I've actually had meetings in downtown San Diego where I fly into SAN, walk to the meeting, then walk back to the airport and go home.

Reply 8

TUGMASTER wrote:

You CANNOT walk to The LHR central area anymore.

Reply 50

Albert12 wrote:

You CANNOT walk to The LHR central area anymore

Copy-paste anyone?

PDX has dedicated foot and bike connections to the terminal.
It’s also possible to walk from LAS to the Strip in under 45 minutes.

You can walk to LAS by using Paradise, though honestly, you don't want to do it in the summer.

As mentioned before, SYD Domestic is accessible by foot. The route is actually somewhat popular for people wanting to save the airport station fee which adds roughly $ 10 to your otherwise $ 4 ticket if you get off at Mascot. I have definitely also walked from Cairns airport into town which is not the most recommendable walk and I don't think intended for pedestrian access.

It's possible to Walk to CPH, DMK, CNX.

Yflyer wrote:

LAX can be accessed on foot, which is kind of ironic considering how car-centric Los Angeles is. There are sidewalks on both sides of Sky Way, and stairs that take you from the overpass down to Sepulveda Blvd. I've walked that route to In-N-Out Burger and back during a long layover.

lugie wrote:

In general I would say that US airports may be harder to reach on foot simply because the pedestrian infrastructure can be lacking in general. I've tried to do it at RDU coming in from the north along the single-carriageway access route and though I eventually pulled it off I would not do it again nor recommend it.

Yeah, we should probably define "can be accessed on foot" as having some sort of pedestrian infrastructure. Technically you *can* walk along the side of the road to pretty much any airport, there's no law saying you can't as far as I know, but at most US airports (like RDU in your example) it's not really safe to do so due to the lack of infrastructure for pedestrians.

This is exactly right. I've walked between LAX and a Century Blvd. hotel many times. It is often faster than waiting for one of the free shuttle buses. Usually I'm just going to or from terminal 1 (Southwest) but a fast walker can make it to any other terminal in 10 or 15 minutes more, and on the top level its usually a fairly pleasant walk.

I think it is strange that you can walk into an airport the size of LAX, but a tiny airport like RNO is nearly impossible to access on foot without going far out of your way. Now that some hotels have been built across the street from the airport it would be nice if a footpath could be built.

I didn't notice if anyone mentioned this above, but you can walk to SEA from the hotels across the street. There is a bridge leading to the light rail station, and from there it is a 10 minute walk through the enormous parking garage to the terminal. Considering the long route used by the shuttle bus from the hotels it is probably faster to walk.

stlgph wrote:

Possible, but a total pain in the ass to get to LGA by foot and probably not something someone would voluntarily. But an option when everything was under construction and traffic was backed up down the GCP for miles - it was obvious to take the backroads through Queens out to the hotels by LGA and then get out and walk over

Or head over to the Trade Fair on 21 Ave and hoof it over to the Marine Terminal.

Crossing the GCP isn't fun but when the rideshare garage is backed up for hours it's not a bad idea to meet your driver on the other side.

You could walk down Broadway Blvd. and into HOU pretty easily, though the neighborhood is very sketchy and I wouldn't recommend it after dark.
I'm surprised no one has said anything about Milan Linate. That seemed like it was in the middle of the city, so I think there would be access. MEX would be pedestrian accessible, though it would be a VERY long walk from the city center. There is a pedestrian overpass over the highway at the west end of the runways that is crowded with families watching planes land and take off on weekends when kids are out of school.

BOI has sidewalks right up to it, and it is easy to access.
SAT has to be the most in-town airport with zero sidewalk access to it. Definitely not pedestrian friendly. Not even from old employee lot was there a walkway...
As for SLC, one can take the light rail....

You can access T3 at YYZ from a sidewalk to Airport Rd. It's actually only about 200/300m to the road. From Airport Rd to downtown Toronto, it's theoretically possible, however it would take 5 hours according to Google, and it's not a particularly inviting walk.

Interestingly you can't walk to T1. You'd have to go to T3 and then grab the free Link Train and take that to T1.

ISP and HPN

ISP and HPN

KEF has had a dedicated footpath into the town of Keflavík for a few years now, it's like 20-30 minute walk to the edge of town. It was possible to go by foot before but it was a rather unappealing route on the shoulder of a road with fast traffic.

BOS is accessible by foot. I live two towns over from it and on nice days I'll walk all the way there. They built a beautiful park right at the foot of where it meets the bus shuttles to terminals. If I don't feel like taking a shuttle, I can walk directly to the inside of Terminal E using sidewalks. It's probably one of the top 5 bigger US airports that you can do this.

