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Getting to St. James’ Park Stadium

While many Premier League stadiums are awkward to get to, Newcastle United’s stadium is slap bang in the heart of a city. Right away this removes a lot of the hassle from getting to St. James’ Park Stadium.

Even better, the NUFC’s ground is up there with the most connected and convenient in the country for transport. In this article we’ll talk you through the many different options, give some canny local tips and show you what to avoid.

Without further ado, let’s get you to NUFC in time to hear “Local Hero”.

The Best Way to Get to St. James Park Stadium: Catch the Train

St. James’ Park is a ten-minute walk from Newcastle Central Station. It’s rare for a Premier League stadium to be so close to a city’s main interchange.

This puts the train at the top of the list for transport methods, especially if you’re making a longer journey to get to the city.

Newcastle Central Station is on the East Coast Mainline and is the main stop for services between London and Edinburgh and Glasgow.

There are 45-46 trains per day, with surprisingly fast journey times from the capital in three hours or fewer.

You can also get to Newcastle Central Station directly from numerous cities across England. Here are just a few of the main ones, with the fastest journey time and average ticket price:

York (54 minutes)
Leeds (1 hour 20 minutes)
Manchester (2 hours 15 minutes)
Nottingham (2 hours 35 minutes)
Birmingham (2 hours 48 minutes)
Liverpool 2 hours 51 minutes)
Reading (4 hours 30 minutes)
Bristol (4 hours 53 minutes)
Southampton (6 hours)
Plymouth (7 hours)

Walking to St. James’ Park Stadium from Newcastle Station

As a football fan it’s refreshing to arrive at a central railway station knowing that you don’t need to catch a connection.

Taking ten minutes flat, the walk to St. James Park is effortless and takes in some impressive buildings.

Simply go:

North on Grainger Street opposite the station
Then Turn west on Newgate Street, which bends to the north
Then cross the churchyard at St Andrew’s
Finally, take Strawberry Lane north until you get to the ground

If you’re a fast walker you may get there quicker than a car because of city-centre traffic.

There are also endless options for dining and shopping on the route, including the famous Grainger Market, dating back to 1835 with 80+ vendors.

The Tyne and Wear Metro: The Perfect Local Way to Get to St. James’ Park

Of all the public transport options listed in our article, none will get you closer to St. James’ Park than the Tyne and Wear Metro. This is the fantastic, super-cheap light railway network that connects a host of locations in Tyneside and Wearside.

St James Metro station (Yellow Line) is directly opposite the Gallowgate Stand on the south side of the stadium.

On NUFC matchdays the station is served by a train every ten minutes or so, although services are marginally less frequent on Sundays.

Catching the Metro to Newcastle Games from Tyneside and Wearside

If you’re fortunate enough to be based near one of the 60 Metro stations in Tyne and Wear, this is a hassle-free way of getting to St. James’ Park quicker than you can say “howay the lads”.

Let’s give you some typical journey times (walk and wait included) to St James Metro station from across the network:

North Shields: 25 minutes
Whitley Bay: 30 minutes
Newcastle Airport: 32 minutes
Sunderland: 40 minutes
South Shields: 35 minutes

As the network spreads across the metropolitan area you could combine a drive with the Tyne and Wear Metro to save money on parking. We’ll show you how below.

Nexus Park & Ride Stations for Newcastle Matches

There are eight Tyne & Wear Metro stations where you can park for £1.20 for the day (free on Sundays) and can catch the Metro to the match. We’ll list them here and give approximate journey times to St James Metro station:

Kingston Park (24 minutes)
Bank Foot (26 minutes)
Callerton Parkway (29 minutes)
Four Lane Ends (20 minutes)
Hebburn (23 minutes)
Northumberland Park (27 minute)
Regent Centre (18 minutes)
Stadium of Light (35 minutes)

So How Much is a Metro Ticket in Newcastle?

There’s a simple pricing system depending on how many zones you travel in. For reference, St James Metro station is in Zone 1, which spans from South Gosforth in the north to Gateshead Stadium in the south, and Walkergate in the east. Here are the prices for adults:

Zone(s)	Single (£)	Daily Cap (£)
One zone	1.80	2.90
Two Zones	2.70	4.00
All Zones	3.40	5.00

Being central makes St. James’ Park simple to get to by bus. We’ll delve into the bus network in the next section.

Catching a Bus to Newcastle United Games: The Cheap Way to Get to St. James’ Park

One big advantage of being next to the city centre is that St. James’ Park is served by a ton of local and regional bus routes.

About a dozen local routes stop right outside the stadium, linking with nearby suburbs. These include the 685 to and from Hexham, the 12 to Winlaton and the 40 to Wallsend/Walker.

Newcastle Bus Stations for St. James’ Park

Eldon Square bus station and Haymarket bus station are practically next door to each other, and both are no more than five minutes on foot from the stadium.

Of course, this makes the bus an ideal way to get to Newcastle United games, especially if you’re setting off from within Tyne and Wear, but also parts of Northumberland, County Durham and North Yorkshire.

