Things To Do Near Me in LA: Griffith Observatory Parking Costs $10 an Hour

Griffith Observatory is free. That is true, it has been true since it opened, and it is the fact every guide leads with. What almost none of them lead with is that getting a car close to the building costs about ten dollars an hour, enforced every day of the year, which means a leisurely three-hour visit to a free attraction can quietly cost thirty dollars before you have bought anything. There is also a shuttle that runs up the hill for fifty cents. The gap between those two numbers is the single most useful thing to know about visiting, and it is buried at the bottom of most pages about the place.

A free attraction with a ten-dollar-an-hour car park is worth five minutes of planning. Ask Karpo the cheapest way up to Griffith Observatory from where you are starting.

Parking near the Observatory runs about $10 per hour. It is enforced Monday to Friday from noon to 10pm, and Saturday and Sunday from 10am to 10pm, every day of the year.

Read those windows carefully, because there is a genuine loophole in them. Before noon on a weekday, the enforcement has not started. An early weekday morning visit is the one scenario where you can drive up, park close and pay nothing — and it is also when the building is quietest.

Everyone else is paying by the hour, which changes how you plan the visit. Three hours at the Observatory is a normal length of visit and thirty dollars is a real amount of money to spend on a free attraction.

The DASH Observatory shuttle runs up the hill for 50 cents, or 35 cents with a Metro TAP card. Seniors and riders with disabilities pay 25 cents.

The move that follows from this: if there is no show on at the Greek Theatre, you can park in the Greek's lot for free and take the DASH up. Free parking plus a fifty-cent ride, against ten dollars an hour at the top.

The catch is the Greek's schedule. On a show night that lot is not available and the whole plan collapses, so check what is on at the Greek before relying on it. This is the single biggest saving available to anyone visiting Griffith Observatory and it takes one search to confirm.

The road up to the Observatory is narrow, winding and shared with pedestrians, cyclists and cars circling for spaces. At sunset on a Saturday the queue of traffic reaches back down the hill, and the car park is full long before the crowd stops arriving.

So the shuttle is not only cheaper; on a busy evening it is faster. You are not competing for a space that does not exist, and you are not doing the descent in a line of brake lights afterwards.

There is also the option of walking up, which people do from Los Feliz. It is a real hike rather than a stroll, uphill the whole way, and it is genuinely pleasant in the cool part of the day and unwise in the middle of a hot afternoon.

The building and the exhibits are free with no ticket. That includes the main hall, the Foucault pendulum, the Tesla coil, the telescope viewing on public nights and the terraces with the view over the basin.

The planetarium show is the exception and carries a separate charge. It is the one paid item inside a free building, and it is worth budgeting for separately from the parking.

The lawn outside is where most people end up at sunset, and it costs nothing regardless of how you got up the hill. The view of the city from the terraces at dusk is the reason the place is crowded, and it is free to everyone standing there.

Sunset is the busiest hour by a wide margin, and it is also the best one. If you want both, arrive at least ninety minutes early and accept that the parking meter is running the whole time.

Weekday mornings before noon are the cheapest and quietest window, with the caveat that the Observatory does not open first thing — check the day's opening time before building a plan around free parking.

The Observatory is closed one day a week, which catches out a surprising number of visitors who drive up the hill on the wrong day. Confirm before you set off.

Admission to the building and exhibits is free. Planetarium shows are ticketed separately.

Parking is roughly $10 per hour, enforced Monday to Friday noon to 10pm and Saturday and Sunday 10am to 10pm, all year.

The DASH Observatory shuttle costs 50 cents, 35 cents with a Metro TAP card, and 25 cents for seniors and riders with disabilities. Parking free at the Greek Theatre lot is possible when there is no show on.

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Ask Karpo the cheapest route up to Griffith Observatory tonight, whether the Greek Theatre has a show that blocks the free lot, and what time to arrive if you want the sunset without the traffic.