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The Bristol Airport problem

fishwomp

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The ever inflating drop-off charges however… (I’d like to have been in the meeting they had a few months back where it was raised from £7 to £8:50 - somebody must have proposed sticking the extra 50p on, and I’d like to know who as they’ll be in the first batch up against the wall)
These are the kinds of things you can do to improve the %-age of public transport users - looks good to the carbon objectives - and earns more money! .. of course, the public transport operators can then get away with adding 50p to their fares and it's back to square one!!
The issue is getting out of the city itself, particularly with the route the buses go. Once you’re at the roundabout at the top of the new link road it’s a clear run. If we’re sticking with buses it’s the route in the city that needs sorting, with priority measures, segregated running (or just use the stuff they’ve already built at great expense).
More bus lanes? Or scope to do something like Nailsea/Blackwell as the actual point for bus connections - smells like too much inconvenience and not enough frequency though.. but a pick-up at Parson St might be more useful once the additional Portishead services start.
 
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Brubulus

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The best long term solution in my opinion would be a new airport near Severn Tunnel Junction, replacing both Cardiff and Bristol. Physically in Wales, so hopefully WG consent to closing Cardiff. I get a lot of money has been put into Bristol, but its a poor location with limited scope to accommodate widebodies. Secondary option for Bristol in my opinion is a tram-train single track spur to the Airport, and a new station at Long Ashton. Buses are fine in the short term, but a weak long term solution
 

Tetchytyke

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More bus lanes? Or scope to do something like Nailsea/Blackwell as the actual point for bus connections - smells like too much inconvenience and not enough frequency though
People won't take a train from Bristol to Nailsea then take a bus to the airport, though. They'll just take a bus from Bristol to the airport.

My experience with the buses is the trudge through Bedminster. The express airport bus should go down the new link road. If there are people in Bedminster using the bus, put a separate non-express bus on.
 

The exile

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These are the kinds of things you can do to improve the %-age of public transport users - looks good to the carbon objectives - and earns more money! .. of course, the public transport operators can then get away with adding 50p to their fares and it's back to square one!!
Airports should be required to give vehicles operating registered PSV services (ie timetabled buses and coaches) free access - with operators then required to set fares at reasonable levels. A night surcharge is acceptable, charging £15 or so over the cap is not.
 

Caaardiff

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The best long term solution in my opinion would be a new airport near Severn Tunnel Junction, replacing both Cardiff and Bristol. Physically in Wales, so hopefully WG consent to closing Cardiff. I get a lot of money has been put into Bristol, but its a poor location with limited scope to accommodate widebodies. Secondary option for Bristol in my opinion is a tram-train single track spur to the Airport, and a new station at Long Ashton. Buses are fine in the short term, but a weak long term solution
What about the consent to closing Bristol Airport which is privately run?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: ==

People won't take a train from Bristol to Nailsea then take a bus to the airport, though. They'll just take a bus from Bristol to the airport.

My experience with the buses is the trudge through Bedminster. The express airport bus should go down the new link road. If there are people in Bedminster using the bus, put a separate non-express bus on.
Nailsea would more be aimed at people coming from the South.
 

The Planner

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Obviously being a rail forum, we think the problem with Bristol Airport is that it has no railway.. but it really isn't a valid problem - what is it that needs to be solved, there are buses?

https://cms.ciltuk.org.uk/media/h31hmc5q/cilt_airportsurfaceaccess_paper.pdf is an interesting data source.

It doesn't summarize the data so this graph is the best source: public (passenger) transport plotted against percentage of foreign travellers - which shows the obvious corrolation that those airports with the most foreign travellers will be the ones were an arriving passenger is least likely to own their own transport and hence most likely to use public transport. However, you can just read across to the left to find out the percentage that use public transport to reach the aiport and ignore the bottom axis.

View attachment 204100

Fascinating that Bristol is doing better than Manchester with its tram and busy railway!
Interesting graph, especially Manchester and Birmingham that have a significant amount of trains per hour to the stations.
 

zwk500

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Interesting graph, especially Manchester and Birmingham that have a significant amount of trains per hour to the stations.
Also Newcastle, a city of comparable population and local prominence to Bristol, with a Metro (light rail) connection to it's Airport, interchanging with the Mainline hub.
 