You can easily walk into DAL, however you cannot walk to in DFW. Even though there are a couple of roads coming from residential neighborhoods on the West side of DFW, they have, to the best of my knowledge, no sidewalk.

mattyfitzg wrote:

Mentioned above a few times, but I’d like to reiterate how scenic the walk to London City is, Canary Wharf, the o2 arena and the shard are just a number of attractions in the backdrop.

Yup. Done the walk from Canary Wharf to LCY early in the morning a few times (for some reason never the opposite). Not a bad view in the sunrise if one likes urban architecture too.

I used to have an apartment at Dresden-Klotzsche a few hundred meters away from the terminal of DRS a couple of years ago. You can walk there as well as go by bike. I walked there often, also because it was the nearest railway station as well.

Walked and biked (with a big parking for bikes) to HAM a couple of times.

CPH is quite nicely accesible too. LIN is very close but the question of safety arises as the "preriferie" are not very safe in Milan.

I've always wanted to try JFK by foot from Midtown but going through all those neighberhoods makes it a pain (there actually is an easily accesible sidewalk from the 60s to enter the terminal area from van wyck but then it becomes grass till you exit the facilieties).

I remember OSL also had a bike/pedestrian pathway accesible to downtown Oslo but I'm sure that was quite a long hike (there were multiple bikes parked at the airport though).

MCO is only accessible by car, bus and soon rail. I have see a few intrepid people attempt to walk to the hotels just North of the airport. Brave souls!

The new South Terminal is supposed to have a bike trail that leads to the South Entrance and Lake Nona, but I have never seen any concrete plans for it.

Airports that I have walked to/from successfully:
Halmstad, Sweden (HAD) - Easy walk into town, though using the bicycle lanes
Qingdao, China (TAO) - After crossing through the car park, could walk out and anywhere on the sidewalk
San Diego (SAN) - Walked to and from downtown, though when first trying to exit I tried to leave first crossing a surface car park but was blocked from accessing the road by a chainlink fence which I climbed, scraping myself. On the way back, I found the right way.
Changhai Island, China (CNI) - Tiny airport, could just walk along small roads to the town. But not made for pedestrians.
Hamilton Island, Australia (HTI) - Walked along the quiet road into the terminal
Gibraltar (GIB) - Walked across the runway and into the terminal from the city centre
Mexico City (MEX) - Not pedestrian friendly, but followed many people out of the terminal walking on the exit road until a main street with a sidewalk.
Saipan (SPN) - Not pedestrian friendly, walked a very long way from my beachside hotel along busy roads with no sidewalk, eventually reached it. Not recommended.
Nantucket (ACK) - Easy but slightly long walk along trails and sidewalk to the town.
Whitehorse, Yukon (YXY) - Also not made for pedestrian entry, but quiet enough to walk in along the road.
Barrow, Alaska (BRW) - The airport is right in the town, so easy to walk in and out and all around the small city.
Ponta Delgada, Azores (PDL) - Longish walk but sidewalk all the way to the city centre, though the streets become very narrow once in town.
Myrtle Beach (MYR) - Not made for pedestrians, but could walk in the grass along the road to enter. Not recommended.
Manistee, Michigan (MBL) - Walked along the highway from the airport to town. Scary at night with fast traffic. Not recommended.
Los Angeles (LAX) - As others have mentioned, walked from Terminal 1 to the In-N-Out. Also walked to the east to a hotel before.
Manila (MNL) - Have walked to the casino, hotels, aviation museum, restaurants from the airport by crossing the parking and onto roads. Just crossing the street outside Terminal 4 can get you into a shopping centre.
Block Island (BIT) - Could walk along the road right out of the airport. It was winter so very few cars on the roads.
Westerly, Rhode Island (WST) - Sidewalks from the terminal to anywhere in town - walked to the train station.
Marble Canyon, Arizona (MYH) - Walked on the shoulder of the highway from the airport to the visitor center of the Navajo Bridge
Imperial, California (IPL) - Walked on the shoulder of the highway from the terminal to get Mexican food at a nearby shopping center.
St. Pierre (FSP) - Walked along the side of the road to and from the airport several times during my stay in St-Pierre et Miquelon.
Rochester, UK (RCS) - I ended up making it to the airport from the railway station, but there was no pavement in several places and it did not feel safe.
Guernsey (GCI) - Had a great walk from the airport to the seacliffs along country lanes.
Isle of Man (IOM) - Walked from the airport to Castletown and back - I believe there was pavement.
Duxford (QFO) - Walked from a nearby railway station to the airport using a scenic dirt trail.
Le Bourget (LBG) - Easy to walk into any of the FBOs from the surrounding city area.
Bern (BRN) - Walked from the airport into the nearby Belp town to a hotel using cycle paths/pavement.
Warsaw (WAW) - Walked into the airport from nearby town area on sidewalk.
Wels, Austria (LOLW) - Walked out of the airport and along residential streets into the town centre.
San Carlos (SQL) - Was able to walk out of the airport and into the commercial areas on sidewalks.
Blackpool (BLK) - Adjacent to a residential area, a long but easy walk on sidewalks to the centre of town.
Tiree (TRE) - Walked out of the airport and down the middle of the road and all over the island. Thankfully, very little traffic.
Donegal (CFN) - Walked out of the airport and down the road to the nearby beach.

