Tips for driving from TPA to WDW

[Louie7080]

My flight will be landing around 530 am and then I'll get my Alamo or Dollar rental and will drive directly to Animal Kingdom at WDW. When is Tampa rush hour? I guess the same as other cities but I haven't had to drive morning rush hours in a big city for a long time and even in my small town I work hours that don't include driving in rush hour. The route I saw looks like it takes me through the heart of Tampa. From the map it looks like 60 south then East on 93/275/I4. Is there a better way? Not familiar much with driving in Florida. How many tolls should I expect to go through?

 

[OKW Lover]

Most of the TPA morning traffic will be headed the other direction. The directions you have sound correct. You won't be on 60 and 93 very long at all, then about 10 minutes on 275 and about an hour on I4.

 

[Louie7080]

Most of the TPA morning traffic will be headed the other direction. The directions you have sound correct. You won't be on 60 and 93 very long at all, then about 10 minutes on 275 and about an hour on I4.

Thanks! Do you think there will be heavy traffic as I get closer to WDW?

 

[OKW Lover]

Yes, it will pick up some. But you'll be getting off just as you hit the worst part of it.

 

[NH-to-FL]

I can't speak about Tampa traffic but you will run into some traffic on I-4 east as you approach Disney. There is a lot of traffic entering I-4 at exits 55 (Rt 27) and 58 (Champions Gate) and that backs up the interstate. You'll be getting off at exit 62, World Drive, so you might have 7-8 miles of slow going. Stay left until you get closer to exit 62. The amount of traffic goes up and down with the tourist season.

On the other side, a good portion of I-4 has a 70 mph speed limit. Which means 75+. Be ready to go fast or get out of the way.

I suggest going to Google Maps + Traffic and look at the traffic patterns around the time you expect to be traveling.

 

[writerguyfl]

As NH-to-FL notes, you can customize the major mapping sites. You can remove toll roads and provide a specific time/date. The map generated will use historical traffic data. Here is what Bing Maps looks like:

This box appears on the left side (on a non-mobile device). You have to click the Options link seen on the top right. In the expanded box, you can select "Avoid tolls" and enter the time you anticipate leaving. Under that time box, there's a calendar where you select a date in the future. (It's too much to capture in one image. Sorry.)

On a random Wednesday in March, the above search shows "Light Traffic" with a total travel time of 1 hour 28 minutes. Bing also provides the time if there were no traffic: 1 hour 19 minutes. Since those two times are close, I'd say you will only see a few minor slowdowns around interchanges.

 

[kydisneyfans]

We are finding it quicker to fly into Tampa, rent a car, and drive to AKL than it is to fly to Orlando and take ME. The flight cost savings also covers the cost of the rental. We'll be doing this again in April.

You will see nothing until you hit the Orlando metro area in terms of traffic heading I4 east at that time of day.

 

[nkereina]

We just spent two weeks in Tampa (my parents live there for the winter) and visited WDW one day. We left around 9am and didn't hit much traffic at all, so we were mostly after rush hour.

IMO, the 275 sucks and there always seems to be traffic on it no matter the time of day. Whenever we could, we would opt to take main roads instead (such as Dr MLK Blvd which runs parallel) and then pick up I-4 near Ybor City or the Selmon Expressway. The Selmon was the easiest for us to drive because its a toll road and never felt busy or congested. It connects to 75 which connects to I-4, which is the way we went to WDW from the Brandon area.

 

[JimMIA]

My flight will be landing around 530 am and then I'll get my Alamo or Dollar rental and will drive directly to Animal Kingdom at WDW. When is Tampa rush hour? I guess the same as other cities but I haven't had to drive morning rush hours in a big city for a long time and even in my small town I work hours that don't include driving in rush hour. The route I saw looks like it takes me through the heart of Tampa. From the map it looks like 60 south then East on 93/275/I4. Is there a better way? Not familiar much with driving in Florida. How many tolls should I expect to go through?

The route takes you just on the north side of downtown Tampa, and as mentioned above, most rush hour traffic will be going the opposite way.

The last time we drove that route, there was a lot of construction around the 60/275 interchange. That was two years ago. Google Maps shows it as a pretty slow area today, so I'm guessing that big project is still under construction. However Maps still says 60/275/I-4 is the fastest route (1:20-1:30).

I'm not totally familiar with Tampa traffic (lived there many years ago), but MLK Blvd looks quite out of the way to me.

The Brandon area PP is talking about is located some distance East of downtown; TPA is NorthWEST of downtown. So those directions from Brandon would not apply to your trip.

 

[nkereina]

I'm not totally familiar with Tampa traffic (lived there many years ago), but MLK Blvd looks quite out of the way to me.

The Brandon area PP is talking about is located some distance East of downtown; TPA is NorthWEST of downtown. So those directions from Brandon would not apply to your trip.

MLK Blvd is slightly out of the way, but in reality is maybe only a couple miles north once you exit the airport. If it saves stop and go and delays on 275, then its worth going a couple miles out of the way to save the time and hassle, IMO.

Brandon is east of downtown Tampa, but is in relatively the same direction OP will be heading towards WDW so the same directions still apply. While we didn't have to deal with 275 to go to WDW, we still had to get to I-4 just as OP does. I was only offering an alternate route if OP wants to avoid 275. We are from upstate NY and the kind of traffic and busy driving we encountered on 275 is not something we're used to and made us really anxious.