Envoy

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It takes 1 hour 5 minutes by the hourly direct trains from Cardiff Central to Nailsea. Note that these also pick up passengers at other places on their all stop runs between south Wales and the south west. Exeter for example is around 1 hour 15 minutes from Nailsea on these very same trains. So, some sort of tram or whatever shuttle between Nailsea and Bristol airport would work & be more convenient than having buses from Temple Meads that get stuck in traffic. You could also get trains coming down from Cheltenham to stop at Nailsea for an airport shuttle.

It would certainly be helpful for people in south Wales if Ryan Air and Easyjet especially could offer more services from Cardiff Airport. As I said earlier, it is regrettable that one big airport for south west Britain was not built somewhere near the Severn crossing and we are in this mess because of incompetent politicians.
 
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The exile

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It takes 1 hour 5 minutes by the hourly direct trains from Cardiff Central to Nailsea. Note that these also pick up passengers at other places on their all stop runs between south Wales and the south west. Exeter for example is around 1 hour 15 minutes from Nailsea on these very same trains. So, some sort of tram or whatever shuttle between Nailsea and Bristol airport would work & be more convenient than having buses from Temple Meads that get stuck in traffic. You could also get trains coming down from Cheltenham to stop at Nailsea for an airport shuttle.

It would certainly be helpful for people in south Wales if Ryan Air and Easyjet especially could offer more services from Cardiff Airport. As I said earlier, it is regrettable that one big airport for south west Britain was not built somewhere near the Severn crossing and we are in this mess because of incompetent politicians.
Whatever the solution to the Bristol Airport problem is (and I’m not convinced how much of one there really is), a shuttle of whatever nature to a minor station perched on the top of an embankment (sorry, N & B!) can at best only be part of it / a sticking plaster.
 

zwk500

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It takes 1 hour 5 minutes by the hourly direct trains from Cardiff Central to Nailsea. Note that these also pick up passengers at other places on their all stop runs between south Wales and the south west. Exeter for example is around 1 hour 15 minutes from Nailsea on these very same trains. So, some sort of tram or whatever shuttle between Nailsea and Bristol airport would work & be more convenient than having buses from Temple Meads that get stuck in traffic. You could also get trains coming down from Cheltenham to stop at Nailsea for an airport shuttle.
I used the Bristol Airport bus regularly and it was very rare to get caught in any kind of congestion (although admittedly I deliberately didn't use it at high peak).
 

The exile

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I used the Bristol Airport bus regularly and it was very rare to get caught in any kind of congestion (although admittedly I deliberately didn't use it at high peak).
Anything going through the centre of Bristol / Temple Meads is going to get stuck in traffic at peak times - though if you think Bristol’s bad, pop 12 miles down the line and try bits of Bath!
 

zwk500

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Anything going through the centre of Bristol / Temple Meads is going to get stuck in traffic at peak times - though if you think Bristol’s bad, pop 12 miles down the line and try bits of Bath!
I had far worse luck with service buses getting stuck at the bottom of Park Street than I ever did getting the Airport bus through Bedminster. Portwall Way isn't great although the bus lane does help when travelling from the Airport to Temple Meads.
 

The exile

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I had far worse luck with service buses getting stuck at the bottom of Park Street than I ever did getting the Airport bus through Bedminster. Portwall Way isn't great although the bus lane does help when travelling from the Airport to Temple Meads.
Oh - it’s definitely not subject to Bristol’s worst congestion.
 

