Sitting on the Midland Main Line in Bedfordshire, Luton Airport Parkway station lies 29.27 miles from London St Pancras in Luton’s Park Town district, between Harpenden to the south and Luton station to the north. Though it sits roughly a mile west of Luton Airport, the two are connected by Luton DART, a light rail people-mover that runs directly to the airport terminal. The station’s three-letter code, LTN, is shared with the airport’s own IATA code. Train services are operated by Thameslink and East Midlands Railway.
From Airfield to Airport Hub
Luton Municipal Airport opened on 16 July 1938, officially launched by the Secretary of State for Air, Kingsley Wood. During the Second World War it operated as an RAF base for No. 264 Squadron, returning to civilian use afterwards. Through the 1950s and 1960s, the airport grew steadily on the back of the package holiday market – a growth that got an unlikely boost from a 1977 Campari television advert featuring Lorraine Chase, which referenced the airport and lodged it firmly in public memory. For its first six decades, however, the nearest rail connection was Luton station, around two miles away in the town centre, and passengers relied on a shuttle bus to reach the terminal.
Opening of the Parkway Station
Luton Airport Parkway opened in 1999, purpose-built to serve the airport and designed along the British parkway model – a park-and-ride station with car parking for commuters travelling south into London. Because the airport sits atop a hill roughly a mile to the east, a shuttle connection remained necessary even after the station opened. Initially, National Car Parks ran a free transfer bus on behalf of the airport’s owners. In January 2008, that free service was replaced by a more frequent but chargeable one, operated by First Capital Connect. The station had already benefited from the cross-London Thameslink route, which had opened eleven years earlier and gave the airport direct rail access to central and south London, Gatwick Airport, and Brighton, as well as Midland Main Line connections to the East Midlands. In November 2008, Luton Airport Parkway became the first station on the Thameslink route to have its platforms extended to accommodate twelve-coach trains. The Midland Main Line itself had first reached this part of Bedfordshire when the Bedford to London section opened on 1 October 1868, built by the Midland Railway to provide a direct route into St Pancras.