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Louise Thomas
Editor
When you are making time-critical decisions about airport ground transportation, you need accurate advice.
At Athens airport I needed to get to Piraeus for a ferry to the island of Poros – and time was against me. The easyJet plane from Gatwick had arrived 10 minutes early, but from the performance of the ground staff you would infer that no aircraft with passengers on board had ever arrived before.
The processes were so slow that it took 50 minutes from touchdown to exiting the airport, and that was with cabin baggage. Heaven knows what happened to those who had checked luggage in.
One train an hour runs to Piraeus, and it would just about get me there on time. But with 20 minutes before it left, I thought I should check if the X96 Piraeus Express bus was leaving imminently. There was one immediately outside the airport terminal, seemingly ready to go.
When is it leaving? “Now, and it takes one hour,” promised the lady who seemed to be in charge. Marvellous, that means I am sure to reach the ship in time.
Except that the bus did not leave “now”. It waited for a further 20 minutes and, by then, was so overloaded that the journey took 90 minutes. I missed the ferry.
Last week I wrote about a similarly frustrating journey from Marseille to its airport, and from Bristol airport into the city. Goodness, did that strike a nerve: thank you for all your responses, which I shall distill here.
Charlotte Goodall provides a wide-ranging response. “Cork airport is miles away and the buses are terrible. Bristol is weird – how did an airport end up there? It’s in the middle of nowhere.
“Bordeaux used to be poor but the new tram is brilliant.”
Andrew Difford said: “The road to Bristol airport is just a glorified country lane. Before they expand the airport any further it needs a rail link.”
Frank Barratt pointed to Leeds Bradford for poor links: “Infrequent bus service, no train, £7 drop-off fee.”
Plenty of UK travellers pointed out that both Aberdeen and Edinburgh have railways on which trains glide past – on the wrong side of the airport. City of Derry in Northern Ireland has the same problem.
Glasgow got plenty of criticism for its expensive bus link; I walk (in about 20 minutes) to Paisley Gilmour Street, from where there are fast and frequent trains to Glasgow Central.
Abroad, many people nominated Dublin. For an airport handling around 33 million passengers a year not to have a rail link to the capital is, er, surprising. Every other airport in the top 30 in Europe, with the sole exception of Palma, has trains.
M Esposito went a little niche: “Rouen to Beauvais airport. One train a day.”
At the opposite end of France, Jean-Luc took issue with me about Marseille: “I took the navette [shuttle] from Marseille airport six days ago; €10, leaves every 10 minutes, took 22 minutes. It was a great service.
Aaron Murray has an eye for value: “Best was Bratislava. I think it was about €0.50 for my ticket. “Worst: I arrived in Nimes on a very delayed flight at 1am. No public transport. One taxi came. He informed us there are precisely four taxis who are allowed to pick up (taxis, not companies). For 150 passengers.”
Rich Alderton merely expressed “a slightly smug feeling as I peer out of my window at the Metro station that will take me to Newcastle airport in 13 minutes”.
Back at the port of Piraeus, after trailing around finding a ticket for the next sailing, at least I had time for a Greek salad while waiting. At the nearest taverna, I said: “I have exactly 20 minutes. Can I please have a Greek salad and some water in that time?”
“Yes, please sit down.”
Twenty minutes later, I left a €5 note for the water and bread and hurried to the boat, hungry.