Snow1964

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Relevant to this thread, Bristol airport has recently put in planning application for expansion, extra car parking, longer runway, various

26/P/0686/OU2|Hybrid planning application (full and outline elements) with Environmental Statement for the expansion of Bristol Airport to enable a throughput of 15 million passengers per annum, operating within a rolling 12 month cap of 99,931 air transport movements and 4,974 night flights between the hours of 23:30 and 06:00.
Full application elements comprising: extension of western apron for additional aircraft stands; reconfiguration of central and eastern aprons; construction of a passenger surface level car park for approximately 2,000 vehicles; eastern extension of existing runway by approximately 170m, with repositioned and additional aircraft approach lighting within Felton Common; taxiway and fillet widening to Taxiway GOLF with a realignment at the western runway end; construction of two new taxiways; extension of surface level car rental parking area; expansion of existing Silver Zone car park to provide an additional circa 1,960 block parked vehicle spaces; construction of new surface level staff car park for approximately 1,720 vehicles; highway improvements to the A38, including upgrades to northern access roundabout, construction of a new southern roundabout and widening of the road to accommodate an additional bus lane with dedicated access onto the A38. Outline application elements comprising of 3no. extensions to terminal building on west, north and east sides; construction of new piers to the west and east of the terminal including an underground walkway; construction of ancillary support buildings; relocated and expanded aviation fuel farm; a pedestrian bridge link; erection of a new baggage building; erection of a maintenance repair and overhaul hangar and ground run up pen; construction of parking decks within Silver Zone car park and car rental facility; minor works within Silver Zone car park; construction of a bus maintenance and washing facility; site wide landscaping, drainage, lighting and other associated infrastructure.

 

AlastairFraser

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Perhaps Bristol Airport should be made to give West of England Combined Authority (WECA) funding for a light automated metro line feasibility study as part of granting planning permission?
 

Magdalia

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Relevant to this thread, Bristol airport has recently put in planning application for expansion, extra car parking, longer runway, various
Lots of documentation is provided for planning applications. Having looked at the recent Stansted application, I followed the same route for surface transport and found this relevant document for Bristol:


BRISTOL AIRPORT LIMITED EXPANSION OF BRISTOL AIRPORT TO ACCOMMODATE 15 MPPA VOLUME I: ENVIRONMENTAL STATEMENT – PART 5 CHAPTER 8: TRANSPORT AND SURFACE ACCESS
The most relevant part is sections 8.6.26-31 on pages 41 and 42, setting out the baseline for National Rail.

Proposed mitigations are in section 8.7. This includes various proposals for buses but the only mention of rail is "further rail integration into bus services" buried in table 8.20 on pages 55-57.
 

Taunton

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The real problem for rail access to the airport (and other airports) is the flight times don't align with railway operations. Airlines have moved on to intensive use of their aircraft, and the principal departing rush at Bristol airport is very early in the morning, and the last ones returning at the end of the day. I just had a look at today, a Sunday, and there are 36 major jets leaving between 0600 and 0755 in the morning. Things quieten down significantly after this. Even I didn't realise the extent to which Bristol airport had developed like this.

These passengers will be arriving at the airport between about 0330 and 0700 in the morning. Meanwhile, for those fortunate to have later departures when the planes do their second trip into Europe, the return flights arrive between 2200 and 0200 early the next morning - provided they are on time, so passengers coming out say from 2300 to 0300.

You are never going to get any rail access suiting these sorts of plane times - on a Sunday! Indeed, elsewhere I have been on one of those final arriving planes, by the time we were coming out into the terminal people were already starting to come in for the first departures that next morning. There's no point having a rail link if people can't use it.
 

AlastairFraser

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The real problem for rail access to the airport (and other airports) is the flight times don't align with railway operations. Airlines have moved on to intensive use of their aircraft, and the principal departing rush at Bristol airport is very early in the morning, and the last ones returning at the end of the day. I just had a look at today, a Sunday, and there are 36 major jets leaving between 0600 and 0755 in the morning. Even I didn't realise the extent to which Bristol airport had developed like this.

These passengers will be arriving at the airport between about 0330 and 0700 in the morning. Meanwhile, for those fortunate to have later departures when the planes do their second trip into Europe, the return flights arrive between 2200 and 0200 early the next morning - provided they are on time, so passengers coming out say from 2300 to 0300.

