Morning Rush Hour in Jacksonville?

[Tarheel girl 1975]

We are driving from Raleigh and decided to leave Thursday after the kids get out of school. Our plan is to drive to Kingsland, GA to spend the night. Will we run into rush hour traffic Friday morning in Jacksonville? If so, how bad is it? Any times should we try to avoid? Would it be better to take 295? TIA.

 

[BibbityBobbitySue]

We are driving from Raleigh and decided to leave Thursday after the kids get out of school. Our plan is to drive to Kingsland, GA to spend the night. Will we run into rush hour traffic Friday morning in Jacksonville? If so, how bad is it? Any times should we try to avoid? Would it be better to take 295? TIA.

We take the fairly new 295 E. Beltway around Jacksonville as opposed to the old 295 west around. It's a nice relaxing drive and not as busy usually. The only time we stay on 95 south through town is if we're there early on a Saturday of Sunday morning. Hope this helps.

 

[cranbiz]

From Raleigh, you are looking at about a 9 hour drive. You may consider driving through Jax and if you want to stop, hit a hotel on the south side of Jax, possibly at Butler Blvd. This gets you past any morning traffic and there are several hotels and a Cracker Barrel there.

It's about 40 miles from Kingsland. at about the 6 hour mark for you.

 

[Jedana]

Avoid the highways from about 7:30am to 9am, then again in the afternoons from 4:30-6:30. Most of the traffic is heading into downtown in the mornings, and out of downtown in the afternoon.

I always avoid driving thru downtown, if I can help it. I hate the way the highways are. I would rather take I295 around.

Personally, I would bite down and drive thru, as a PP said. Get those extra 3 hours out of the way, which means less of a drive to Disney in the morning!

BTW, the Orlando traffic--same thing but add about half an hour on each side of the times. Their rush hour traffic always seems worse to me than Jax's. But not as bad as in Phoenix, LA or Vegas.

 

[Tarheel girl 1975]

Avoid the highways from about 7:30am to 9am, then again in the afternoons from 4:30-6:30. Most of the traffic is heading into downtown in the mornings, and out of downtown in the afternoon.

I always avoid driving thru downtown, if I can help it. I hate the way the highways are. I would rather take I295 around.

Personally, I would bite down and drive thru, as a PP said. Get those extra 3 hours out of the way, which means less of a drive to Disney in the morning!

BTW, the Orlando traffic--same thing but add about half an hour on each side of the times. Their rush hour traffic always seems worse to me than Jax's. But not as bad as in Phoenix, LA or Vegas.

We probably won't get to Kingsland until 9:30 or 10. I'm not sure that we'll want to go any further. If we use 295 in the morning, is it better to go East or West? We have rush hour traffic in Raleigh too, so I'm used to it, but we got stuck in afterrnoon rush hour last year in Orlando and that was awful.