An IATA airport code , also known as an IATA location identifier , IATA station code , or simply a location identifier , is a three-letter geocode designating many airports and metropolitan areas around the world, defined by the International Air Transport Association (IATA). The characters prominently displayed on baggage tags attached at airport check-in desks are an example of a way these codes are used.
63-615: Adolfo Suárez Madrid–Barajas Airport ( IATA : MAD , ICAO : LEMD ) is the main international airport serving Madrid , the capital city of Spain . At 3,050 ha (7,500 acres; 30.5 km) in area, it is the second-largest airport in Europe by physical size behind Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport . In 2019, 61.8 million passengers travelled through Madrid–Barajas, making it the country's busiest airport as well as Europe's fifth-busiest . The airport opened in 1931 and has grown to be one of Europe's most important aviation centres. Within
126-455: A complete line – dropping passengers at departures of terminals 1, 2 and 4 before collecting passengers in the reverse order at arrivals. The EMT public night bus service N4 (nicknamed "Buho", Owl) also services from Madrid downtown (Plaza Cibeles) to Barajas (Plaza de los Hermanos Falcó y Alvarez de Toledo, 400m from the airport through a passageway above the highway). EMT also have an express bus linking Barajas airport to Renfe's Atocha Station ,
189-567: A new airport is built, replacing the old one, leaving the city's new "major" airport (or the only remaining airport) code to no longer correspond with the city's name. The original airport in Nashville, Tennessee, was built in 1936 as part of the Works Progress Administration and called Berry Field with the designation, BNA. A new facility known as Nashville International Airport was built in 1987 but still uses BNA. This
252-509: Is GSN and its IATA code is SPN, and some coincide with IATA codes of non-U.S. airports. Canada's unusual codes—which bear little to no similarity with any conventional abbreviation to the city's name—such as YUL in Montréal , and YYZ in Toronto , originated from the two-letter codes used to identify weather reporting stations in the 1930s. The letters preceding the two-letter code follow
315-513: Is an indoor car park with direct access to terminals T2 and T3. A Parking 'Express' facility, available for short periods only, is located at Terminal 2 and dedicated long-term parking is also available with 1,655 spaces; a free shuttle operates between the long-stay car park and all terminals. There are also VIP car parks. [REDACTED] This article incorporates public domain material from the Air Force Historical Research Agency IATA airport code The assignment of these codes
378-617: Is available. However, many railway administrations have their own list of codes for their stations, such as the list of Amtrak station codes . Airport codes arose out of the convenience that the practice brought pilots for location identification in the 1930s. Initially, pilots in the United States used the two-letter code from the National Weather Service (NWS) for identifying cities. This system became unmanageable for cities and towns without an NWS identifier, and
441-422: Is designed to give passengers a stress-free start to their journey. This is managed through careful use of illumination, with glass panes instead of walls and numerous skylights which allow natural light into the structure. With this new addition, Barajas is designed to handle 70 million passengers annually. During the construction of Terminal 4, two more runways (15L/33R and 18L/36R) were constructed to aid in
504-523: Is different from the name in English, yet the airport code represents only the English name. Examples include: Due to scarcity of codes, some airports are given codes with letters not found in their names: The use of 'X' as a filler letter is a practice to create three-letter identifiers when more straightforward options were unavailable: Some airports in the United States retained their NWS ( National Weather Service ) codes and simply appended an X at
567-671: Is governed by IATA Resolution 763, and it is administered by the IATA's headquarters in Montreal , Canada. The codes are published semi-annually in the IATA Airline Coding Directory. IATA provides codes for airport handling entities, and for certain railway stations. Alphabetical lists of airports sorted by IATA code are available. A list of railway station codes , shared in agreements between airlines and rail lines such as Amtrak , SNCF , and Deutsche Bahn ,
630-513: Is in conjunction to rules aimed to avoid confusion that seem to apply in the United States, which state that "the first and second letters or second and third letters of an identifier may not be duplicated with less than 200 nautical miles separation." Thus, Washington, D.C. area's three airports all have radically different codes: IAD for Washington–Dulles , DCA for Washington–Reagan (District of Columbia Airport), and BWI for Baltimore (Baltimore–Washington International, formerly BAL). Since HOU