By our count, 66 individual routes serve these stations, connecting the heart of Newcastle with a host of locations in the region. Here’s a condensed list:

Ashington (X20, X21, X22)
Alnwick (X15, X20)
Blyth (308, 309, X7, X8, X9, X10, X11)
Berwick-upon-Tweed (X15, X18)
Chester-le-Street (21, 25, 28, 28B, 29)
Durham (X12, 21)
Hexham (74)
Middlesbrough (X10, X12)
Newcastle Airport (X77, X78, X79)
North Shields (306, 307, 354)
Stockton (X12)
Whitley Bay (306, 308, 309, 351)

Extra Buses for NUFC Matchdays

The two most popular buses to get to St. James’ Park are the X10 (Newcastle-Middlesbrough) and the 21 (Newcastle-Chester-le-Street).

To cope with increased ridership there are additional services for both of these routes for matches on weekday evenings.

How Much Does the Bus Cost in Newcastle?

For adults the price of a single ticket is capped at £2.

U21s only have to pay £1 for a single on most services, although ID may be required.

Getting to Newcastle Games by Coach

You might be bored of us saying this, but it’s also a breeze to get to St. James’ Park Stadium by inter-city coach. If you have time to spare, the coach is an economical way to travel across Britain to Newcastle. After all, match tickets for St. James’ Park are expensive enough as it is.

Newcastle coach station (NE1 4EE) is on Churchill Street, near the main railway station and a little over ten minutes on foot from the stadium.

Average Coach Prices for Newcastle Games

The station is mainly for National Express coaches, with fares typically costing about £10 from Manchester and £18 from Birmingham and just under £30 from London.

Subtract about £2 for Megabus fares. Megabus services stop about ten minutes east of St. James’ Park by Newcastle City Library.

Below, we’ll help you work out where to leave your car if you’re driving to St. James’ Park.

Driving to Newcastle: Where to Park for Newcastle Football Matches?

If there’s a downside to having one of the best-located stadiums in the UK, it’s that you can’t just drive up to St. James’ Park, get out and watch a match.

The club advises against using a car to get to Newcastle games, but with a bit of forward planning you can make it work.

The Best Car Parks Near St. James’ Park

There are several off-street and multi-storey QPark and NCP, and Newcastle City Council car parks within an easy walk of St. James’ Park.

You can pre-book your space with Qpark and NCP, while the council offers a pre-pay system. Here are three main facilities to keep in mind, all a short hop from the ground:

Q-Park Stowell Street, NE1 4YB: 266 spaces (18 disabled) - £2.80 per hour
Eldon Garden Multi-Storey Car Park, NE1 7RZ: 445 spaces (33 disabled) - £2.60 per hour
NCP Newcastle Dobson Street, NE1 8HL: 550 spaces (6 disabled) - £2.95 per hour (£1.95 with the app)

The drawback to these may be congestion post-game. Now, you can save a bit of money, but also get away a bit faster and guarantee availability if you pick a car park further out. These options are about 15 minutes on foot:

Manors Multi-Storey Car Park, NE1 2BN: 486 spaces (5 disabled) - £1.40 per hour
Quayside Multi-Storey Car Park, NE1 2HJ: 499 spaces (24 disabled) - £1.50 per hour

For us, they are the best places to park in Newcastle. If you’re the kind of fan who doesn’t hang around after a game you could end up spending much less than a tenner on parking for the Newcastle game.

Newcastle United Park & Ride

Still, the simplest and cheapest way to get parking for a Newcastle United game is to use the park & ride schemes available on NUFC matchdays. You can park for free at a convenient site, and then catch a bus into Newcastle for an easy day out.

The most convenient option is from the vast MetroCentre shopping complex, across the Tyne in Gateshead. On matchdays the X50 offers a direct express link between the coach park at the MetroCentre and St. James’ Park:

15-minute journey time
Buses depart at frequent intervals
First bus leaves two hours before kick-off
Last bus leaves 15 minutes before kick-off
The St. James’ Park stop is on Barrack Road behind the Milburn Stand
Return buses depart regularly until an hour after full-time
Tickets cost £1.50 for a single and £2 for a return

If you’re driving in from the north along the A1, Newcastle United also operates a park & ride service from Newcastle Great Park. The same pricing and schedule applies, and once the bus departs it will take a little longer, about 20 minutes, to get to the ground.

If you’re heading to a match at Newcastle United from abroad, the next section is for you.

Getting to St. James’ Park from Newcastle International Airport

Just under eight miles northwest of the city centre, Newcastle Airport (NCL) has links to cities across Western Europe, but also the UK.

In fact, the busiest route is to and from London-Heathrow, with a 70-minute flight cutting down significantly on the journey time by train. Here are the other cities with links to Newcastle:

Amsterdam
Barcelona
Belfast
Berlin
Dublin
Düsseldorf
Geneva
Lyon
Paris
Rome
Vienna

Once again, Newcastle Airport is neatly hooked up to the city’s public transport network.

