Melbourne Airport (MEL) to the city
SkyBus is the airport coach and runs seven days a week. An adult single is $25.90, a return bought online $43.40, and a child aged 4 to 16 pays $6.60. The rail link is still a building site.
- Adult single $25.90. A return bought online is $43.40, against $51.80 if you buy two singles.
- Children aged 4 to 16 pay $6.60 one way, and $11.00 return online. That is about a quarter of the adult fare.
- Seniors pay $20.70 one way and $35.10 return, on presentation of an Australian state-issued Seniors card.
- A 10 trip bundle is $180.00, available only in the app, which works out at $18.00 a trip.
- It runs seven days a week with frequent departures.
- There is no train. Melbourne Airport Rail is a live construction project, not a service you can catch.
- The return fare is the one to buy, since it is $8.40 cheaper than two singles and fixed all day, every day.
- A family travelling together is where this gets cheap. Two adults and two children return is well under the price of a taxi each way.
The coach
- SkyBus operates the Melbourne City Express between Melbourne Airport and the city, seven days a week and frequently enough that there is no need to plan around a timetable.
- Fares are fixed all day, every day. There is no surge pricing and no peak supplement, which is the pitch against a rideshare.
- $25.90 for an adult single. A return costs $51.80 at the counter but $43.40 bought online, which works out at $21.70 each way.
Who pays what
- Children aged 4 to 16 are $6.60 one way and $11.00 return online. That is the fact worth knowing here: the child fare is roughly a quarter of the adult one, which is a much steeper discount than most airport coaches offer.
- Seniors are $20.70 one way and $35.10 return, and you need a valid Australian state-issued Seniors card, so an overseas concession card will not do.
- A 10 trip bundle is $180.00 in the app, worth it only if you are back and forth repeatedly.
No train, still
- Melbourne is the largest city in Australia without an airport railway.
- Melbourne Airport Rail exists as a project, with construction works under way and a Sunshine Superhub interchange planned, but it appears on the Victorian government's Big Build site as something being built rather than something you can use.
- So the coach is not a stopgap while you wait for a train, and any advice that mentions catching one at Tullamarine is describing the future.
Practical
- Buy the return before you land if you know you are coming back, because the online return is the cheapest per-trip fare on offer short of the ten-trip bundle.
- Two adults with luggage will still usually find SkyBus cheaper than a rideshare, and much cheaper than two.
- A family of four returns for well under a hundred dollars, because of the child fare.
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