We will be stopping in Los Angeles for about 4 hours on our way back from New Zealand (to the UK). Could anyone tell me what the transit facilities are at Los Angeles airport? Do you have to stay in a transit room all the time or is it a bit more exciting (like in Singapore airport)?
Thank you.

Non-existent! LAX is not interesting at all. You might go get a drink at the bar - but that's about it. It's not very cosmopolitan or hip. The surrounding neighborhoods are riddled with crime - so please don't venture out on foot. Take a taxi somewhere, if you want to get food outside of the airport...

Hi There.. I have to say.. and trust me, I live here and actually LOVE Los Angeles, but LAX is kind of blah! The best thing to do would be to stop at the Encounters restaurant, which is in the center of the Airport parking lot (I don't think you will have to stay in the transit room all the time, but security precautions change constantly, you might want to check up on that) , and have a drink and maybe grab a bite. I must disagree that the area is "riddled with crime" It's made some major improvements over the past few years and you could easily walk to some of the fancy hotels in the area without fear of your life.. but it would be a LONG LONG walk.. you don't say when you will be arriving, but right now we are knee deep in a transit strike and you can barely get 4 miles in an hour.. let alone any place interesting from the airport..furthermore..if you were arriving this week.. it's currently blazing hot and really dry.

I am afraid that if you are considered in transit, you won't be able to see much. Not sure about the facilities in LAX, but do know that in transit passengers are not left to wander on their own at US airports. You may want to check and see whether you will be able to clear immigration. That is the only way you will be able to get into the main part of the airport.

Jerry

Our situation may be different as we had cleared US customs and immigration and then had 8 hours until our next flight onwards in the US. We could wander at will, but once we left the secure area we had to go through all the security lines again which takes time. LAX is boring with a not-very-nice atmosphere. Because we had so long to kill, we caught a cab to Venice Beach for a look around and some lunch. Took about 20 mins. It was good to get some fresh air and get away from the airport. We found places to eat and shops at LAX almost non-existent but maybe we were looking in the wrong place. Nothing at all like Heathrow or Changi.
Kay

Hi MietteMeg:

This past Saturday I was on the Air New Zealand flight from Auckland to LAX, with a connection to Toronto on Air Canada and LAX was an 'F-ing' mess (excuse the profanity but thats the only way to put it).

We had a 4 hour layover as well & it took over 2 hours to get through security even through we were just 'connecting' & we took 2 shortcuts to keep it to just over 2 hours -
- everyone had to go through 'immigration', even those just connecting through LAX, there was an 'express' lane for US citizens but evenyone else had to queue up in a huge line with everyone being scrutinized (once the US citizens lineup cleared they allowed some of us 'forginers' to move to that line)
- even though we checked out bags all the way through, we had to pick them up & carry them to the 'connecting' services (we had to linup again & were scrutinized by security before leaving the baggage area)
- now the worst of it - the linup to put the bags on the 'connecting flight' belt made more then 2 loops down the entire length of the entire cooridor (there had to be 500+ people in the linup) as security staff was 'hand searching' all checked luggage in front of the owner for all flights (& I mean all) & only 2 people were doing it (there was an Air Canada rep there who told us if we went upstairs to the Air Canada counter the linup was shorter - only ~15 people in front of us but still took 40 minutes as they were 'hand inspecting' the checked luggage there as well

In total we had to linup 5 times to show our boarding passes/passports between getting off the the flight from Auckland flight & getting on the flight to Toronto ... and aside from the hand inspecting of the checked luggage everyone else was just 'double checking' the same 2 pieces of paper

So if you run into the same experience the 4 hours will get eaten up fairly quickly (even though it might feel like 4 days) ... on the flip side, after than experience I went straight to the Cheers pub (next to Burger King & Starbucks) for a stuff drink (even though it was 11am in LA, it was well past midnight in Auckland so I could at least justify it).

Hopefully you'll have a more pleasant experience.

Later,

Z

I don't think four hours is enough time to make it worth leaving the airport, given all those lines you'll need to wait in. I'd just read a good book. Not what you want to hear I know....

LAX is not a great airport and most of us locals dislike it. But at least it has somewhat better food now thanks to Wolfgang Puck (gourmet pizza) and a few other places. If you really want to do something, then I'd go eat at that central surreal-looking restaurant that dominates the LAX skyline. But then you'll be stuck waiting in more lines to get back into the airport....

Another thought --- just about all airports now have websites with information. Probably worth checking out the LAX website for ideas.

LAX transit probably the worst transit experience u can have (see above). And God help u if u are a smoker. Civilised airports recognise that smokers are still human - hey we pay the same fares, we pay the taxes, we have two legs, talk, don't have green skins or antennae for ears - most places have a smoking place - but not LAX!!

Thanks everyone, you've just confirmed what we thought. We'll just have to put up with it I guess!

The best thing to do at LAX MietteMeg, is people watch. As the others said, it's a bad airport in terms of things to do. It's actually shocking how lame it can be, and I was always glad it was my home airport because I didn't have to layover here!

Depending on what you are flying (probably Air NZ) you'll be hanging out at Tom Bradley International, which is better than the other terminals. All the terminals I've been to have a bar, so just settle in and hang out. Leaving the grounds is more trouble than it's worth (otherwise I would agree with Miranda and go to the restaurant that sits in the middle of the LAX "horseshoe".)

Alice, it's true that we Californians don't leave a whole lot of room for smokers. But there are places to smoke in the terminals (at least there is in terminal 6 off the top of my head), but they aren't easy to find, that's for sure. It's so tough to smoke here that quite a few of my friends have quit or cut down. I don't smoke, so I guess I don't realize how much of a hassle California can be to smokers (although most smokers I talk to prefer the nonsmoking environments!)

On a recent stopover from LAX to Sydney, my husband and I took the advice of someone from this forum to visit the Proud Bird restaurant. The complimentary airport parking lot shuttle drops passengers off just past the restaurant at Parking Lot B. It's just a short walk back to the restaurant. Shuttle pickup from Parking Lot B is every 15 minutes. The restaurant is like a museum with numerous restored planes on its grounds. We happened to arrive at happy hour when very nice free munchies were being served (fruit, cheese, chicken wings, etc.). We sat outside and relaxed, sipping a cocktail, eating snacks and watching the planes land and takeoff at LAX. We definitely would visit there again should we have another long and boring layover at LAX.

Interesting post. We're flying through LAX from Toronto to Sydney in April and I'm already dreading the flight. I wonder if it'll be as bad going that direction. (We're coming back via Hong Kong.)

Susan:

We went to Auckland via LAX from Toronto on Oct 9th, so did US customs at Pearson & our baggage was checked all of the way through. There was absoutely no problem at LAX going to Auckland (the Air Canada flight came in right beside the gate for the Air New Zealand flight so didn't even have to look for where to go next). That is why I was so surprised about the problems at LAX when coming back.

Later,

Lee

if you can leave the terminal!
right inthe middle of the car park area
is an elevated restaurant "Encounters"
well worth the visit

Travelmaster, that's good news. As I said, I'm already dreading the long flight (we've been to Australia before, so know what to expect) and problems at customs definitely wouldn't make it any better!