Question about traffic heading to Vegas....

[misscampbells]

Hey everyone,
We will be checking out of PPH on a Friday morning and plan on staying in Vegas for the evening. I know traffic to Vegas gets heavy on Friday afternoons, and local business traffic is heavy in the mornings. What time of day would be safe to leave Anaheim heading for Vegas, stop over in Calico for 2-3 hours and arrive in Vegas sometime in the late afternoon/evening? We want to avoid bumper to bumper traffic as much as possible, I know there is always traffic somewhere, but with 2 kids in the backseat, we want to avoid it as much as possible.

Any info is appreciated,
Thanks!
Kathy

 

[oc_tony]

I'd leave sometime between 9-10 am. You could even leave earlier, as you are going "against" most of the morning rush hour traffic. The 57 North to the 210 East would be the most congested part of the drive, but after that, it shouldn't be bad at all.

 

[skiingfast]

The confounding part of the traffic between LA and Vegas is not the traffic in LA, that's to be expected. It's when you are in the middle of the desert dragging along for no apparent reason.

Calico itself is only about a mile off the freeway so it's hardly a detour.

I think if you leave between 9 and 10 am that is pretty prime. Even after stopping for 2 or 3 hours along the way. Most of the people from LA won't be leaving until after noon. This should keep them behind you.

 

[mom2rtk]

The confounding part of the traffic between LA and Vegas is not the traffic in LA, that's to be expected. It's when you are in the middle of the desert dragging along for no apparent reason.

Calico itself is only about a mile off the freeway so it's hardly a detour.

I think if you leave between 9 and 10 am that is pretty prime. Even after stopping for 2 or 3 hours along the way. Most of the people from LA won't be leaving until after noon. This should keep them behind you.

So do these lengthy stops in the desert happen a lot????? We were headed in to Las Vegas once and stopped in traffic in the middle of nowhere outside Las Vegas for over 2 HOURS on a Sunday afternoon and watched the temperature rise to 126! as we sat there WITH the air conditioning on the whole time. I'm glad we had a full tank of gas. I assumed it was a fluke thing, but we never did hear what it was.......

 

[skiingfast]

I think the worse part is around Barstow. Though you could be well outside of Barstow when it happens. In Barstow I-40 merges into I-15 carrying a lot of trucks. Also HWY 58 comes in on the other side of Barstow also carrying trucks.

Other than that I can think of a time where everyone was going along at 85 mph and all of a sudden jumped on thier breaks because there was a cop hiding in the median behind a little mound of earth. It caused everyone to drive in a giant pack for about 50 miles.

It would be great if there were 3 lanes the whole way so trucks could pass trucks without slowing the fast moving cars.

Still I wouldn't want to leave before 8 while commuters are out but 9 to ten will be the best you could do other than leaving early morning.

 

[lulubelle]

Just another vote for the 9-10 am timeframe. Closer to 10 am is better. I know when I drive to Vegas I always work 1/2 day which means I leave around noonish. Traffic is not too bad but still a factor. If you can't leave before 2 pm you are gonna sit with everyone else heading to sin city.

Have a great trip.

 

[misscampbells]

Thanks for the info everyone. That's kind of the timeframe I was thinking, but wanted to get some locals input to double check.

Kathy