693-543: Is not followed outside the United States: In addition, since three letter codes starting with Q are widely used in radio communication, cities whose name begins with "Q" also had to find alternate codes, as in the case of: IATA codes should not be confused with the FAA identifiers of U.S. airports. Most FAA identifiers agree with the corresponding IATA codes, but some do not, such as Saipan , whose FAA identifier
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#1732776353238756-403: Is responsible for more than 40% of Barajas's traffic. The airport has five passenger terminals: T1, T2, T3, T4 and T4S. The airport was constructed in 1927, opening to domestic and international air traffic on 22 April 1931, although regular commercial operations began two years later. A small terminal was constructed with a capacity for 30,000 passengers a year, in addition to several hangars and
819-416: Is used for William P. Hobby Airport , the new Houston–Intercontinental became IAH. The code BKK was originally assigned to Bangkok–Don Mueang and was later transferred to Suvarnabhumi Airport , while the former adopted DMK. The code ISK was originally assigned to Gandhinagar Airport (Nashik's old airport) and later on transferred to Ozar Airport (Nashik's current airport). Shanghai–Hongqiao retained
882-571: The Canadian transcontinental railroads were built, each station was assigned its own two-letter Morse code : When the Canadian government established airports, it used the existing railway codes for them as well. If the airport had a weather station, authorities added a "Y" to the front of the code, meaning "Yes" to indicate it had a weather station or some other letter to indicate it did not. When international codes were created in cooperation with
945-567: The Estonian ride-hailing company Bolt has operated exclusive pickup areas at the airport, offering flat-rate fares for rides into the city. The Madrid Metro Line connects the airport with city centre station Nuevos Ministerios in Madrid's financial district. The Barajas Line 8 provides a fast route from the underground stations at Terminal 2 (access to T1 and T3) and Terminal 4 into central Madrid. The metro also provides links to stations on
1008-604: The Prebetong brand. The company soon expanded into different geographical areas (Madrid, Aragon, Costa del Sol, Baleares and Canary Islands). In practice, they were the first concrete-mixer trucks to circulate on Spanish roads. In 1968 he started the company Shockbeton , dedicated to making pieces of architectural concrete. It was the first time in Spain that concrete prefabricated structures for facades were created, with results of great technical and aesthetic importance. Another of
1071-569: The "Puente Aéreo" (in Spanish), literally called "Air Bridge", used to be the busiest route between two EU airports with 55 daily flights in 2012. The schedule has been reduced since the February 2008 opening of the Madrid–Barcelona high-speed rail line which covers the distance in 2 + 1 ⁄ 2 hours. Subsequently, the route has been overtaken by London-Dublin and Paris-Toulouse. On
1134-468: The 1990s, the airport expanded further. In 1994, the first cargo terminal was constructed and the control tower was renovated. In 1997, it opened the North Dock, which is used as an exclusive terminal for Iberia's Schengen flights. In 1998, it inaugurated a new control tower, 71 m tall and then in 1999 the new South Dock opened, which implies an expansion of the international terminal. During this time,
1197-438: The 2006 IStructE Award for Commercial Structures) was built by Ferrovial and inaugurated on 5 February 2006. Terminal 4 is one of the world's largest airport terminals in terms of area, with 760,000 square meters (8,180,572 square feet) in separate landside and airside structures. It consists of a main building, T4 (470,000 m) and a satellite building, T4S (290,000 m), which are approximately 2 km apart. The new Terminal 4
1260-589: The Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas Airport), along with Richard Rogers . In 1976 Lamela founded in Spain the Club of Rome , an international organization that seeks to improve the world with tools such as education, social integration and the fair and equitable development of the planet. Antonio Lamela has written several books and publications, as well as numerous papers, writings and essays on land use, water policies, conservation of
1323-589: The Alsa bus company runs services to the cities of Zaragoza , Barcelona , Valladolid , León , Murcia , Alicante , Gijón , Oviedo , Lugo , Coruña , Santiago de Compostela , Burgos , Vitoria , San Sebastián , Santander , Bilbao , Logroño and Pamplona . From terminal T1 the Socibus company runs services to the major cities in Andalusia : Huelva , Córdoba , Cadiz , Jerez and Seville . In early 2006,