Unsuccessful:
Charlotte (CLT) - After visiting the Carolina Aviation Museum, I wanted to go back to the terminal for my flight and thought I'd walk. First I found myself walking on the airport perimeter road, a police car passed me and took no notice. Then, I walked down a slope and was walking on the shoulder of the interstate. At an overpass, I went back up the slope and along the side of that road and found myself at an employee parking lot. I boarded an employee shuttle that took me back to the terminal.
Las Vegas (LAS) - I wanted to go to a nearby airport hotel but it was too late for the shuttle to operate, so I tried to walk there from the airport. I tried to cross several parking lots but was always met by high fences. Eventually I returned and took a rip-off taxi ride to the hotel.
Stansted (STN) - Wanted to walk to a nearby airport hotel, but it seemed the only way to leave the airport was to get onto a road with lots of fast traffic. Took an Uber in the end.
Newquay (NQY) - This is from the old Classic Air Force museum rather than the terminal. I wanted to walk back to town from the museum, but the road is narrow with steep mounds on either side. I had to run up the mound each time cars would come. Eventually someone stopped who was worried for my safety and gave me a ride the rest of the way.
Atlantic City (ACY) - Thought of walking out of the airport to see what was around, but seemed I would have to walk on the road to do so.
Newport News (PHF) - No way out without walking on the road itself, so I ended up taking a taxi which drove in the wrong direction and pretended not to understand me and then later used my credit card number for fraudulent purchases.

bohica wrote:

SFO. In the early 90's I used to live in San Bruno, CA just across the freeway from SFO. I used to walk down San Bruno Ave over the freeway to the long term parking lot next to United airlines MX base. From there I would get on the long term parking bus and ride it to work at the terminal. This was before the International terminal and the people mover was built. I haven't been to SFO in a long time so I don't know if walking would be feasible today.

Walking is still totally feasible at SFO and people still do it. Funny thing is that in the early mornings, one can see individuals jogging along McDonnell Road which leads one directly to International Terminal G with continuing access to all other terminals. A few employees even cycle to work at SFO.

Both airports for the once busiest route on Earth are easily accessed by foot: CGH and SDU.

HAM, DXB, DND and EDI I've done; LCY should be possible, no?

You can walk from Amsterdam to Schiphol, will take a long time but it's possible.

MEL is freeway access only, owing to it's 'isolated' location. You can catch a local bus if you need to get to one of the nearby suburbs - good luck getting a Cab to drive you if you need to get to somewhere within 10kms of the airport!

SYD can be accessed on foot as it's located in the middle of inner suburban Sydney, MEL was built at the-then edge of suburban Melbourne to allow for expansion & unrestricted ops.

Both MNL and CEB are inside city centers so it's very much possible to just walk to them if you wanted to, but in practice I don't think I've ever seen anyone do that given that they're mainly accessible by car. Some other airports that are inside cities (such as many Japanese airports like FUK) should be similar.

I fairly routinely walk to the airport if I have time and no bags.
ROK, OOL and EMD are the most common I do on foot.

DXB I've definitely done on foot, but the hotel wasn't really that far away, it could potentially be considered "at the airport".

LGAviation wrote:

As mentioned before, SYD Domestic is accessible by foot. The route is actually somewhat popular for people wanting to save the airport station fee which adds roughly $ 10 to your otherwise $ 4 ticket if you get off at Mascot. I have definitely also walked from Cairns airport into town which is not the most recommendable walk and I don't think intended for pedestrian access.

I've done the Cairns walk before and will likely do it again in January, it's under an hour to the northern hotels and about an hour and a half to the southern ones. The airport road is easy enough to walk up.
Next time I'm up I'll have a heavy bag of dive gear so not too sure.

entdoc wrote:

ISP and HPN

The eastern side of HPN (containing the main terminal) is walkable from the immediate surrounding residences, businesses, and colleges. From the city of White Plains, it's quite a hike with no defined pedestrian infrastructure. If you need to be on the western side (containing Million Air and most light GA), the only option is to walk up Route 120 and Tower Road, which weren't designed with pedestrians in mind.

