Anyone driven I-5 to/from Anaheim lately?

[disneydenisel]

Well, leaving in the morning sometime...two kids to deal with by myself. I'll try and report back tomorrow night once we are settled about any traffic nightmares I encounter, if I can stand typing with one finger on the iPad.

Okay, we didn't leave as early as we wanted to, hitting 101 in San Jose at 8:41 am. Stopped at first rest stop after 152/I-5 interchange at 10:05. Back on I-5 at 10:11 until Buttonwillow for lunch at 12:14. We bypassed red sigalerts on I-5 by taking 7th Standard Road/Buttonwillow Rd to Brandt to 58 West to I-5. Figured we would eat lunch and get gas while off the freeway. Back on road at 12:43. Thought we were making good time ...until I-5 looked all red and yellow going forward after Newhall, so we took the 210 E which was great until Pasadena. Stuck for 10 miles until 605 S (1 hour ) then stuck there on 605 for 5 miles from I-5 S until after interchange. 91E was stop and go, and then I-5 S was fine for 4.2 miles until the resort. It was maybe 4:15 when we stopped to unload luggage!

No clue how we are getting home. I might abandon the car and fly home !

 

[HappyHaunt]

Eek! We'll be going through I5 tomorrow. I was kinda hoping since it was a weekend they'd have the lanes open. HAHA I know I'm funny. Guess we'll have to be prepared.

 

[sassy*girl]

Okay, we didn't leave as early as we wanted to, hitting 101 in San Jose at 8:41 am. Stopped at first rest stop after 152/I-5 interchange at 10:05. Back on I-5 at 10:11 until Buttonwillow for lunch at 12:14. We bypassed red sigalerts on I-5 by taking 7th Standard Road/Buttonwillow Rd to Brandt to 58 West to I-5. Figured we would eat lunch and get gas while off the freeway. Back on road at 12:43. Thought we were making good time ...until I-5 looked all red and yellow going forward after Newhall, so we took the 210 E which was great until Pasadena. Stuck for 10 miles until 605 S (1 hour ) then stuck there on 605 for 5 miles from I-5 S until after interchange. 91E was stop and go, and then I-5 S was fine for 4.2 miles until the resort. It was maybe 4:15 when we stopped to unload luggage!

No clue how we are getting home. I might abandon the car and fly home !

Oh Wow!! In 5 trips we have never hit traffic on 210, 605, 91, or the Short drive on 5. We live very close to 99 so we always take that all the way down till it turns into 5.

Our trip we just got back from we left modesto a little before 7 and made 2 stops on the way to switch drivers and use restrooms. I'm pretty sure we got to the hojo around 1:30 -2:00 we hit no traffic at all.

I know we have always left the resort between 10-11 am and never hit any traffic coming back either.

 

[OnTheRoadAgain]

There were signs for future expected delays thru the LA area on Highway for the July 16th - July 18th time period as well.

A Caltrans message board in Stanislaus County near Modesto was lit up with this warning for Los Angeles in July. I have never seen such a warning so far away, a month ahead of time. I'm guessing it's going to be apocalyptic!

 

[LisainCalifornia]

Sounds like it just depends on what time you hit the lane closure. I was on i5 this past weekened Fri (south) and Sun (north) and it was NOT good. The lane closure at button willow southbound added 1hour 15min to our trip on Friday evening at 5:30. There were two sections in a 10 mile stretch that went down to 1 lane. The back up to get to that portion was stop & go. At this same time there was no back up going northbound. So we decided to come back north on i5 on Sunday.
The delay on Sunday was only about 20min, for the section that had the lane closure. The rest of i5 was EXTREMLY congested, which added another hour and a half to our trip (We were guessing it was from all the graduation travel.) We never drove over 55mph after passing button willow going northbound.
Having said all this, our family is taking our DL trip this weekend and we are going to take i5 on Sunday, just leaving EARLY. We figured it would still be betterr than 101, and won't go out of my way to take 99.
I'll let you know how that goes next week

This was our experience as well. We drove up on Sunday June 12th, and our delay was almost 2 hours. It was often dead stop traffic--and it lasted for miles. I was very surprised because this isn't L.A. traffic (my inlaws live in L.A. and I am very use to that kind of slow traffic)--this is in the middle of nowhere (dirt piles abound) but the traffic goes at a crawl due to them closing one of the two lanes. It typically takes us 6 hours to get to Disneyland from our house, and it took 8+ this trip. The trip home (going North) was much better, delaying us by only a half hour.

 

[Nonsuch]

A Caltrans message board in Stanislaus County near Modesto was lit up with this warning for Los Angeles in July. I have never seen such a warning so far away, a month ahead of time. I'm guessing it's going to be apocalyptic!

