Why is Gatwick such a big pain in the arse to get ro

[Pavementworrier]

And why does British airways put so many of its flights out of there??

Gets right on my wick

Simple answer is there's not enough capacity for the whole BA operation at Heathrow..

Heathrow and Gatwick are both awful to get too, Stansted on the other hand is a breeze.

Funnily enough it is far easier for us to fly from our local regional airport to Schipol and fly onwards from there than it is form any of the big UK airports. Its so easy that we even see people fly to Schipol to pick up flights to the USA flying back over the UK who so its faster for them to use their local small airport and fly to Amserdam and transfer than it is drive to UK airports and wait in the lines there.

from where?

Leeds to Kings X
Into St Pancras and train to Gatwick. What’s difficult?

Because the only sizeable settlement south of the Thames is Croydon…🙃

Sussex, Surrey, Kent and the rest of South London exist and have a combined population of many, many million.

Some people’s geography is absolutely shocking!

Obviously Stansted is far easier than Gatwick for someone in East Anglia…. but someone saying it isn’t probably had bad luck getting caught in traffic going to Stansted at some point, and thinks therefore it’s further away!

This . Not really London is it .

Well people who live in Essex (or further north into East Anglia) don’t all want to travel to Heathrow or Gatwick so there is nothing odd about Emirates flying from Stansted. It’s a 17 min drive from my house. Why would I want to travel 1.5 hours to Heathrow or Gatwick, which can easily become three if there’s an incident on the M25, if I can fly from my local airport?

Or living anywhere on the trainlines to gatwick! Trains don’t just shuttle between Gatwick and Croydon!

among other shorter routes like the one from Horsham, the one from Redhill or the slightly longer one from Brighton, there’s also the much longer line that runs between Portsmouth harbour to Gatwick (and continues north of Gatwick) I counted and there are 38 station stops along that line between Portsmouth and Gatwick!

so 100% agree with others that it depends where you live!

I mean, over 400,000 people do live in Croydon though.
Then there is Redhill, Horley, Horsham, Crawley etc. Lots of places which have Gatwick as the most convenient airport!

I was about to say we're a 25min drive away so it's no problem. Tbf though we only go once a year or so and most recently we've been getting the train to avoid the drop off charge of £10.

Heathrow is appalling for me to get to.

There are fast trains from Clapham Junction to Gatwick. I won’t fly from anywhere else. Heathrow and Stansted would take me hours to get to.

With regard to why certain airlines use certain airports it's often a case of take-off/landing slot availabilty and cost.

Heathrow is pretty much full so airlines have to either try and buy slots there when they come on the market (at as much $75 Million a pop) or use another airport in the south east e.g. Gatwick or Stansted, where slots might be slightly more plentiful and certainly cheaper.

The cost of slots also means Heathrow flights have to be big consistent big earners, which is one reason why some BA routes have moved back and forth between LHR and LGW over the years (and leads to a lot of people having to do the often frankly horrible journey between LHR and LGW when connecting).

Awful airport! I would rather pay extra and fly from Heathrow.

Gatwick is very easy to get to if you’re on any of the London train lines - if you can get to Clapham Junction / London Bridge it’s a change and 20-30 mins.

Far better if travelling by public transport than going to Heathrow (this may have changed for north Londoners with the Lizzie Line).

It’s the easiest airport to get to for me!!!

Depends where you live. Super easy for me!

I get the train from the north into Euston then walk 10 mins to St pancras and get train from there - a quick look at services and trains are every 10 mins

Lol at the idea that Heathrow has poor public transport or it is hard to get to central London from Gatwick.

I live in SE London and tne Elizabeth line now means it is really easy to get to Heathrow.

I live in Hertfordshire and both train and driving are easy to Gatwick so I’m not sure what the expectation is? Luton is my closest airport but it’s always gridlock and the security queues are awful.

Thameslink is the only train line that crosses London. So those of us on the Bedford or Cambridge lines find Gatwick the easiest to get to. Despite living an hour north/northeast of London, we don't have to change trains. If I fly from Heathrow I need to change to get a tube/Elizabeth line/Heathrow express.

Yep..I know getting to LHR on the Piccadilly line could be somewhat, err, sub-optimal, but OTOH the Heathrow Express has been an option for many years and the Elizabeth line has dramatically changed matters.

I think it’s a lot less of a stretch than “London” Oxford.

https://www.oxfordairport.co.uk/

Literally depends where you live op - what a stupid thread.

I live next to Stansted and Happen to need to fly from there loads - that’s just luck 😆😆

long haul flights I jus factor in the further airports journey / cost

whether that’s travelling day before and getting an airport hotel or giving ourselves heaps of extra time 😝

Well like other pps, it largely depends on where you are starting from.

However I hate their parking, the terminals are grim and we avoid it as much as possible. It's 1hr30 from home to Gatwick or just under an hour to Heathrow.

Heathrow is great, super fast car park buses, use the POD if in terminal 5 and BA flights.