NYC to NoVA Good Friday Drive

[bluecountry]

Usually, when driving from lower Manhattan to Northern VA on Friday, the 'rules' to avoid congestion (as much as possible) are clear. However, next Friday is Good Friday, so I wanted to know if perhaps there would be changes or less traffic?

Normally I would want to leave Lower Manhattan between 10-11 so I can hit the beltway before 2:30 and be on 66 no later than 3.
OR I would wait until 7 PM to leave Lower Manhattan.

Wondering about Good Friday, if I can alter or even ease up and leave maybe 12, 2, or 4 and not get nailed?

[Rothman]

Usually, when driving from lower Manhattan to Northern VA on Friday, the 'rules' to avoid congestion (as much as possible) are clear. However, next Friday is Good Friday, so I wanted to know if perhaps there would be changes or less traffic?

Normally I would want to leave Lower Manhattan between 10-11 so I can hit the beltway before 2:30 and be on 66 no later than 3.
OR I would wait until 7 PM to leave Lower Manhattan.

Wondering about Good Friday, if I can alter or even ease up and leave maybe 12, 2, or 4 and not get nailed?

I doubt it.

[1995hoo]

I answered the other duplicate thread in the Mid-Atlantic forum.

[bluecountry]

I answered the other duplicate thread in the Mid-Atlantic forum.

I tried to delete that thread, that was a mispost.

Basically then, what should I do?

If it were a regular Friday, I would either leave my job in lower Manhattan around 10:30, and I would be in Fairfax by 3 or so.
OR I would leave after work around 7, and get in around 11:30.
Those times I would miss most of the stress and be fine.

Leaving anytime from 12-6:30 would be miserable.
Given it is Good Friday; what makes sense?
I would hate to leave work early if I don't have to OR if it is going to be no relief.

[1995hoo]

I answered the other duplicate thread in the Mid-Atlantic forum.

I tried to delete that thread, that was a mispost.

You can't delete it because I posted in it–you can't delete a thread that has any replies. Tell you what, here is what I said there. After I paste this, I'll go delete my post there and then maybe you can delete that thread.

Note it's not just Good Friday–it's also the first night of Passover, so that'll affect traffic patterns too because of the need for people observing that to be home early. In suburban Maryland this is a big deal because Montgomery County has a larger Jewish population than the rest of the area.

Plenty of people will leave work early and travel; plenty of others won't. One consideration here in the DC area is that a lot of schools will be on spring break, so to the extent parents travel with their kids they'll already be away. The local school systems usually try to tie spring break to Easter unless Easter is really late.

Any early getaway won't be on the scale of a Memorial Day or Labor Day or the like, at least not here.

I would say if you don't want to leave early, don't leave early. Waiting until after 7:00 probably makes sense in terms of avoiding the Passover traffic in New York and in Maryland.

[74/171FAN]

I removed it since it was in Mid-Atlantic.  -Mark

[Alps]

Rush hour will still be rush hour, just a bit lighter. If you can leave by 10-11, do that. If you need to work longer, I would leave by 2 so that you skirt past Philly by 4 and just have to deal with Baltimore on the tail end.

[bluecountry]

Rush hour will still be rush hour, just a bit lighter. If you can leave by 10-11, do that. If you need to work longer, I would leave by 2 so that you skirt past Philly by 4 and just have to deal with Baltimore on the tail end.

On a 'normal' Friday, I would never leave at 2.
Traffic would be bad leaving NYC, and I would hit DC/BAL around 5:30-6 which is the worst.
But you think this might be better?