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Indianapolis International Airport
The Indianapolis International Airport is the closest large airport to Bloomington. It is located on the southwest side of Indianapolis. In 2009, the passenger terminals were built from scratch to replace older facilities that were inconveniently located. It is also a regional FedEx Hub, with many cargo jets operating from the airport.
For picking passengers up, there is a Cell Phone lot near the freeway entrance (follow signs) where one can legally wait until a passenger calls to say they have arrived and which side to pick them up from.
Getting There
Driving and parking or having a friend drive is often required for flights at certain times. There are two shuttle services that will take passengers to or from the airport between 6 am -10 pm. There is also a public bus to downtown Indianapolis, through their IndyGO system.
The Bloomington Shuttle Service is the most familiar, and has offered airport trips for many years. It runs 9 times a day, every two hours.
The Star of America Shuttle recently started offering service to the airport, and is attempting to gain passengers by undercutting the price of the Bloomington Shuttle. It runs on a similar schedule to its competitor, about 1/2 hour before.
Directions
The new airport terminal is reached from a different place than the old terminals. Instead of Airport Expressway from I-465, there is a direct entrance off of I-70.
There are two main routes that people use to get to the airport from Bloomington. Both routes take about 60 minutes, and can be longer if traffic on the interstates, or poor weather, slow travel.
The most common, but generally slower, is to take SR 37 north to I-465 west to I-70 West, and exit soon after at the Airport signs.
A second way that considered faster by many is to take SR 37 to SR 67 via a short drive around Martinsville on SR 39. SR 67 connects to I-465, but it is generally preferable to take Ameriplex Parkway North which feeds into the airport entrance and bypasses both interstates.
The actual travel time as usual depends on time of day, traffic, road construction, etc. Looking up the directions on a map is advisable, as it is not necessarily clear on the roads where the turns and exits are, but note that, as of August 2009, most map programs list the airport terminal in the old location and do not include the new entrance. The new entrance is from Ameriplex Parkway / I-70 where it is at the southwest corner of the airport grounds. This can be confirmed by looking at the satellite images showing the construction of the new entrance not shown yet on the maps.