Newcastle Airport to St. James’ Park Stadium by Metro

A corridor links Newcastle Airport Metro station with the terminal, with regular services zooming you to Newcastle city centre in just over 20 minutes.

If you really don’t feel like walking you can get off at Monument station and make the one stop on the Yellow Line to St James Metro station outside the ground.

Getting from Newcastle Airport to St. James’ Park by Bus

From the airport, the following buses stop next to or near Newcastle United’s stadium:

X77, X78, X79
787

The bus will take a little longer, for a journey time of about 40 minutes.

Taxi from Newcastle Airport to St. James Park Stadium

The fastest way to get from the airport to St. James Park is with a taxi. The airport’s on-site service is Arrow Cars. The fare for a standard cab will be £25 to £30 and the journey will take between 15 and 20 minutes. Allow for traffic if you’re setting off within an hour of kick-off.

Fancy an active alternative? You could always ride to NUFC matches if you live locally.

Cycling to St. James’ Park Stadium: The Healthy Choice

In the 2020s Newcastle is just catching the cycling bug. The city’s bicycle infrastructure lags behind a few UK cities, but cyclists are encouraged to get to games at St. James’ Park Stadium by bike.

One of the drawbacks, especially if you’re heading in via western areas like Westerhope, Blakelaw, Fenham, Cowgate and Arthur’s Hill is the topography, with tall hills over 130 metres.

From the north, south and east, it’s much easier with light gradients from the likes of Gateshead (15 mins), Longbenton (23 mins), Jarrow (48 mins), Wallsend (35 mins) and Hebburn (40 mins).

For one thing, storage isn’t a problem if you’ve got St. James’ Park match tickets, with 35 Sheffield stands (racks) outside the ground. Locks are not provided.

In the next section, let’s look at our Newcastle United transport options from a few different perspectives.

What is the Best Way to Get to St. James’ Park Stadium?

From Outside Tyne and Wear

Get the train. Newcastle Central Station is right by the ground for one thing, and catching the train solves a big parking headache. For longer journeys it’s also way faster than driving.

For Cheap Parking

Use the park & ride at the MetroCentre. For convenience and price, we would choose this option over any of the car parks in the city.

From Inside Tyne and Wear

Use the Tyne and Wear Metro. If you’re heading from western areas where there’s no Metro coverage, you can catch a bus.

For Accessibility

Consider catching the Metro for short journeys as all stations offer level access, ramps or lifts.

In the next section we’ll clear up some commonly asked questions about travelling to St. James Park on Newcastle matchdays.

St. James’ Park Transport FAQs

How Long is the Train Journey from London to Newcastle Upon Tyne?

On average, just over 3 hours. The fastest Lumo and LNER trains you can get from London to Newcastle in 2 hours and 26 minutes.

How Far is St. James’ Park from the Train Station?

0.6 miles. You can walk it in ten minutes.

Can You Park at St. James’ Park on Matchdays?

No. There are no unreserved public car parks for NUFC fans, and there may be traffic restrictions around the ground.

Where to Park for Free in Newcastle?

“Nowhere” is the safest bet. Instead of wasting time looking for free parking, use the MetroCentre or Great Newcastle Park park & rides.

How to Pay on Newcastle Metro?

With contactless payment using your card or smartphone at the gates, or ticket machines if the station has no gates.

Can You Use a Rail Ticket with Newcastle Metro?

Yes, any rail ticket valid between Newcastle, Heworth and Sunderland will be valid on the Tyne and Wear Metro. The exception is Advance tickets that don’t specify the Metro.

Does Newcastle Metro Run Through the Night?

No. The last services are around 00:00 AM, and the first trains run from around 5:30 AM or about an hour later on Sundays.

How Long Can You Park at the MetroCentre?

There is free parking as long as you want. Four-hour limits apply at the Metro Retail Park and MetrOasis sections.

How Much Is It from Sunderland to Newcastle on the Metro?

£3.40 for an adult single, £5 for a return.

The End of Our Newcastle Matchday Journey

We’ll finish with a comparison table for journeys from five miles away from St. James’ Park.

Mode of Transport	Total Price (£)	Estimated Journey Time (Minutes)
Metro	2.70	21
Bus	2	30
Car	7	20
Bicycle (Owned)	0	30

Each mode of transport depends on availability. All calculations are averages, including queuing, waiting, walking, and estimated cost of fuel and parking.

So now our train is pulling into the platform and it’s time to stretch our legs. We’ve given you plenty of ideas and solutions for getting to St. James’ Park Stadium, but they won’t be much use if you don’t have Newcastle United match tickets.

If you’re still on the hunt, Ticket Compare sources reliable Premier League tickets from a select group of trustworthy secondary marketplaces and official hospitality partners. All that’s left is to snag your NUFC tickets for a perfect, hitch-free Newcastle matchday experience.

Getting to St. James’ Park Stadium