Edmonton Airport to Downtown: Bus 747, Taxi & Rideshare

Edmonton International (YEG) sits about 30 kilometres south of downtown, and the honest split is a C$6 airport bus against a C$62 flat taxi. Route 747 is the only public link to downtown Edmonton - Leduc Transit route 10 also serves YEG, southbound, but its C$6 ticket does not transfer to regular Edmonton Transit - if you’re headed to Jasper Avenue you’ll pay again for the LRT at Century Park. Uber and Lyft work through the app only - you can’t hail them at the curb - and booking a transfer ahead is the move when your flight lands at an hour the 747 doesn’t cover well.

Taxi and rideshare both run the same QE II highway at the same rough speed, so speed was never really the choice on the table. What you’re actually weighing is whether the 747 plus a second LRT fare beats splitting one regulated flat rate between however many people are in your group.

Quick answer

Every car option covers the ground in roughly the same time. The bus is the odd one out because it stops short, at Century Park, and leaves the last stretch to the LRT.

Route 747 and the transfer trap

Edmonton Transit Route 747 is a contracted express between Century Park Transit Centre in south Edmonton and the airport. It runs seven days a week from 4:10 am to 12:30 am, with buses every 30 to 60 minutes depending on the time of day.

The fare is a flat C$6 one-way for every passenger, including children. Pay with cash, an Arc card tap, a C$6 Arc airport ticket, or a credit or debit card at the farebox. You can also buy tickets 24 hours a day at the Parking and Ground Transportation counter between doors 5 and 7 on Arrivals.

Here’s the trap that catches newcomers every week: that C$6 ticket doesn’t include a transfer to regular ETS service. Route 747 uses its own fare structure because it runs partly outside city boundaries with different subsidies. When the bus drops you at Century Park, you need a separate regular ETS fare - currently C$3 on an Arc card tap or C$3.75 cash - to ride the Capital Line LRT north into downtown. Children 12 and under ride free on regular ETS when accompanied by a fare-paying adult, but they still pay the full C$6 on Route 747 itself.

Get the direction right, because the two legs aren’t the same trip. Leaving the airport - the one you’ll actually take - the bus goes from Door 8 on Arrivals and calls at the Premium Outlet Collection Mall and Costco before Century Park: 27 minutes on every scheduled run in the published timetable. It’s the trip towards the airport that is the non-stop express, and that one takes 22 minutes. Guides that promise you a 24-minute express ride into town have the legs the wrong way round.

If you’re flying in for several days and expect multiple airport runs, the ETS Airport + 3-day Pass (C$36) or + 5-day Pass (C$42) covers both Route 747 and regular buses and LRT for consecutive days. A straight C$3.75 Arc 90-minute local ticket doesn’t work on the 747.

Century Park and the LRT south line

Century Park is the southern terminus of the Capital Line LRT. From there, trains head north through Health Sciences/Jubilee, University, Government Centre, and Corona before reaching Churchill in the core. Downtown hotels cluster around Churchill, Corona, and Bay/Enterprise Square stations - all are a short walk from the platforms.

Don’t memorize a timetable from a guide written weeks ago. Pull up the ETS trip planner or Arc app when you land; winter storms and summer construction on the Henday can shift road time even when the train is on schedule.

The Valley Line also passes through downtown, but Route 747 does not connect to it directly. Unless your hotel sits on the new valley route, you’ll almost certainly transfer at Churchill between Capital and Valley lines - another reason to plan live rather than from a screenshot.

Flat-rate taxis at Door 9

Taxis and limos queue curbside outside Door 9 on the Arrivals level. Edmonton International publishes zone flat rates, not a meter guess to downtown. As of the airport’s current ground-transport page, the taxi flat to downtown Edmonton is C$62 and the limo flat is C$71, before tip.

Remember that fare is per car, not per seat, so it gets cheaper the more of you pile in. One person on the 747 plus LRT pays C$9 total and walks from the nearest station. Two people pay C$18 and still carry bags up from Churchill station, against C$31 apiece if they’d split the C$62 taxi instead. Push it to four adults and transit falls to C$36 all in versus the same flat C$62 taxi, so the cab never wins on price per head - and children under 12 riding the LRT free alongside a paying adult only widens that gap further. What the C$62 buys instead is the door, the luggage and the four blocks of icy sidewalk you skip.

Drivers working the airport carry Blue Tag certification from a NorQuest College course - orange tags mean a trainee is still on the line. Feedback goes to the airport’s ground-transport office if something goes wrong.

Rideshare and pre-booked transfers

Uber and Lyft run at YEG under airport agreements too, and neither can be hailed curbside or use the taxi stands. Book through the app and rideshare pickup is Arrivals Paid, outside Door 10, which the airport publishes on the same page as the flat taxi rate.

Rideshare here has no fixed price, so weigh whatever the app quotes against the C$62 taxi before you commit - a winter Sunday night after a late transcontinental landing is exactly when demand pricing can quietly beat the flat fare.

Booking ahead through a service like Kiwitaxi skips that guessing game: one fixed price, a driver holding a sign at the curb, room in the van if you’re hauling ski gear. You’re on the same QE II highway as everyone else either way, only you paid before you landed and aren’t decoding Arc fare rules with jet lag setting in.

Matching the curb to your landing hour

Land at 2 pm with a carry-on and a hotel near Corona station: buy a 747 ticket at the ground-transport desk, ride to Century Park, tap C$3 on Arc, walk from the platform. A late arrival with real luggage and a hotel near the legislature grounds calls for the C$62 flat taxi from Door 9 instead, skipping the Century Park transfer altogether. Land mid-afternoon with four people after a wedding out in Leduc County, or step off any flight into a January cold snap: the taxi wins on comfort even where the bus wins on paper, because nobody wants extra minutes standing on an open platform in a prairie deep freeze.

Whichever curb you pick, downtown Edmonton itself is walkable along the river valley once you’re there. A car only earns its keep once you’re pushing north to Jasper or east toward Saskatoon and Riding Mountain on a prairie loop. Our Edmonton city guide covers the mall and the Fringe; where to stay in Edmonton sorts downtown against Whyte Avenue. If you’re still choosing between YEG, Calgary and Vancouver as an entry point, which Canadian airport to fly into compares the western hubs - and the Alberta province guide links the Rockies runs most people add after Edmonton.

Read also

• Where that LRT ride actually ends: Edmonton
• Sorting neighbourhoods before you book a room: where to stay in Edmonton
• The loop most visitors drive after landing at YEG: Alberta travel guide
• Weighing YEG against Calgary and Vancouver as your entry point: which airport for Canada
• Prairie skies and Wanuskewin on a side trip east: Saskatoon