Travel time from Oceanside to LAX on a Monday morning?

[Charles]

Originally Posted by 1200RT

Just out of pure curiosity, where are you headed and on what airline?

You're driving past two very low stress airports (SNA/LGB), just to get to the mess that is LAX. I'm a very frequent airline traveler, as well as a private pilot, and I also just moved away from LAX being my primary home-base airport for commercial travel. Don't miss it at all. Hell, you even have SAN to the south, which is easier than LAX.

Point being - unless you're flying non-stop international, any way to change your flight to a better airport?

I'd say the same thing. I'd rather fly SNA (or San Diego from Oceanside?????) and change planes than drive to LAX and deal with the traffic, noise, filth, parking hassles, crowds, offsite rental car hassles, aggressive traffic cops, long TSA lines, and fumes.

[HarryKerryJr]

Originally Posted by ysr_racer

Drive up Sunday night, and get hotel?

Actually not a bad idea, as I have family in Temecula who needs to fly out of LAX every month for work and she can't leave it to chance and does NOT want to get up way early to leave from Temecula to LAX or she loses her high-paying job. So, she either stays with family much closer to LAX the night before, or gets a room at one of the LAX hotels. Much cheaper than losing her job, and it is a great paying job, but she not missing her flight is crucial because that is just the first leg of her long trip to where she will work.

[formerchigal]

Thanks for the input. I would fly into a different airport but the cost was going to be over $700 more for the three of us (we are flying from east coast). A hotel near LAX the night before might be an option. Getting up early is not such a bad thing for us as we will need to adjust back to east coast time anyway.

Our flight now leaves at 9:45am on a Monday. What is the latest time that we could leave and safely get to LAX in time?

[Coldjensens]

You need to get there by 8:35. Earlier if you have to park and take a shuttle, or if you are flying internationally. The puts you right in the worst traffic. At that time of day, you should leave three hours if you want to be certain that you will make it on time. You might be ok with two and a half hours, maybe a little less, but if there is a major accident or rain, you will miss your flight. If you are parking your car and taking a shuttle I would leave at 4:45 - 5:00. If you are being dropped off, I woudl leave at 5:30.

Sitting around the airport waiting for an hour or more sucks a little. Missing your flight sucks a lot.

Did you try Ontario Airport?

[formerchigal]

Just and update: We recently completed our trip. We left our LAX rental car lot at 1pm on a Saturday and it took use 2.5hrs to drive to Oceanside (really not a fan of southern California traffic). For the return, we left at 6am and arrived at the rental car lot at 7:30am. Our flight was at 9:50am. So we had ample time to check-in, get breakfast, etc. It really surprised me that traffic on a Saturday afternoon was so much worse than at rush hour on a Monday morning.

Thanks for the help, everyone!