London Southend Airport – SEN

Sí, por fin has llegado a los UK, has pasado el control de pasaportes donde 4 policías comprueban tu documentación y agilizan la cola, recogida tu maleta y…¿ahora qué? El aeropuerto de Southend es pequeño, muy pequeño. Perfecto para un vuelo low cost, pero sin nada más para el turista. Eso sí, si has facturado, las maletas las recoges en un plis plas.
Desconozco cómo será en cuanto a salidas, pero en cuanto a llegadas se refiere, una vez has recogido el equipaje, tan solo pude localizar una cafetería, un puesto de cambio de moneda y luego el vacío más absoluto. Hasta el cuarto de baño es pequeño y se forman largas colas. Al menos está muy bien comunicada con tren, así que el acceso a Londres lo tienes fácil.

An international airport that is shut from 12.00 am to 4.00 am doesn’t suit the waking hours of a city like London but there you go.
I had an early morning flight to Amsterdam the following morning and was hoping to camp at the airport through the night but alas.
Thankfully the train station serving the airport is just across the road and the station manager was kind enough to let us hang in there until the airport reopened.
The airport itself is tiny but well organised. Pass the security and there is a shop and a café. Nothing grand but absolutely no complaints on this front, exactly what you would expect from a small airport.
I have always been a fan of small airports because everything from the check-​in to security control to immigration is seemingly queueless which was exactly the case here as well.
3 stars from my end. Would have been a 3.5 starrer had it been open 24 hours and had Unilocal provided that option. Granted that I should have checked the opening hours but that is something I would have expected off an international airport.

Absolutely the worst airport I have ever been in. Every one is rude and unhelpful. The place makes no logical sense as to why so many planes run delayed and why no one has any desire to help or be friendly in any way. It literally only services a handful of airlines and has less than a thousand people pass through it on any given day.

Whilst this airport has the potential to be great, it suffers massively from:
1. Flights arriving later than the last train to London
2. Non-​existent alternative bus services
3. Being a painfully slow drive from London
4. Having very few airlines that serve it.
‘London’ Southend is the clear winner of the ‘worst airport claiming to serve London’ award.
If the above issues were resolved (ok maybe bar the drive there which would be hard to solve) it would get more like 4 stars. It’s quick to travel through, it’s just not set up to handle anything more than a trickle of passengers. If I hadn’t found 6 other people to share a taxi back to London with, I’d have had to find a cheap hotel in Southend to stay the night after returning to the UK!

LOL ‘London’ Southend. That’s slightly comedic seeing that Southend is on the coast. Unless you’re stayin in southend the night after an evening flight, you’re going to have to run for the trains or if there are no trains– grab a taxi. (Tip: alot of my fellow passengers on my flight actually buddied up to split the cost of the cabs and although alot of people grumbled, it was actually quite sweet to see people getting talking to other people. This made for a much friendlier atmosphere!)
But the departures were such a breeze, its the smallest airport ever so, you’re through passed security in a matter of minutes which is super efficient. Not many offerings but the café was alright.

Its small. Ohh its so small. Three gates, one shop and one place to eat. Well, its still a decent airport.
Only advice: do not take an evening flight into Southend after 11pm if you depend on the trains. There are no trains after 11pm. The taxis to London cost a fortune and your only other way out of it includes a visit to Stansted. Not something I would like to do in the middle of the night.

Southend is small. Everything about it is small. The airport is small, it takes a small amount of time to get from one end to another and the staff they have on hand: small.
This made passport control, my least favourite part of travelling anywhere, frustrating. They had one person working the non-​EU passports and three working the European ones, so the lines built up quickly and did not move. It was a long wait to get through.
And yet, when I did get through, it was easy. Right to baggage where my bag was waiting, right outside, where across the street was the train station. The train arrived, brought me to London and off I went.
There are advantages to a small airport and the ease of exit was one of them. if they had only moved the passport line along faster, everything would have been great. Ah well.

First trip to London, so I have little to compare an airport experience, but I have been to many airports, both small and large and couldn’t help but offer my experience here.
This is a small airport. You will most likely pay less and possibly significantly less to book your trip through Southend. If you are departing or arriving in the middle of the day, this may be worth it.
To agree with the other review, this is a no frills airport. It is small but actually quite nice inside and I am guessing it is somewhat new. It will take you very little time to get through check-​in and security but if you are looking for convenience beyond that, this is not the place to book.
These are the two issues that I experienced which I found to be fairly noteworthy.
(1) The airport is CLOSED from 12am-​4am. If you have an early flight, forget about it. The tube is closed around this time and there are no trains that will get you to this airport. It’s roughly 55 miles away, so your option will be to either rent a car, take a taxi or take the last train and wait outside for 3 hours until they open. I opted for a taxi and spent around 80 pounds. There was a group of about 10 people who chose to wait outside for 3 hours prior to the airport opening, all wrapped in blankets and laying on the ground. Keep in mind, there is staff inside the building, but the door will remain closed.
(2) Carry on luggage size is highly enforced. I witnessed the check-​in agent charge someone a fee because his luggage was probably an inch too tall. The guy was furious. I am all for pushing back on people taking advantage of carry on allowances, but this was ridiculous. I was also told by a ticket checker that I would need to consolidate my camera bag with my small carry on bag to make it through security, or pay a fee. I got out of line to consolidate my bags and about 30 minutes later, the ticket checker approached me and said that he checked with security and I was allowed a personal item, so it was fine. Nice of him to follow up, but come on!
Honestly, I appreciate small airports, but when you need to wait and pay for a train, then wait and pay for the tube and/​or pay some pretty excessive taxi fares and drive an hour and a half to get there, it’s just not worth it. If you’re going to central London, do yourself a favor and go to Heathrow.

Exit from the plane, passport control and on the train to Liverpool station: all done within 5 minutes time! What a record! Its a no fuss and no frills small airport in the Southend but does the job. Do not expect anything beyond straightforward airport because you will just get disappointed. The train that takes you to Stratford and Liverpool St stations is literally stones throw from this tiny airport. The travel time from the airport to the main stations took us approximately 40 – 45 minutes on a weekday at 630pm. This travel time is better than travel time from Liverpool Street station to Stanstead, which takes about 1 hour.
In my opinion, this is my kind of airport: get in and fly out.

Bringing some employment and revenue into the town, Eddie Stobart has certainly gone to the extremes to make the airport very neat and modern for domestic, European, and global flights though a larger runway is needed for larger aircraft, this isn’t currently possible due to listed buildings in the area.

new place and new beginning i hope for areas around southendhope more destinations will add on from this airport