Originally Posted by
dchristiva
And, frankly, while I wouldn't necessarily fly a route that should only take 3-4 hours to drive, sometimes the cost and the time spent not behind the wheel can be worthwhile.
I agree. I use two different time thresholds for driving versus flying:
1. I will drive
the entire route instead of flying if I can drive door-to-door in 4 hours. This is because the process of transiting to the airport, clearing security, waiting, flying, and transiting on the other takes about 4 hours even if the flight is only 45 minutes.
2. I will skip taking a short-hop connection if I can drive it in 2 hours. This is less than the 4 hour threshold above because I still have to spend (or have already spent) time on clearing security and transit to/from the airport on the other end. Basically I figure that once I'm already at the airport, taking even a short connecting flight generally adds at least 2 hours to the itinerary.