Berlin Tegel Airport is the main international airport serving Berlin, the capital of Germany. Although it serves the capital, Berlin Tegel Airport is with 20 million passengers a year only the fourth busiest airport in the country.
Berlin Tegel Airport was build during the Berlin Blockade and the Berlin Airlift was in full operation. In June 1948 the Soviets blocked all ground-based traffic to then West-Berlin and the Allied powers decided to start an air-bridge to deliver food, fuel and all other supplies for 2 million people in West-Berlin by airplane (the Berlin Airlift). At the height of the Airlift in early 1949 an airplane landed in West-Berlin every 30 seconds. In the 15 months of the blockade over 2.3 million tons were delivered by airplane, most of that being coal for heating in the winter. Berlin had at that time only one airport and it was quickly decided to build another one to handle all the air traffic. It took just 90 days after construction of Berlin Tegel Airport started for the first airplane to land.
Berlin Tegel became the main commercial airport in 1960 and the construction of the famous main terminal began. Berin Tegel has a unique main terminal which is shaped as a hexagon (8 sides of even length) with aircraft parking at the outside and an open square with taxis in the center, which makes the walking distance from the aircraft to the exit as short as 30 meters.
This terminal is now called Terminal A. Tegel has four more terminals although they are all part of the same building. Terminal A is used for all main airlines and intercontinental flights. Terminal B is only used for check-in. Terminal C is mostly used by AirBerlin. Terminal D and E (the lower level) are used for smaller aircraft.
The airport is located 10 km northwest of the Berlin city center.
The airport does as one of the few European airport not have a rail or metro link so you need to take either a bus or taxi to get into the city. Be aware when you want to go to the airport the Tegel Railway station is not for the airport but for the Tegel area of Berlin.
Several buses depart for the city center and for nearby U-Bahn and S-Bahn stations. It would take about 45 minutes to get to Alexanderplatz, one-way fare is 3 euro.
See for tickets and schedule: buses: vbb.de .
A taxi from Tegel Airport to city center (Alexanderplatz) would cost about 25 to 30 euros.
All prices quoted here were found in July 2017
