Getting Around Sedona

Sedona stretches for miles along two highways, and most visitors get around it by car. A rental gives you the most freedom, and the free trailhead shuttle saves you the hunt for parking at the busiest hikes from Thursday to Sunday. For short rides in town, the city’s ride-on-request van, Sedona Shuttle Connect, costs $2. This guide covers how those fit together, how the Red Rock Pass works, how the roads are laid out, and how to plan a day with or without a car.

If you are still working out how to reach town in the first place, see how to get to Sedona for the airports, the Phoenix shuttle and the drive in.

The town in two highways

Two roads do nearly all the work. State Route 89A runs through town from West Sedona, past the shops and groceries, to Uptown. Highway 179, signed as the Red Rock Scenic Byway, heads south from the middle of town past Tlaquepaque and Bell Rock, on through the Village of Oak Creek to I-17. The Holy Cross chapel sits just off it.

Those two meet at a roundabout known as the Y, and locals give directions from it. Uptown sits just north of the Y, Highway 179 heads south, and West Sedona lies to the west. If you can picture that letter on a map, you already know the town. Most trailheads, restaurants and shops are within about 15 minutes of it.

The house is out in West Sedona, a quarter hour from Uptown. Most of the town’s everyday stores line 89A on the way there, so a quick trip for groceries or coffee rarely takes long.

Road status for now

Floodwater on November 1, 2026 damaged the road north of town. State crews have closed 89A north of the Owenby Way roundabout, all the way to Flagstaff, and they had not set a reopening date when we checked on November 5. Highway 179 is running both ways again. To reach Flagstaff for now, go south on 179 to I-17, then north, which takes roughly 75 minutes for the 58 miles from the Y.

Slide Rock and Red Rock State Parks are closed, Crescent Moon and Grasshopper Point were restricted or unconfirmed at last report, and the creek itself is off limits. The rest of town is open. See az511.gov and Visit Sedona’s flood update for the latest.

Do you need a car?

For most trips, yes. The trailheads, overlooks and places to eat are scattered across miles of town, and a car lets you be on a trail at sunrise and home for lunch on your own schedule. It also opens up the big outings: the Grand Canyon, Jerome, Flagstaff and the vineyards of the Verde Valley lie beyond any local bus.

Any ordinary car will do on the pavement. A little extra clearance helps on some forest roads, but rough tracks such as Schnebly Hill Road are better left to a jeep tour, since rental contracts often exclude dirt roads.

Uber and Lyft work in town, but drivers are few, waits can be long, and getting picked up at a trailhead around sunset can be slow. Keep the number of a local taxi handy before a night out. Visit Sedona keeps a list on its transportation page.

Driving, roundabouts and fuel

Sedona built roundabouts instead of most stoplights, and there is a chain of them along Highway 179. The rules are simple: slow down, give way to cars already circling, and do not stop inside it. On the two-lane circles, choose your lane before you enter, the inner lane for later exits and the outer lane for the first exit or two, and stay in it until you leave.

Traffic is heaviest on spring and fall weekends, on Highway 179 from the interstate into town and along 89A through Uptown, most of all between about 10 in the morning and 3 in the afternoon. The answer is to go early. Be parked by 8 a.m. and you will miss nearly all of it, and save Uptown for late afternoon, when the day visitors have started home.

You can buy gas in West Sedona and at the south end of town, usually for more than in Phoenix. If you are coming up from the Valley, top off on the way. Tesla drivers can use the Supercharger at The Collective, south of town, and slower chargers sit at some hotels and shopping centers. Look up a plug on a charging app before you count on it.

Cell service can be spotty once you leave the highways, so download an offline map before a hike or a back-road drive. Leave nothing valuable on view in a trailhead lot.

The Red Rock Pass

Most of Sedona’s famous hikes start on national forest land, where the Forest Service charges a small fee at 19 day-use sites, among them the lots at Bell Rock and Cathedral Rock. That fee is the Red Rock Pass.

When you buy online at recreation.gov, you type in your license plate number. You can skip it for a quick stop of 15 minutes or less for a photo. Shops, restaurants and Tlaquepaque need no pass, and neither does the small free lot at the Holy Cross chapel.

