Getting from Liverpool to Manchester
· Updated · BootsnAll
Liverpool and Manchester are 35 miles apart and have been rivals for about as long as both have existed. Liverpool has the Beatles, two football clubs and a waterfront that was built on the Atlantic trade. Manchester has the music, two football clubs and the industrial history.
The rivalry is real and the journey is trivial. You can very easily base yourself in one and see the other.
Trains from Liverpool to Manchester
Between 35 and 55 minutes depending on the service, with several trains an hour through the day. Most run from Liverpool Lime Street to Manchester Piccadilly or Manchester Victoria.
Because the frequency is so high, there is little point planning around a timetable. Turn up and take the next one.
The fares are low by British standards on a hop this short, and a day return is often barely more than a single. If you are going back the same day, ask for the return rather than buying two singles.
One thing worth knowing for its own sake: this is the oldest intercity passenger railway in the world. The Liverpool and Manchester Railway opened in 1830, and the opening day is also when the MP William Huskisson became the first widely reported railway fatality, stepping into the path of Stephenson's Rocket.
Which Manchester station
Piccadilly is the main one and the one for onward intercity trains. Victoria is closer to the northern quarter and the arena. Oxford Road is the most central for the universities. Check which one your ticket lands at, because walking between them takes fifteen minutes.
In Liverpool, Lime Street is the terminus and is right in the middle, five minutes from St George's Hall and ten from the waterfront.
Coaches and driving
National Express and Megabus run the route in around an hour, sometimes less, and are cheaper than the train. On a journey this short the coach is a genuine competitor rather than an endurance test.
Driving is 45 minutes on the M62 without traffic, which is not a condition the M62 is often in. Both cities have clean air charging for older commercial vehicles and expensive central parking.
Airports
Both cities have one. Manchester Airport is much the larger, with long-haul flights and its own railway station with direct trains to Liverpool taking around an hour and a quarter. Liverpool John Lennon is smaller and low-cost focused, and has no rail link at all: it is a bus or a taxi into the city.
If you are flying into the region, Manchester is almost always the more useful arrival even if Liverpool is your destination.