Tolls in Southern California

E

eireabu

Registered User
Messages
14
Hi.
I will be in California in September and will be doing a bit of driving.
Will be hiring a car at Santa Barbara airport, driving from here to Santa Barbara itself.After a few days I will be driving from SB down to Laguna Beach and a few days later again from Laguna to San Diego.
I will do a little bit of driving around the Laguna Beach/Newport Beach/Costa Mesa area also as I am staying in that area for 3 nights.

Am just wondering are there toll roads around these areas that I will be driving? I'd just like to know in advance if any of the roads require a toll so I can be sure I have the cash to hand etc. It is hard to find accurate info on tolls online.

thanks
 
None of the freeways I've been on in the LA/Santa Barbara area have any tolls on them ... there are certainly no tolls anywhere between Santa Barbara and Los Angeles on the US-101 /I-405 .. and I don't think there's any tolls anywhere in the LA area

Time your drive from SB to Laguna beach right to avoid anything like rush hour .. the traffic going through LA is absolutely awful

For getting info online look on google maps and do some directions and it will indicate if there's any tolls - it's usually pretty reliable.
 
There are tolls on the roads around Laguna, I'm thinking the 5 and the 1 but that's off the top of my head - I could be completely wrong. I'm not 100% sure that all of them offer the option to pay cash. I know one of them does but I'm not sure about the other.

I would get a sat nav with the car or bring your own. Pacific Coast Highway (PCH) around Laguna tends to get shut due to accidents, fires and other incidents on a fairly frequent basis.

We have friends in the area so get there fairly regularly. I second the advice about the drive from SB to Orange County, traffic can be a nightmare. The drive from OC to San Diego is much less stressful.
 
I was driving around California and covered a huge area from LA to San Francisco, west to Death Valley, Yosemite etc; did about 3000 miles (about half that on interstates) and didn't see a single toll the whole time I was there
 
redchariot said:
I was driving around California and covered a huge area from LA to San Francisco, west to Death Valley, Yosemite etc; did about 3000 miles (about half that on interstates) and didn't see a single toll the whole time I was there
Click to expand...

That was almost five years so it could be (but unlikely) different now
 
On the coast road down to San Diego there are no tolls. However, if you take the highway from Long Beach to there you'll need a harrier jump jet to avoid them. If you Google "toll roads ca" you should come up with something.
 
I promise you there's no tolls north of LA to Santa Barbara though ... I just drove there yesterday !

As an aside - In some parts of the US rental cars sometimes come with an "Easypass" equivalent which will pay the tolls for you and take it from your credit card after the rental ... Never seen this with cars I've picked up in LA or SBA though ... I've seen it in Texas (where there are a lot more toll roads)
 
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