Real driving times?

[iheartdisney]

OK, we are moving to Port Hueneme in May, and MApquest says it is only one hour, 37 minutes to Disneyland. Before I get too excited, is this an acurate estimate? Because I've heard all kinds of horror stories about California Traffic.
Thanks!

 

[lark]

Heck, you could spend an hour and thirty seven minutes stuck on the five just getting from Glendale to L.A.

You're going to be north of L.A., so that means any trip to Orange County will require you to drive through L.A. Depending on the time of day and conditions, you just can't predict.

I would say that an hour and a half assumes close to ideal circumstances.

 

[iheartdisney]

OK, OK, I'm not heart-broken yet...
Can you estimate worst-case scenario? And what is the best and worst times of day for driving through LA?
(to give you a point of reference, I'm originally from a Texas town with 6 stop lights, and now in Virginia I find Hampton Roads traffic attrocious, if it takes 45 minutes to get through the tunnel)
Any help you can give me is appriciated!

 

[lark]

Actually, Norfolk/Hampton roads is pretty bad too, so you'll be prepared.

I'm not an expert and I don't mean to get you down, but I mean this is southern california you're talking about. Worst case scenario? You don't want to know.

I think that most times if you leave a couple of hours, that should be fine unless there's trouble. Carpool lanes help too. Every once in a while you'll get hung up for longer. There's just nothing you can do about it and you'll get used to it quickly.

From the part of the trip that's north of downtown L.A., figure that this will be bad in the morning headed south and bad in the afternoon headed north. Rush hour starts early and ends late. The opposite is true for the stretch south of L.A.; south will be bad in the afternoon and north will be bad in the morning. Once you get to orange county, it will be bad in the morning and in the afternoon in either direction.

Late August and early September (kids back in school) are particularly brutal I understand.

Weekends shouldn't be too bad.

 

[got2gp]

I'm no expert either, but 2 hours sounds reasonable to be. We are in Santa Clarita and usually make the trip in about an hour. To avoid rush hour as much as possible, we go on weekends or wait until 9am on weekdays to leave home and either leave the parks by 3pm, or wait until after 7pm. It's really not as bad as some people make it out to be, most of the time that is. Just be glad you won't be traveling on the 10 or 405, aka parking lots!