have removed / bagged separately.

They even came around and called out to people in advance everything they needed to do to get through smoothly and STILL some people think it doesnt apply to them.

I honestly feel at times like going "sorry, talk me through how that fking big sign there telling you to remove electrical devices and liquids from your bag DIDNT apply to you and your laptop and deodorants?"

Idiots.