You are never going to get any rail access suiting these sorts of plane times - on a Sunday! Indeed, elsewhere I have been on one of those final arriving planes, by the time we were coming out into the terminal people were already starting to come in for the first departures that next morning. There's no point having a rail link if people can't use it.
That's why some sort of automated light metro initially from Temple Meads to the Airport via Hengrove may be suitable. You could have a few hours maintenance period from 00.30 to 04.00, and then open up in time for early departures to be dropped off at Temple Meads or a station along the route.
 

Snow1964

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The real problem for rail access to the airport (and other airports) is the flight times don't align with railway operations. Airlines have moved on to intensive use of their aircraft, and the principal departing rush at Bristol airport is very early in the morning, and the last ones returning at the end of the day. I just had a look at today, a Sunday, and there are 36 major jets leaving between 0600 and 0755 in the morning. Things quieten down significantly after this. Even I didn't realise the extent to which Bristol airport had developed like this.

These passengers will be arriving at the airport between about 0330 and 0700 in the morning. Meanwhile, for those fortunate to have later departures when the planes do their second trip into Europe, the return flights arrive between 2200 and 0200 early the next morning - provided they are on time, so passengers coming out say from 2300 to 0300.
Yes, that's the main reason rail is useless for Bristol airport. Around 25-30% of passengers would need to be arriving at Temple Meads at 3-4am for shuttle to airport, for that huge outbound rush. There simply are no trains (any day of the week) for those passengers to get to their planes

The airport nowadays has about 90% of its flights as holiday double out and back plane utilisation. An early departure before 8am, return early afternoon and another trip returning mid-late evening. Usually a longer trip to Canaries, Greece or Turkey, and a shorter 2 - 3 hour return to Med. So plane is utilised about 15-16 hours per day

Inevitably most people on holidays, (both packages or own accommodation) get the return a week (or other number of days) later, so even if you are early afternoon one way, the other leg is at ends of day. Tends to mean 80-90% of passengers can't get a rail service at one end (out or back) of their journey. So rail is not attractive, and people drive or take private hire cars instead.

Go to some of my local stations (eg Trowbridge and Bradford on Avon) and local taxi companies that serve the rail stations, have published rates to Bristol airport, because trains don't make it possible to go to/from the airport at required times.
 

JamesT

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That's why some sort of automated light metro initially from Temple Meads to the Airport via Hengrove may be suitable. You could have a few hours maintenance period from 00.30 to 04.00, and then open up in time for early departures to be dropped off at Temple Meads or a station along the route.
How are they getting to Temple Meads? The first train of the day doesn’t arrive until after 6am (looking at tomorrow on RTT).
 

Snow1964

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Bristol airport is relatively seasonal (because of holiday flights), but no where near as seasonal as some UK airports.

eg February (latest month published) Bristol had 678,065 passengers, just over half its August 2025 figure of 1,217,412 passengers

Not so easy to justify a rail link for 24,000 passengers a day in quieter months, even if can make a case for 40,000 passengers a day in school summer holidays


 

AlastairFraser

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How are they getting to Temple Meads? The first train of the day doesn’t arrive until after 6am (looking at tomorrow on RTT).
Taxi or local bus. I agree that rail to metro transfers for the early flights are unlikely, but drop offs for those early flights at Temple Meads for the metro or an intermediate metro stop would still reduce pressure on the A38 and other routes approaching the airport (good for people looking to avoid expensive drop off fees too).
 

takno

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Bristol airport is relatively seasonal (because of holiday flights), but no where near as seasonal as some UK airports.

eg February (latest month published) Bristol had 678,065 passengers, just over half its August 2025 figure of 1,217,412 passengers

Not so easy to justify a rail link for 24,000 passengers a day in quieter months, even if can make a case for 40,000 passengers a day in school summer holidays


Realistically you're never going to get all that much of the holiday flight market over to rail because so much of it is composed of groups of people who can fill a car. Even accounting for parking, the cost of rail against the cost of a full car going any distance isn't very often winning these days. For a lot of places rail plus shuttle buses would struggle against the cost of a full pre-booked taxi. I'm not sure you even need to get this market over, since full cars aren't taking up a crazy amount of road space.

