Venue Location

Getting Here

Bus

Greater Manchester’s buses are now run under the Bee Network: most buses are yellow, and a flat £2 single and a £5 day cap is charged if you tap the same contactless card or phone every time you board. There’s no need to tap off on buses.

The handy one for the venue is the free bus, route 1. It loops from Piccadilly Rail Station via Portland Street, Princess Street and Whitworth Street to Deansgate and back, and stops almost outside the venue at the Whitworth Street / Princess Street junction. It runs every ten minutes from 7am to 7pm on weekdays and Saturdays (every 30 minutes in the evening), and every ten minutes from 10am to 6:30pm on Sundays. No ticket needed, just hop on.

Almost every regular bus into the city centre stops at Piccadilly Gardens (about seven minutes’ walk) or on Oxford Road Railway Station (about five minutes’ walk).

Tram (Metrolink)

The nearest stop is St Peter’s Square, about five minutes’ walk: leave the stop, walk past the Central Library and head down Princess Street, and the venue is on your right at the Whitworth Street junction. St Peter’s Square is served by every Metrolink line, so from Altrincham, Bury, Eccles, MediaCity, Didsbury, Ashton, Rochdale, the Trafford Centre or the Airport you can get here without changing. Piccadilly Gardens and Piccadilly are also within a ten-minute walk.

Fares are zone-based. The city centre is Zone 1 (£1.40 single). Tap in and tap out with the same contactless card or phone at the platform readers. Trams run every 6 to 12 minutes depending on the line.

Train

Manchester Oxford Road is the nearest station, a five-minute walk. Come out of the main entrance, drop down onto Whitworth Street, turn right and walk past the Palace Theatre to the Princess Street junction; the venue is on the left-hand corner. Oxford Road is on the through-line from Liverpool, Warrington, Preston, Bolton and Manchester Airport, so check whether your train calls there before Piccadilly.

Manchester Piccadilly, the main station for London, Birmingham, Leeds, Sheffield, Edinburgh and Glasgow, is about a ten-minute walk. Leave the station onto Fairfield Street, which runs into Whitworth Street, and keep going straight past Sackville Gardens (the Alan Turing memorial) and Manchester New Square until you reach Princess Street.

Manchester Victoria (services from Leeds, Bradford, Rochdale and the north) is a 20-minute walk, or hop on the tram to St Peter’s Square.

Air

Manchester Airport (MAN) has direct flights from most of Europe and is well connected to the venue. Trains are the quickest route to the city.

Trains from The Station (the combined rail, tram and bus interchange at the airport, reached by covered walkway from all terminals) run to Piccadilly every few minutes and take 15 to 20 minutes; many also call at Oxford Road which is even closer.

Trams on the Dark Blue (Airport) line goes straight to St Peter’s Square in about 45 minutes, every 12 minutes, £4.60 single with contactless.

Taxi to the venue takes 25 to 40 minutes depending on traffic and costs roughly £25 to £35. Book a black cab or private hire from the ranks at each terminal, or use Uber, or Bolt. Try not to use taxi’s mind, as Manchester in their infinite wisdom has changed the Uber pickup point in the past month, meaning you’re left running through the Manchester rain at 2am to chase a taxi when you just want to get home. Trust me, the lead organiser had that grief a few weeks back.