London City Airport Taxi
London City was the last of the capital's six airports to charge for its forecourt, and from 6 January 2026 stopping outside the terminal costs £8 for five minutes with a hard ten minute cap. Book your London City airport taxi with Airport Taxis Transfer and the forecourt charge, the tunnel tolls and the congestion charge are all inside one agreed price, with your driver tracking the flight from the moment it leaves.
Is The DLR Or A Taxi Better From London City Airport?
London City Airport station sits inside the terminal on the DLR, reaching Bank in about 22 minutes and Canary Wharf in roughly 10. By road the airport is 6 miles from the City and 3 from Canary Wharf, usually 20 to 40 minutes. The DLR wins on price, a booked taxi wins on luggage, late arrivals and any destination off the DLR line.
What Terminals Does London City Airport Have?
London City has one passenger terminal, a DLR station built into it, and a separate Private Jet Centre on its own site away from the main building. Every booking includes live flight tracking, free waiting time and a fixed fare, so what changes below is the place, not the service.
Main Terminal, Ground Floor (Check-In And Arrivals) — Pickup & Drop off
Unusually, check-in and arrivals share the same ground floor concourse, and the west side of the building holds baggage reclaim, immigration and the control authorities. The immigration hall was enlarged with ten e-gates, so eligible passengers off a 90-seat aircraft can clear passport control almost as one group.
Pick-up
- Everyone comes out of the same doors into a concourse that also holds the check-in queues, so "meet me outside arrivals" is not a plan here. We agree a fixed indoor spot before you land and stick to it.
- Collection is only permitted from the Short Stay car park. Waiting on the forecourt is not an option at any price, so a friend circling the block is genuinely the slower way to be picked up at LCY.
- With ten e-gates on a small aircraft, an entire flight can be landside within about five minutes of the doors opening. Our driver is parked before that happens rather than being summoned by phone afterwards.
Drop-off
- The ground floor forecourt is the only set-down point on the airport, and since 6 January 2026 it costs £8 for five minutes, then £1 per minute to a ten minute ceiling. Your driver deals with the ANPR payment.
- Blue Badge holders are exempt, but only if the vehicle is pre-registered before the visit. We handle that registration in advance instead of leaving you to argue it after a charge notice arrives.
- There is very little landside seating on this floor, so arriving two hours early means standing about. We aim the drop at the check-in window, not at an arbitrary early margin.
Which Routes Do Our London City Airport Transfers Cover?
LCY sits in the Royal Docks, closer to the Square Mile than any other London airport. That makes some journeys very short and others surprisingly awkward, and it is the awkward ones people book.
How Much Is A London City Airport Taxi?
Fixed prices per vehicle, agreed before you travel. The forecourt charge, congestion charge and tunnel tolls are included, and waiting time on a delayed flight is free.
Why Book A London City Airport Transfer In Advance?
At LCY the meter now carries charges the airport invented this year. Since 25 April 2026, TfL's fare card lets a black cab add a £6 extra to the meter for any journey ending at the London City drop-off area, on top of a minimum fare that rose to £4.40 and tariffs that went up 2.88 percent. Ride-hailing apps pass the £8 forecourt charge through in their own way and price the journey dynamically, so the number you are quoted at 07:00 on a Monday is not the number you get on a Friday evening.
Then there is the rest of London. The congestion charge rose to £18 on 2 January 2026, £21 if you pay in the three days after travel, and the Blackwall and Silvertown tunnels have been tolled since April 2025 between 06:00 and 22:00, at a higher rate northbound in the morning peak and southbound in the evening. A fixed fare absorbs every one of those.
What Your Fixed London City Airport Taxi Price Includes
- The £8 forecourt drop-off charge, settled by the driver, with no ANPR payment deadline to miss and no penalty notice weeks later.
- The congestion charge where your route enters the zone, at the day rate rather than the higher late-payment rate.
- Blackwall or Silvertown tunnel tolls on southbound journeys to Greenwich, Kent and Gatwick, including the peak rate when that is when you travel.
- A ULEZ-compliant vehicle as standard. The whole of London is inside the zone, including the airport itself.
- Free waiting time on delayed flights, which matters here because LCY passengers clear the building in minutes and then have nowhere to wait.
When Is London City Airport Actually Open?
LCY runs the tightest operating hours of any London airport, and it changes what a transfer has to do. Weekday flights run from 06:30 until around 22:30. On Saturday the airport closes at 12:30 and does not reopen until 12:30 on Sunday, a full 24 hour curfew that no other London airport has.
The government approved a rise in the passenger cap from 6.5 million to 9 million in 2024 and allowed three extra flights in the first half hour of the day, but it refused the airport's request to fly on Saturday afternoons, so that weekend shutdown is staying. Add a DLR with no night service and you get a very narrow window in which everything happens at once, particularly the first departures of the morning and the last arrivals of the evening.
How We Work Around It
- Morning collections are timed to the 06:30 opening and the first-wave bank of departures, when the security hall goes from empty to full in about fifteen minutes.
- Late evening arrivals are covered right up to the curfew, when the terminal closes behind you and there is no train and no rank to fall back on.
- Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning journeys are almost always to another airport, since LCY is shut. We quote those as airport-to-airport runs rather than treating them as a standard transfer.
- Return legs can be booked with the outbound at the same locked price, which is worth doing on a route where your flight home may be the last one of the day.
- Very early departures are confirmed by message the night before, so nobody is awake at 05:00 wondering whether the car is coming.
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