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#17327763532381386-461: The Plan of Airports of 1957, Barajas Airport is classified as a first-class international airport. By the 1970s, large jets were landing at Barajas, and the growth of traffic mainly as a result of tourism exceeded forecasts. At the beginning of the decade, the airport reached the 1.2 million passengers, double that envisaged in the Plan of Airports of 1957. In the 1970s, with the boom in tourism and
1449-456: The Spanish government announced plans to tender Madrid–Barajas airport to companies in the private sector for a period of up to 40 years. On 27 January 2012, Spanair suspended all flights affecting Madrid–Barajas as well as other domestic and international connections. On 20 September 2012, both runways 15/33 were renamed as 14R/32L (the longest) and 14L/32R (the shortest). On 1 August 2015,
1512-422: The Spanish railway network. In October 2006, a bid was launched for the construction of a Cercanías link between Chamartín Station and Terminal 4. Now finished, this single Cercanías Line (C-1) links Madrid Barajas Terminal 4, with Chamartín Station and Atocha AVE high-speed train stations. In June 2011 a decision was made to equip this link with dual gauge which will allow AVE high-speed trains to reach
1575-494: The U.S. For example, several airports in Alaska have scheduled commercial service, such as Stebbins and Nanwalek , which use FAA codes instead of ICAO codes. Thus, neither system completely includes all airports with scheduled service. Some airports are identified in colloquial speech by their IATA code. Examples include LAX and JFK . Antonio Lamela Antonio Lamela Martínez (December 1, 1926 – April 1, 2017)
1638-481: The United States, because "Y" was seldom used in the United States, Canada simply used the weather station codes for its airports, changing the "Y" to a "Z" if it conflicted with an airport code already in use. The result is that most major Canadian airport codes start with "Y" followed by two letters in the city's name (for example, YOW for O tta w a , YWG for W innipe g , YYC for C algar y , or YVR for V ancouve r ), whereas other Canadian airports append
1701-602: The airport itself has medical rooms and medical personnel attached to the Airport Medical Service to cover transit passengers who need medical attention. It also has 75 Cardiac Rescue Points equipped with defibrillators in the event of cardiorespiratory arrest. All terminals have clearly signed taxi ranks outside the arrivals area. Official taxis are white with a red stripe and have the Madrid City Council coat-of-arms on their doors. Since 2024,
1764-440: The airport itself instead of the city it serves, while another code is reserved which refers to the city itself which can be used to search for flights to any of its airports. For instance: Or using a code for the city in one of the major airports and then assigning another code to another airport: When different cities with the same name each have an airport, they need to be assigned different codes. Examples include: Sometimes,
1827-449: The airport station. The Nuevos Ministerios metro station opened a satellite check-in center in 2002 right by the AZCA business area in central Madrid; the satellite check-in center was permanently closed in 2006 due to security concerns. EMT ( Madrid Municipal Transport Company ) runs regular public bus services between the airport and Madrid (Avenida de América station): bus 200 runs as
1890-418: The airport's former name, such as Orlando International Airport 's MCO (for Mc C o y Air Force Base), or Chicago's O'Hare International Airport , which is coded ORD for its original name: Or char d Field. In rare cases, the code comes from the airport's unofficial name, such as Kahului Airport 's OGG (for local aviation pioneer Jimmy H ogg ). In large metropolitan areas, airport codes are often named after
1953-497: The airport, allowing 120 operations an hour (one takeoff or landing every 30 seconds). Terminals 1, 2 and 3 are adjacent terminals that are home to SkyTeam and Star Alliance airlines. Terminal 4 is home to Iberia , its franchise Air Nostrum and all Oneworld partner airlines. Gate numbers are continuous in terminals 1, 2 and 3 (A1 to E89), but are separately numbered in terminal 4 (H, J, K and M, R, S, U in satellite building). The Madrid–Barcelona air shuttle service, known as
Madrid–Barajas Airport - Misplaced Pages Continue
2016-505: The architectural gap between the original Terminals 1, 2 and 3 and the newer Terminal 4. The project has a budget of 750 million Euro and is set to be executed in the period from 2022 to 2026. The following airlines serve regular scheduled flights to and from Madrid: The airport is attached to the Ramón y Cajal University Hospital in Madrid as a referral hospital for medical and surgical emergencies requiring hospital care. In addition,