You can also walk from DPS to some of the nearby areas like Tuban pretty easily.

Some great shouts in this thread, and quite a few airports I wouldn't have thought were walkable off the top of my head.

HKT - agreed, decent beachfront accommodation and food within 10-15 mins walk of arrivals.
CZM - anywhere from 5 to 30 minutes to reach most of San Miguel, while taxis ask for $30.
GMZ - the village of Santiago is a beautiful cliffside walk up/down from the airport, although very steep on the way up.
LRH - skipped the bus to save money as a student, about an hour to the old town and harbour.

BubbleFrog wrote:

HAM, DXB, DND and EDI I've done; LCY should be possible, no?

While HAM is located within the city its far from Downtown or from any places most people would head to. But if your Destination is close to the airport you can walk easily, or go by bike.

DLHAM wrote:

BubbleFrog wrote:

HAM, DXB, DND and EDI I've done; LCY should be possible, no?

While HAM is located within the city its far from Downtown or from any places most people would head to. But if your Destination is close to the airport you can walk easily, or go by bike.

Yeah, I lived not too far from it (northerly Langenhorn). Actually used to have quite a few Sunday walks round there. From Downtown it's a fair distance (although quite bikeable), agreed.

BubbleFrog wrote:

DLHAM wrote:

BubbleFrog wrote:

HAM, DXB, DND and EDI I've done; LCY should be possible, no?

While HAM is located within the city its far from Downtown or from any places most people would head to. But if your Destination is close to the airport you can walk easily, or go by bike.

Yeah, I lived not too far from it (northerly Langenhorn). Actually used to have quite a few Sunday walks round there. From Downtown it's a fair distance (although quite bikeable), agreed.

I used to live in Norderstedt, now within Hamburg. Yeah from large parts of Langenhorn you can easily walk to the airport. In Fuhlsbüttel there is even a neighborhood where you just have to cross a small pedetrian bridge, a car park and after a walk of 300m/900ft or around 3 minutes you are inside the Terminal. A lot of my ex coworkers at the airport lived in that area.

By Bike its like 35-45 minutes from the Airport to Downtown, absolutely bikeable thats true, if weather is good and you do not have baggage.

I have walked to DMK, DPS, CNX, PHS and CPH

You can walk to YXU (London, Ontario), I've never walked it, but I biked there many times when I worked there. The bike ride was 12 minutes for me so I'm guessing an hour walk from some of the houses/apartments closest to the airport.

There should probably some minimum size requirement to be interesting for this thread. I can offer one more international airport big enough for a wide-body jet serving the principal city in a nation that you can easily walk to: RAR, Rarotonga in the Cook Islands. I flew there in both a 737 and a 767. The whole island of Rarotonga is only about 7 miles in diameter. You can tour the entire paved road system by bicycle in a very leisurely afternoon.

The international terminal may be the largest building in the country.

You can technically get in to JFK on foot but I don't think there's a way to reach the passenger terminals anymore without taking the AirTrain. You can definitely reach the cargo areas, US customs, etc. just on foot. But the closest you can get to the passenger terminals is about 1/4 mile away on the North Service Road, where the sidewalk (temporarily) ends after the road merges with the Van Wyck. Interestingly, it starts up again near T1, so if they just built like 1/8 a mile of sidewalk, you could walk all the way in. But the problem is then you'd be walking that 1/8 of a mile on an expressway. I don't think it's even legal to build a sidewalk there.

The passenger terminals are several miles from the airport entrance anyway, so I doubt many people would want to do it. But I'm sure you used to be able to.

You *can* walk down Lefferts Blvd. or the cargo service road to one of the AirTrain stations and take it one stop to the terminals. Technically those stations are on airport grounds, so you are "accessing the airport" on foot, and in fact this is one of multiple ways to do that. But I don't know of a way to directly walk off the street into one of the passenger terminals.

NCE is accessible by foot. I have never done it but it is about an hour-and-a-half walk from the center of Nice down the Promenade des Anglais.

You can walk to ( and around ) HAM, Hamburgs Helmut Schmidt Airport.
You can walk to ( and around ) HAJ, Hannover airport.

HKG supposedly doesn't have pedestrian access... but that didn't stop one foolhardy soul from casually walking down the hard shoulder of the elevated airport highway the last time I was there.

passengerpigeon wrote:

HKG supposedly doesn't have pedestrian access... but that didn't stop one foolhardy soul from casually walking down the hard shoulder of the elevated airport highway the last time I was there.

