Originally Posted by
Palal
If you miss the flight, you're better off driving up to sac'to as that will be faster than waiting for the connection. It's only a 2-hour drive. If you don't want to drive, you can take Megabus or a bus+train combo.
June is usually pretty bad with fog in the city, so it really depends on the day and on your luck as to whether the fog reaches the airport or not.
Honestly, if you have to pay for the ticket separately, you're better off driving or taking a bus up to sac'to, as the total travel time will be very similar to what you will have with waiting for your connection+flying+getting to your destination in Sac'to.
As stated here, if you are booking two separate PNRs to make this trip, I would just do the drive. However at the time of your arrival traffic could be pretty bad out of the bay area.
One issue will be that if you have two separate PNRs, UA will not "know" you are making a connection. If you arrive at SFO and miss your "connecting" PNR/flight to SMF, they will
most likely rebook you onto the later departure, but they are not necessarily under a specific obligation to do so since you booked it as two separate PNRs. Rebooking will not necessarily be done automatically since you would basically be treated as a "no show" for the SFO-SMF segment and you will not get a priority position on a waitlist due to same day travel disruption.
Can't you get a saver F award on a routing like LGA-DEN-SMF instead?