2079-493: The arrival of the Boeing 747 , the airport reached 4 million passengers and began the construction of the international terminal (current T1). In 1974, Iberia , L.A.E. introduced the shuttle service between Madrid and Barcelona, a service with multiple daily frequencies and available without prior reservation. The 1982 FIFA World Cup brought significant expansion and modernisation of the airport's two existing terminals. In
2142-444: The bombing. As a result of the explosion, two Ecuadorians who were sleeping in their cars died. The whole module D of the car park was levelled creating around 40,000 tonnes of debris. It took workers six days to recover the body of the second victim from the rubble. In 2007, the airport processed more than 52 million passengers. Barajas was voted "Best Airport" in the 2008 Condé Nast Traveller Reader Awards . In December 2010,
2205-504: The building of the Avión Club. The first regular flight was established by Lineas Aéreas Postales Españolas (LAPE) with its route to Barcelona . In the 1930s, flights started to serve some European and African destinations, the first international flights from the airport. Originally, the flight field was a large circle bordered in white with the name of Madrid in its interior, unpaved, consisting of land covered with natural grass. It
2268-512: The city limits of Madrid, it is 9 km (6 mi) from the city's financial district and 13 km (8 mi) northeast of the Puerta del Sol or Plaza Mayor de Madrid , Madrid's historic centre. The airport name derives from the adjacent district of Barajas , which has its own metro station on the same rail line serving the airport. Barajas serves as the gateway to the Iberian peninsula from
2331-502: The code SHA, while the newer Shanghai–Pudong adopted PVG. The opposite was true for Berlin : the airport Berlin–Tegel used the code TXL, while its smaller counterpart Berlin–Schönefeld used SXF; the Berlin Brandenburg Airport has the airport code BER, which is also part of its branding. The airports of Hamburg (HAM) and Hannover (HAJ) are less than 100 nautical miles (190 km) apart and therefore share
2394-457: The construction of new terminals T4 and its satellite, T4S, designed by architects Antonio Lamela , Richard Rogers and Luis Vidal . Two parallel runways to the existing ones were also built. The new terminals and runways were completed in 2004, but were not in service until 5 February 2006. Terminal 4, designed by Antonio Lamela, Richard Rogers and Luis Vidal , (winning team of the 2006 Stirling Prize ) and TPS Engineers , (winning team of
2457-504: The distribution of the terminals changed: The south dock and most of the International Terminal were now called T1, the rest of the International Terminal and Domestic Terminal were now called T2 and the north dock was called T3. In November 1998, the new runway 18R-36L started operations (replacing the previous 18–36), 4,400 m long, one of the largest in Europe under expansion plans called Major Barajas. In 2000, it began
2520-934: The end. Examples include: A lot of minor airfields without scheduled passenger traffic have ICAO codes but not IATA codes, since the four letter codes allow more number of codes, and IATA codes are mainly used for passenger services such as tickets, and ICAO codes by pilots. In the US, such airfields use FAA codes instead of ICAO. There are airports with scheduled service for which there are ICAO codes but not IATA codes, such as Nkhotakota Airport/Tangole Airport in Malawi or Chōfu Airport in Tokyo, Japan. There are also several minor airports in Russia (e.g., Omsukchan Airport ) which lack IATA codes and instead use internal Russian codes for booking. Flights to these airports cannot be booked through
2583-423: The environment, and even on the protection of the Spanish language. The architecture of Antonio Lamela is also a history of more than 1,500 projects and achievements of land use planning. Some have been collected in the book "Lamela: Urbanística y Arquitectura. Realizaciones y Proyectos 1954-1992"as well as in the supplement "Proyectos y Realizaciones 1990-2003". His architecture narrates by itself an entire epoch of
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2646-456: The first driverless transit system in Spain and the longest airport people mover system in Europe began transporting passengers between the new terminal (T4) and a new satellite terminal (T4S). Deploying the CITYFLO 550 automatic train control technology, the system is the only mode of transportation for passengers between the two terminals, which are spaced two kilometres apart. Bombardier became
2709-557: The first scheduled Airbus A380 flight landed in Madrid-Barajas in a daily service to Dubai by Emirates . Following the death of former Spanish Prime Minister, Adolfo Suárez , in 2014, the Spanish Ministry of Public Works and Transport announced that the airport would be renamed Aeropuerto Adolfo Suárez, Madrid–Barajas . This renaming seeks recognition for Suárez's role as the first Prime Minister of Spain after