It's really the non-holiday traffic you should be targetting, even in summer. Personally I can't see the value of a fixed rail or tram link. Speeding up the buses, both to Bristol and Yatton, and making them run more regularly, would have much more of an effect for a fraction of the cost.

They do also need to fix the ticketing so that walkup fares aren't twice as much as the advances from Yatton to stations southwards. Right now you have to build a at least one wasted hour into your plans to get a reasonable price, and you can't get an advance with the bus fare built in.

Basically, don't spend hundreds of millions on a rail or tram link until you've at least spent a fraction of that on seeing if softer solutions work.
 

stuu

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Taxi or local bus. I agree that rail to metro transfers for the early flights are unlikely, but drop offs for those early flights at Temple Meads for the metro or an intermediate metro stop would still reduce pressure on the A38 and other routes approaching the airport (good for people looking to avoid expensive drop off fees too).
What pressure is there on the A38 at 430am?
 

The exile

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What pressure is there on the A38 at 430am?
None - but the person not driving to the airport at 4.30am (when, as you say, it doesn’t matter much) is also not driving back from the airport at 4.30pm a few days later (when it might).
 

Envoy

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To avoid the airport parking fees, a lot of people are getting friends/ relatives to drive them to the airport. These people then drive home or wherever and the same thing happens when the air passengers return and need to be picked up - that’s why for miles around Bristol airport, you will see people in lay byes and down country lanes just hanging around waiting for a phone call to come through for the pick up. So, this increases the amount of road traffic compared to people just driving themselves to the airport and paying for the parking. (2 trips for the drop off plus 2 trips for the pick-up = 4 trips v 2 trips if the people travelling actually drove their own cars and parked at the airport). Some of these trips might be coming a fair old way from say south Wales, Gloucester/Cheltenham and Devon & Cornwall.

Bristol Airport desires to have trans-Atlantic flights and such long haul services are likely to be at more convenient times than the ‘bucket & spade’ flights to the Med. Inbound foreigners are more likely to need public transport than Brits going abroad. It remains to be seen how Cardiff Airport’s arrivals from Toronto cope with the poor public transport at that airport when flights start this week.
 

Topological

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Waiting around for Bristol Airport is annoying as you say. At least drop off is in and out.

There also seem to be a lot of people getting out of cars on the main road and walking in with their cases.

This is not a car forum, but it does make me wonder whether it would be better to have a multi-story and just charge a flat fee rather than have so many people clogging up the roads waiting to minimise their actual pick up spend.
 

Envoy

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Waiting around for Bristol Airport is annoying as you say. At least drop off is in and out.

There also seem to be a lot of people getting out of cars on the main road and walking in with their cases.

This is not a car forum, but it does make me wonder whether it would be better to have a multi-story and just charge a flat fee rather than have so many people clogging up the roads waiting to minimise their actual pick up spend.
They don't want to pay the fees & the number plate recognition cameras clock people in / out and people are stressed loading up knowing that every second counts regarding costs. This is how airports make their money - along with passengers hanging around for departures and therefore spending money. This is why for miles around, we have people hanging around in lay byes and down country lanes - no doubt causing annoyance to locals.
"The Drop Off & Pick Up Car Park is fully cashless and uses the latest in automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) ticketless technology. Cameras will read your vehicle registration on entry, with payment taken at exit by contactless or Chip & PIN. Apple and Google Pay are also accepted. There will be no surcharge for using a credit card in this car park."


Those passengers who leave on early flights are more likely to return in the middle of the day whilst those leaving in the middle of the day are more likely to return late evening/night. That being so, then surely public/rail transport would be viable at least for those trips in the middle of the day and therefore reduce the amount of car traffic?
 

WelshBluebird

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This is not a car forum, but it does make me wonder whether it would be better to have a multi-story and just charge a flat fee rather than have so many people clogging up the roads waiting
You do have the waiting area that is free for a hour too. It's just people dont want to pay for the drop and go part so presumably wouldn't want to pay a flat fee for a multistory either.
 

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