Manchester – Spotting Around The Airport

AvGeekery was the main aim of my tour of the north-west and after a disappointing spotting trip to Liverpool’s John Lennon Airport the previous day, day two’s itinerary featured a location that promised to be more successful. Manchester Airport is the third busiest airport in the UK and the busiest outside of London, with more than 28 million passengers passing through in 2023. The airport sees more than 180,000 annual movements and with destinations ranging from Amsterdam to Addis Ababa and Zurich to Zakynthos, there’s plenty of variety. If you want to read the previous posts from my tour of the north-west, you can find them here, here, here, here, here and here.

Getting to Manchester Airport is fairly simple as the airport is served by both a railway station and a stop on the Manchester Metrolink tram network. The railway connects the airport to destinations across the north of England and northern Wales, and opens up most of the UK with a single change, with services provided by Northern, TransPennine Express and Transport for Wales. There’s also plenty of bus and coach connections, meaning Manchester Airport is as well connected as its London competitors.

My first AvGeek spot to visit was the Runway Visitor Park (RVP), located to the south-west of the terminal area on the northern side of the runways. Unfortunately despite a well located bus stop just outside the gate, there’s not actually a bus that serves the RVP and so reaching it from the railway station is a bit of a pain. One option is to catch the 313 bus as far as ‘Hasty Lane’ and then take a 25 minute walk or you can splash the cash like I did and jump in a cab which cost me £11.80 plus tip. Alternatively, you can make your way to ‘Sunbank Lane’ via the 88 bus from Altrincham and Wilmslow, again with a 20 or so minute walk from the stop to the RVP, or you can choose to drive and pay to park at the RVP which costs £4 for 2 hours, £10 for 2-4 hour or £12 for all day.

In terms of facilities the RVP is well supplied with toilets, a decent café, aviation shop and a picnic area. There’s also a play area for kids and a reasonable amount of shade and shelter, something that was very much appreciated on a very warm June day. The RVP is also home to a number of historic aircraft including Concorde G-BOAC, the Avro 146-RJX (the last aircraft to be built in the UK), a Nimrod, a Trident and the nose of a Monarch Airlines DC-10. Entry to the aircraft usually cost extra, however it does mean you can really make a day of your visit to the RVP.

During my morning visit to the RVP, Manchester Airport was using runway 23R for landings and initially 23L for take-offs, with aircraft landing and taking off to the south-west. This meant that arriving aircraft mostly taxied right alongside the RVP fence, allowing for close up photos, although these were slightly hindered by the sun being behind the aircraft. Landing shots were also possible with a reasonable zoom and take-off shots were possible if you had a decent long-range camera, although my mobile phone camera struggled with the long range zoom.

Manchester Airport has a very good mix of airlines and aircraft to spot and whatever time you turn up, you’ll be able to see a variety of different liveries. Aswell as almost the full selection of Low Cost Carriers (easyJet, Ryanair and Vueling), and being a major base for Holiday airlines Jet2 and TUI, Manchester is also served by a large number of European, Middle Eastern and Asian ‘full service’ carries. This means as well as the Airbus A320s of British Airways, Swiss, Finnair and SAS, you can also see the widebodies of Emirates, Saudia, Ethiopian and Cathay Pacific.

If smaller aircraft are more your thing, Aurigny and Emerald Airlines, the latter on behalf of Aer Lingus, serve Manchester with their ATR 72s, whilst Luxair operate between MAN and Luxembourg with Bombardier Dash 8-Q400s. There’s also the occasional ERJ visit on behalf on SAS, although the majority of the Scandinavian carrier’s flights are operated by Airbus A320 family aircraft. The rarest aircraft serving Manchester is Sunair’s Dornier 328JET which operates on behalf of British Airways between Manchester and Billund during the winter months. Unfortunately the timings for this have a evening arrival and departure making photography harder, however if you just want to see this very aircraft, Manchester is the place to be!

After spending a few hours at the RVP, getting a good selection of photos and ticking off plenty of aircraft as seen, it was time to head to the second Manchester AvGeek spot that I wanted to try out. Another taxi booked and I was soon on my way to The Airport Pub, which is located at the northern end of the airport complex. If you’re wanting to access the pub directly from the railway station, its about a 20 minute walk or its about a 15 minute walk from the Shadowmoss tram stop.

The Airport Pub has all the facilities you’d expect from a pub and you can sit inside and enjoy a full meal if you so desire. However, if you head out to their beer garden, you can enjoy a selection of fast food whilst also getting excellent views of aircraft landing or taxing for departure on runway 23R. On a hot sunny day in June, the beer garden was very popular with families, although I was able to grab a picnic bench to sit at and enjoy a cider and a late lunch of burger and fries whilst I watched the afternoon arrivals.

During my stay at The Airport Pub I was able to see a good mix of arrivals including a Swiftair ATR72 cargo aircraft and an Egyptair arrival from Cairo. Unfortunately, the majority of departures were still using runway 23L and so could be just about seen in the distance but weren’t able to be photographed. If photography is the main aim of your visit, make sure to pick the left side of the beer garden to picture arrivals as the few potted trees that provide the limited shade can obstruct photos if you sit the wrong side of them.

Obviously, there is an expectation that if you visit The Airport Pub you do at least purchase some drinks from the bar and you don’t eat your own food on their premises. The food served by the pub is of good quality and is reasonably priced given the high demand and there’s a good selection including burgers, dirty fries and hot dogs. You can drive to the pub, however there is limited parking and this can be quite expensive, so if you can get the train or tram and walk then I’d certainly recommend it.

All in all Manchester is a great airport to spot at, although neither of the above spots are particularly easy to access via public transport. The mix of traffic is great, with a wide range of airlines and aircraft and both spots allow close up views of taxiing aircraft depending on the runway in use. The RVP with its historic aircraft and aviation shop is a bit of an AvGeek’s paradise, so is obviously more popular with spotters, but The Airport Pub is also very popular, especially in the summer months.

Viewing location                   4*

Charge (free)                       5*

Facilities                          4*

Variety of Traffic                 5*

MAN (Runway Viewing Park) Overall Score 4.5*

Viewing location                   3*

Charge (food and drink)            3*

Facilities                          3*

Variety of Traffic                 5*

MAN (The Airport Pub) Overall Score     3.5*