HKG certainly does have pedestrian access. Airport Trail is a paved, red-coloured footpath that can is accessible from Tung Chung and passes by Cathay City, east of the end of Runway 25L, Gatehouse 2, before terminating at the airport Ground Transportation Centre adjacent Terminal 1. Though I can understand why someone might think to walk along the main road as the trail isn't signposted from the terminal and you'd need to walk through the Ground Transportation Centre and past Gatehouse 2 before the first signage and red pavement begins.

Sent from my ELE-L29 using Tapatalk

In the Los Angeles area in addition to LAX and SNA, you can also walk into BUR.

blockski wrote:

You can walk to DCA right now; there is a project in the works to dramatically improve the pedestrian connections to the airport.

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/ ... _small.pdf

Recognizing I am responding 7 months after the post was created, it seems DCA is the only major airport in the US that actively supports walking to the airport.

Just about every small commercial airport in the US supports pedestrians. One interesting airport is BTV. Just beyond the parking garages is a neighborhood with even a small deli across the street. I bet airport employees go there for a cheap lunch.

As larger airports have grown and car accessibility improved through highways in the US, it shuts out pedestrian traffic unless you want to be cited for walking along a highway without a good reason (car broke down, etc).

Though recently at TPA, with the advent of the SkyConnect train, there does now appear to be sidewalk access from Spruce Street to the SkyConnect train. I suppose this also exists to support the upcoming SkyCenter One office park complex across from the SkyConnect station.

ClipperGoodwill wrote:

MCO is only accessible by car, bus and soon rail. I have see a few intrepid people attempt to walk to the hotels just North of the airport. Brave souls!

The new South Terminal is supposed to have a bike trail that leads to the South Entrance and Lake Nona, but I have never seen any concrete plans for it.

Nope, you won't see me doing that. If the cars don't get ya, the gators in the moats will.

phatfarmlines wrote:

blockski wrote:

You can walk to DCA right now; there is a project in the works to dramatically improve the pedestrian connections to the airport.

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/ ... _small.pdf

Recognizing I am responding 7 months after the post was created, it seems DCA is the only major airport in the US that actively supports walking to the airport.

Some additional news at DCA since this thread was created - they've added a bikeshare station to connect to the DC region's bikeshare system - this is believed to be the first such connection for an American airport. The airport is located directly along the Mount Vernon Trail, which is a very popular biking and walking trail along the Potomac River, connecting to Alexandria, Arlington, and DC.

https://wtop.com/business-finance/2020/ ... -national/

I will say that while DCA is probably the best major airport here, they have a lot more they could do to actively promote walking and biking connections to the airport itself.

spacecadet wrote:

You can technically get in to JFK on foot but I don't think there's a way to reach the passenger terminals anymore without taking the AirTrain. You can definitely reach the cargo areas, US customs, etc. just on foot. But the closest you can get to the passenger terminals is about 1/4 mile away on the North Service Road, where the sidewalk (temporarily) ends after the road merges with the Van Wyck. Interestingly, it starts up again near T1, so if they just built like 1/8 a mile of sidewalk, you could walk all the way in. But the problem is then you'd be walking that 1/8 of a mile on an expressway. I don't think it's even legal to build a sidewalk there.

The passenger terminals are several miles from the airport entrance anyway, so I doubt many people would want to do it. But I'm sure you used to be able to.

You *can* walk down Lefferts Blvd. or the cargo service road to one of the AirTrain stations and take it one stop to the terminals. Technically those stations are on airport grounds, so you are "accessing the airport" on foot, and in fact this is one of multiple ways to do that. But I don't know of a way to directly walk off the street into one of the passenger terminals.

originally you could walk to JFK. That part right before the terminal area is from the 60s:

https://www.pinterest.es/pin/327214729150591433/

Pity how times have changed.

A weird one: you could walk to the terminals at CAI; they are accessible by foot.

But it would be very impractical. The airport isn’t really within walking distance to anything, with its long access roads. Not to mention, the heat. And dust.

I've rode a bike to Umeå airport (UME) from my student apartment. They even have a free bike shelter for the passengers or airport employees. Quite a scenic ride I must say and since Umeå has an excellent bike lane system it was a smooth ride. Although the wind can be quite strong when you're on the bridge crossing thw Umeälven. My friend once walked there but it was too much for me.

You can also technically walk to all Indonesian airports, if you don't mind about the absence of sidewalk. The one that has a proper pedestrian access that I can think of are BDO, HLP, and JOG.