Madrid Airport
Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas Airport is located to the north-east of Madrid, 12 km from the centre. It began its service in 1928, although it was only officially opened in 1931 and is currently operated by Aeropuertos Españoles y Navegación Aérea (Aena). It is the main airport in Spain and the European airport with the most direct flights to Latin America. The Madrid-Barcelona route, known as the “air bridge” (“puente aereo” in Spanish), is the route with the most weekly flights in the world. In 2011, 49.6 million passengers travelled through Barajas Airport, making it the 11th busiest airport in the world and the fifth busiest in Europe, behind London Heathrow, Paris Charles de Gaulle, Frankfurt and Amsterdam-Schiphol.
Madrid airport
The airport has four terminals known as: T1, T2, T3 and T4, and a satellite building of terminal 4, which is known as T4-S. T4 became operational on 5 February 2006, making Madrid Airport the largest airport in the world in terms of terminal space, with one million square metres distributed between T1, T2, T3, T4 and T4-S and one hundred and four direct boarding gates.
T4 is home to all domestic and international flights by Iberia and all the airlines that are part of the Oneworld alliance, including British Airways, American Airlines and LAN Airlines. Air Europa remains in terminals T1, T2 and T3, as do all SkyTeam and Star Alliance airlines, KLM, Air France, Alitalia, Lufthansa, Aerolíneas Argentinas, etc.
In 2014, with the death of Adolfo Suárez (first President of the Spanish Government after the dictatorship), the name “Madrid Barajas” was changed to Adolfo Suárez, Madrid-Barajas.
The airport is located in the north-east of Madrid in the district of Barajas. Terminal 4, the newest, is 2 km away from Terminals 1, 2, 3 and communication between T-4 and the other three terminals has been provided by a free bus service created exclusively for the airport by AENA.
Similarly, metro line 8 connects the new T-4 area with the rest of the airport, making Barajas the only airport, along with Heathrow and Barcelona-El Prat, to have several metro stations within the terminal.
In addition, the two buildings that make up Terminal 4, the main building and its satellite, are connected by an underground electric train without a conductor.
Terminal 4 pre-boarding area and shopping arcade
Street connections are covered by madrid airport taxi station, for which there are three stations in the various old terminals and a new one in Terminal 4; similarly, the municipal company buses have stops in each of the airport terminals.
Terminal 4
T2 is also connected by metro to the city centre (ticket cost 4.5€, 1.5€ normal ticket and 3€ surcharge), the station is easily accessible from Terminals 1 and 3. The Terminal 4 project created a new metro station, which is already in service, while the new railway line, originally planned to come into operation at the same time as T4, opened in 2010. Recently, the Cercanías train station was tested, which should directly connect the airport to the Sol station in the city centre.