Even with distant signs, many travelers will be caught by surprise

 

[disneydenisel]

Hi,

Just wanted to update everyone on the drive home from Anaheim to the Bay Area. We left the resort just before 11:00 and headed north on I-5 at 11:03. There were a couple of stretches of stop and go/red/yellow traffic, but we stayed on I-5 and escaped the LA area by 12:30 . Stopped just before Valencia at Wendys' (off Lyons) for lunch and gas, and headed back onto I-5 by 1:00.

We didn't hit any traffic until around 43, where Caltrans has one lane completely closed for at least four miles. To complicate matters, there was a three car severe fender bender in that lane, so we all had to pass on the right shoulder, which wasn't terribly wide, so trucks were going really slowly. There was just a lot of sitting there, checking my email , etc. I can't see any way around this unless you take 99 and cut back over to I-5 eventually. We just waited it out. It would have been a lot faster without the accident. Oh, and I-5 South looked completely open all the way through the construction area!

After that, it was pretty smooth. All in all, with three stops, we got to San Jose at 6:15, so door to door, 7 hours, 15 minutes. The weather here was over 95 degrees yesterday, so I would much rather be back at Disneyland where the weather was perfect!

 

[minniecarousel]

We left Anaheim at 12:45 today and made it home at 7:45. 3 quick stops along the way.

The one-lane issue was the big hang-up, with really slow-moving traffic leading up to the one lane, while still two lanes. The big rigs passing each other slowed things down too.

Probably added an hour to our drive home.

 

[HappyHaunt]

We went down thru 5 last Saturday, and then home on Thursday. No real stops at all, we had to slow down to maybe 65 here and there. But nothing bad at all, and didn't really make our trip longer. I think it might be a timing thing, depending on how many cars are going through the area and trucks.

 

[frst4mike]

Hello,

We leave Friday and I heard that the ongoing construction on I-5 near SR 58 has been causing longer backups due to summer travel (1 hour to go 5 miles). Just checking to see if anyone has driven this route lately and what their experiences have been.

Driving south from San Jose, I was thinking of taking Lerdo Hwy and then cutting over to Buttonwillow Dr until it meets up with SR 58, then heading back to I-5. Then I'd have to find a reverse workaround for the ride home.

Any advice from those of you who travel this route regularly. Should we leave Thursday night instead and drive at night?

Just made the trip Sunday night we hit the area about 6 PM
it took 2 hours to go about 5 miles.

 

[quatrom]

Has anyone driven through there around 10:30 pm? Just wondering if it makes a difference, being late at night?

 

[NorthernCalMom]

Left SF at 9am last Tuesday (July 31) and arrived at the DLH around 5pm (one hour break at Lost Hills). On the drive back left Anaheim around 9:30am on Sunday, Aug 5, and arrived in SF around 5:45pm (one hour break at Panoche).

 

[kylie71]

Just made the trip Sunday night we hit the area about 6 PM
it took 2 hours to go about 5 miles.

Where was this? Outside of Bakersfield? Or on I-5 near Bakersfield......

I wonder how it will be on a Friday morning, at 6am?

Lori

 

[helenb]

We did the drive back and forth in July. Buttonwillow is still a mess. I can't believe how long that project is going on! That being said, if you get there before 10 am I think it's a lot better. If you get there at noon or later, be prepared to wait up to an hour in backup for the merge.

 

[PinkBudgie]

We did the drive back and forth in July. Buttonwillow is still a mess. I can't believe how long that project is going on! That being said, if you get there before 10 am I think it's a lot better. If you get there at noon or later, be prepared to wait up to an hour in backup for the merge.

We went through there around 11:15am both ways. Down on a Sat, and up on a Monday. A slight slow down, but it didn't add any significant amount of time to our trip. No back ups or stops. I remember thinking that wasn't bad at all. Guess it does sound like it's best to go through before noon.

 

[kylie71]

Thanks, we plan to drive to Reno to Santa Nella on Thursday afternoon/evening, spend the night, then head out super, duper early on Friday morning Aug 31st, we will for sure make it before noon.... going into that holiday weekend.
Thanks for your help, and reports.

Lori

 

[disneydenisel]

Just made the trip Sunday night we hit the area about 6 PM
it took 2 hours to go about 5 miles.

Wow! I just can't believe that the construction is going on still! It was over a year since my post about the traffic during the summer of 2011. Amazing! I am glad that we flew to Orange County this summer instead.

By the way, the detour that I took worked brilliantly last year. We avoided the mess, stopped for lunch, etc. There was still down time, but at least it wasn't spent sitting in the car. Good luck to all you I-5 travelers! When will the construction be complete?