Heathrow Terminal 3 taxi | U Want Taxi

Terminal 3 sits on the central terminal island next to Terminal 2, reached the same way from the M4 via the tunnel road under the airfield. It handles a broader spread of airlines than any other Heathrow terminal — Virgin Atlantic's long-haul network, American Airlines, Emirates and a number of others — and takes a large share of the airport's long-haul arrivals traffic generally, which shows in how busy the arrivals hall gets first thing in the morning.

Arrivals at Terminal 3 has a reputation for a long walk from the gate to the exit, particularly for anyone coming off a long-haul flight at the far end of the pier, so we build a bit more time into the pickup than we would for a shorter walk at another terminal, especially for the first wave of the morning when several wide-body aircraft land close together and immigration queues stretch out.

The forecourt directly outside arrivals charges after a few minutes, same as the rest of Heathrow, so we hold at the free long-stay drop-off until you're actually out, then bring the car round rather than parking on the meter waiting for a passenger who might still be twenty minutes from the doors.

Departures from Terminal 3 can mean a longer walk to check-in too, depending on which part of the terminal your airline uses, so if you're cutting it fine we'd rather drop you as close to your check-in desk's end of the building as the road allows, which is something a driver only really knows from having done the run before rather than from a satnav pin.

Fares are the standard Heathrow rates from our coverage area — £18 saloon or £28 executive from Slough or Burnham, £16/£25 from Windsor, £22/£32 from Maidenhead, £30/£42 from Marlow — regardless of which part of Terminal 3 you're using or which pier your flight leaves from.

Terminal 3 dates back to 1961, when it opened as the Oceanic Terminal for the airport's first wave of long-haul jet traffic, and though the arrivals and check-in areas have been rebuilt and extended many times since, the building's footprint is still less straightforward to navigate on foot than Heathrow's newer terminals. Emirates' double-decker aircraft use dedicated air bridges here, and a full one landing tends to send a large group of passengers through arrivals at once.

Because Terminal 3 shares some access roads and drop-off areas with Terminal 2 on the central island, a driver unfamiliar with the layout can find themselves in the wrong lane approaching the roundabout — ours know to stay right for Terminal 3's own forecourt rather than following signs meant for Terminal 2 traffic.

The World Traveller Plus and business lounges here sit some distance from the main departures concourse, down a corridor that isn't obvious from the main hall, so if you're running close to a departure time we'd rather drop you as near to that corridor entrance as the road allows than at the general terminal doors. It's a small difference, but on a terminal with as much walking as Terminal 3 has, a couple of minutes at the drop-off end can matter.

Coach and long-stay car park transfers also route past the same forecourt as our drop-off, so at peak times, particularly Friday evenings and Sunday nights, the immediate terminal frontage can back up with coaches loading and unloading — our drivers know to hold back at the long-stay point rather than queuing behind a coach that isn't moving.