2772-557: The first three letters of the city in which it is located, for instance: The code may also be a combination of the letters in its name, such as: Sometimes the airport code reflects pronunciation, rather than spelling, namely: For many reasons, some airport codes do not fit the normal scheme described above. Some airports, for example, cross several municipalities or regions, and therefore, use codes derived from some of their letters, resulting in: Other airports—particularly those serving cities with multiple airports—have codes derived from
2835-497: The flow of air traffic arriving and departing from Barajas. These runways were officially inaugurated on 5 February 2006 (together with the terminals), but had already been used on several occasions beforehand to test flight and air traffic manoeuvres. Thus, Barajas came to have four runways: two on a north–south axis and parallel to each other (separated by 1.3 km) and two on a northwest–southeast axis (and separated by 1.9 km). This allowed simultaneous takeoffs and landings into
2898-478: The following format: Most large airports in Canada have codes that begin with the letter "Y", although not all "Y" codes are Canadian (for example, YUM for Yuma, Arizona , and YNT for Yantai , China), and not all Canadian airports start with the letter "Y" (for example, ZBF for Bathurst, New Brunswick ). Many Canadian airports have a code that starts with W, X or Z, but none of these are major airports. When
2961-597: The form of " YYZ ", a song by the rock band Rush , which utilizes the Morse code signal as a musical motif. Some airports have started using their IATA codes as brand names , such as Calgary International Airport (YYC) and Vancouver International Airport (YVR). Numerous New Zealand airports use codes that contain the letter Z, to distinguish them from similar airport names in other countries. Examples include HLZ for Hamilton , ZQN for Queenstown , and WSZ for Westport . Predominantly, airport codes are named after
3024-430: The history of Spain. Architecture has been for Antonio Lamela a path towards other disciplines. Humanist and thinker, he is the inventor of the new sciences "Geoísmo" and "Cosmoísmo", which he developed in the 1975 book of the same name. These new disciplines constitute a synthesis of urbanism on a planetary scale. In these books he advocated Sustainable architecture , at a time when that ecological term did not exist. At
3087-487: The international air booking systems or have international luggage transferred there, and thus, they are booked instead through the airline or a domestic booking system. Several heliports in Greenland have 3-letter codes used internally which might be IATA codes for airports in faraway countries. There are several airports with scheduled service that have not been assigned ICAO codes that do have IATA codes, especially in
3150-569: The leading companies that he launched in those years is CTC, a pioneering firm in the industrial supply of packaged bricks. In Madrid, Antonio Lamela concluded two reference works. The first was the remodelling and extension in 1988 of the Santiago Bernabéu Stadium (Lamela holds membership number 59 for Real Madrid Football Club ). The second is the award-winning Terminal 4 of the Barajas Airport (since 2014,
3213-475: The main rail station in Madrid, during day and Plaza Cibeles during night. Unlike the two services mentioned above, this line runs 24 hours of the day during all the days of the year. CRTM ( Consorcio Regional de Transportes de Madrid ) runs four bus services between the airport and nearby cities in the metropolitan area: From terminals T1 and T4 the bus company Avanzabus operates routes to Ávila , Castellón , Salamanca , Valencia and Zamora . From terminal T4
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#17327763532383276-472: The morning of 30 December 2006, an explosion took place in the carpark building module D attached to Terminal 4. Authorities received a bomb threat at approximately 8:15 local time (7:15 GMT ), with the caller stating that a car bomb carried with 800 kg of explosive would explode at 9:00 local time (8:00 GMT). After receiving the warning, police were able to evacuate part of the airport. Later, an anonymous caller stated that ETA claims responsibility for
3339-612: The name of the airport itself, for instance: This is also true with some cities with a single airport (even if there is more than one airport in the metropolitan area of said city), such as BDL for Hartford, Connecticut 's B ra dl ey International Airport or Baltimore's BWI, for B altimore/ W ashington I nternational Airport ; however, the latter also serves Washington, D.C. , alongside Dulles International Airport (IAD, for I nternational A irport D ulles) and Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA, for D istrict of C olumbia A irport). The code also sometimes comes from
