SUNDAY, THE PEAK OF THE WEEK: LAWA ENCOURAGES TRAVELERS TO PREPARE FOR LONGER LAX-IT WAIT TIMES, TYPICAL SUNDAY EVENING AIRPORT TRAFFIC
For Immediate Release
Nov. 2, 2019
Contact:
LAX Public Relations
(424) 646-5260
Nearly 9,000 More Passengers Arriving Tonight than Saturday Night
Peak Hours Expected from 5 p.m. to Midnight
(Los Angeles, CA) As Sunday evening is Los Angeles International Airport’s (LAX) most heavily traveled period of the week, officials strongly urge travelers to prepare for the possibility of longer wait times. LAX is expecting nearly 54,000 passengers arriving 5 p.m. to midnight tonight, in contrast to fewer than 45,000 last night – an increase of 16.5%. As Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA) continues to streamline and improve the LAX-it process and experience five days after launch, travelers are encouraged to plan for longer waits than normal whether taking a taxi or ride app service at LAX-it. Guests are reminded that taxi and ride app drop-offs continue to take place at the terminals.
Airport officials continue to work closely with partners to ensure passengers can leave LAX as swiftly as possible and have seen improvement over the first week of LAX-it operations. Shuttles, on average, currently have a wait time of approximately 3-5 minutes, and a travel time of 10-15 minutes. Ride app wait times have seen a marked decrease from a high of more than 60 minutes to now a non-peak wait time of approximately 15 minutes. LAWA will be deploying additional shuttles and staff this evening in an effort to maintain these improvements, but travel times can be expected to increase, as they do throughout the airport environment, during the evening peak.
LAX-it is designed to mitigate traffic congestion during construction of the Automated People Mover train at LAX, which will result in closures of 30 percent of the inner curb in the CTA. In the first five days of operation of LAX-it, there were on average 13,000 fewer cars in the CTA than the previous week.
Officials will have support on-the-ground on Sunday evening to make adjustments in real time, but given the large influx of traffic, travelers are encouraged to anticipate longer wait times than average. Sunday is always the busiest day of the week for LAX, and it is expected that this first Sunday of LAX-it operations will be no exception. LAWA officials are doing everything possible to make the peak of the week as smooth as possible.
Please note that the wait time can vary tremendously between car services throughout the day, so guests planning to use ride app services should check their apps for projected wait time. LAX is also reporting approximate current wait time conditions at LAX-it by mode every 30-60 minutes on Twitter at @FlyLAXAirport, and travel rel="noopener noreferrer" times on Twitter at @FlyLAXstats.
LAX, the sixth-busiest airport in the world serving nearly 66 million guests in 2022, is owned and operated by Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA), a proprietary, revenue-generating department of the City of Los Angeles that also governs Van Nuys Airport (VNY). As the international gateway to the Southern California region, LAX and its partners are dedicated to meeting global airport standards for customer satisfaction, safety, regional economic leadership, organizational performance and sustainability.
To better serve the millions of domestic and international guests that travel through LAX each year, the airport is undergoing a multi-billion-dollar capital improvement program to modernize its entire campus. Initiatives underway include an Automated People Mover, a Consolidated Rental Car Facility and two projects that will each add over one million square feet to the airport's existing property: Terminal 9 and Concourse 0. For more information about LAX, its transformation and its environmental, social and local workforce commitments, please visit flylax.com. Follow LAX on X (formally Twitter), Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook and YouTube.
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