3402-416: The one they are located in: Other airport codes are of obscure origin, and each has its own peculiarities: In Asia, codes that do not correspond with their city's names include Niigata 's KIJ , Nanchang 's KHN and Pyongyang 's FNJ . EuroAirport Basel Mulhouse Freiburg , which serves three countries, has three airport codes: BSL, MLH, EAP. Some cities have a name in their respective language which
3465-421: The only contractor for the completely underground shuttle system, including the construction of the civil works, operation and maintenance of the system. The route is 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) in length and can carry up to 13,000 passengers per hour. Long- and short-term car parking is provided at the airport with seven public parking areas. P1 is an outdoor car park located in front of the terminal building; P2
3528-498: The rest of Europe and the world and is a key link between Europe and Latin America. Following the death of the first Spanish Prime Minister after Franco's dictatorship , Adolfo Suárez , in 2014, the Spanish Ministry of Public Works and Transport announced that the airport was to be renamed Aeropuerto Adolfo Suárez, Madrid–Barajas . The airport is the primary hub and maintenance base for Iberia and Air Europa . Consequently, Iberia
3591-566: The restoration of democracy and his key participation in the transition to democracy after the dictatorship of Francisco Franco . In late 2018 and early 2019, Iberia renovated its two lounges in Terminal 4, the Dali and Velazquez lounges. In December 2019, the airport's operator Aena announced plans to significantly expand and renovate the existing installations, increasing their yearly capacity from 70 to 80 million passengers and bridging
3654-506: The same first and middle letters, indicating that this rule might be followed only in Germany. Many cities retain historical names in their airport codes, even after having undergone an official name/spelling/transliteration change: Some airport codes are based on previous names associated with a present airport, often with a military heritage. These include: Some airports are named for an administrative division or nearby city, rather than
3717-500: The station code of Malton, Mississauga , where it is located). YUL is used for Montréal–Trudeau (UL was the ID code for the beacon in the city of Kirkland , now the location of Montréal–Trudeau). While these codes make it difficult for the public to associate them with a particular Canadian city, some codes have become popular in usage despite their cryptic nature, particularly at the largest airports. Toronto's code has entered pop culture in
3780-515: The two-letter code of the radio beacons that were the closest to the actual airport, such as YQX in Gander or YXS in Prince George . Four of the ten provincial capital airports in Canada have ended up with codes beginning with YY, including: Canada's largest airport is YYZ for Toronto Pearson (as YTZ was already allocated to Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport , the airport was given
3843-529: The use of two letters allowed only a few hundred combinations; a three-letter system of airport codes was implemented. This system allowed for 17,576 permutations, assuming all letters can be used in conjunction with each other. Since the U.S. Navy reserved "N" codes, and to prevent confusion with Federal Communications Commission broadcast call signs , which begin with "W" or "K", the airports of certain U.S. cities whose name begins with one of these letters had to adopt "irregular" airport codes: This practice
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#17327763532383906-541: Was a Spanish architect. Lamela was born in Madrid . He graduated from the Technical School of Architecture of Madrid (ETSAM) in 1954 and received his doctorate in 1959. From the beginning of his professional career he proved to be a visionary and innovative architect, the result of his great professional curiosity and much global travelling. In 1965 Antonio Lamela introduced ready-mixed concrete to Spain through
3969-644: Was not until the 1940s that the flight field was paved and new runways were designed. The first runway which started operation in 1944 was 1,400 metres long and 45 metres wide. By the end of the decade the airport had three runways, none of which exist today. In the late 1940s, scheduled flights to Latin America and the Philippines started. In the 1950s, the airport supported over half a million passengers, increasing to five runways and scheduled flights to New York City began. The National Terminal, currently T2, began construction in 1954 and opened later that year. In
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