Sites with their own fees

Five other sites collect their own day fee instead: Beaver Creek, Lower Lake Mary, Grasshopper Point, Crescent Moon Ranch, and West Fork at Call of the Canyon. A $50 annual pass covers them, listed by Visit Sedona as the Coconino Annual Pass and in local news as the Sedona Pass, which replaced the old Grand Annual Pass. Some of those sites are affected by the flood closures, so check before you buy. Slide Rock belongs to the state parks system and charges separately, and federal passes do not apply.

The free Sedona Shuttle

If you are hiking one of the big three, take the bus. The free trailhead routes leave from lots in town for Soldier Pass, Cathedral Rock and Dry Creek Road, which leads to Devil’s Bridge, Thursday through Sunday between 7 in the morning and 5:30 in the afternoon. You park free, ride free and skip the parking lots at the trailhead, some of which close to private cars during shuttle hours.

The park-and-ride lots include Posse Grounds in West Sedona and a lot on North Highway 179 for Cathedral Rock. Catch the first bus of the morning if you can, for cooler air and fewer people on the trail. You can watch the buses move on the TransLoc app.

The schedule adds days during spring break and at the end of the year, and Thanksgiving and Christmas are days off. See sedonashuttle.com for the current timetable. Good to know: the buses are wheelchair accessible and have front bike racks, and dogs are not allowed, so hikers with a dog will need to drive and display a pass.

Sedona Shuttle Connect and the Verde Shuttle

Sedona Shuttle Connect works much like a rideshare run by the city, and it is the most dependable short ride in town. Use TransLoc or dial 928-203-5152, and the wait is typically under 15 minutes. It goes curb to curb across most of town from 6:30 in the morning until 8:30 at night, Thursday through Sunday and on some holidays. A trip costs $2, and seniors 60 and older pay $1. Designated pickup signs stand at Hillside, Uptown and other shopping areas.

The service added the Mystic Hills and Chapel neighborhoods in November 2025, with a stop at the Mystic Trailhead for people headed to the Holy Cross chapel. It began as a pilot, so check the current service map at sedonashuttle.com, and look up your own address while you are there.

The Verde Shuttle connects Sedona and Cottonwood for $2, and it makes 12 stops along 89A and Highway 179 in town for $1. That makes it a handy way to reach Old Town Cottonwood’s tasting rooms without a designated driver. Connect is great for a dinner in Uptown or an afternoon at Tlaquepaque, as parking will not be your problem and nobody has to skip a glass of wine.

Tours that do the driving

Several kinds of tours include the ride, and they make a good day off from the car. Sedona Trolley runs narrated one-hour tours from Uptown, where an adult seat costs $24.99 and a child’s costs $16.99, plus tax. Tour A climbs the chapel hill, and Tours B and C cover West Sedona, Fay Canyon and Airport Mesa. A two-tour combination runs $38.99 and $24.99. Call 928-282-4211.

Jeep tour companies mostly leave from their offices in or near Uptown and along 89A, and a guided tour needs no pass. Wine tours and spiritual tours may pick you up from where you are staying, so ask when you book.

Without a car

A car-free stay works if you keep it simple and plan around Thursday to Sunday, when the shuttles run. On those days you could ride Connect to a shopping area and walk, take a trolley tour in the morning and a free shuttle to a trailhead the next day, and book a jeep tour or winery tour for another. From Monday to Wednesday, plan on staying closer to home, or book a ride ahead.

Most people who travel this way arrive on the Groome shuttle from Phoenix, with stops that include West Sedona. Our house sits in a neighborhood well west of the main shops, so look at the Connect service map first. If you do stay with us without a car, stock up on the way in and settle in for a few slow days at home.

Getting around with limited mobility

A good part of the scenery can be reached with little or no hiking. You can see plenty through the windshield along the scenic byway on Highway 179, which has paved places to pull over. Tlaquepaque is mostly flat and paved, with accessible parking. At the Holy Cross chapel the ramp is steep, but golf carts can help you reach it, and families can borrow a chair.

The Airport Mesa overlook is another easy view from the parking lot. The free shuttle buses are accessible, and the TransLoc app lets you flag a wheelchair boarding. For easy walking, see the flattest paths on our easy hikes page.

A sample day

Here is how a typical Friday might go once you know the system:

1. 7 a.m. Drive to the shuttle lot and take the first free bus for Soldier Pass or Cathedral Rock.
2. 10 a.m. Ride the shuttle back and drive to West Sedona for a late breakfast.
3. Noon. Head home through the warmest hours for a rest, and a game if you are at our place.
4. 3 p.m. Drive Highway 179 to Bell Rock with your Red Rock Pass on the dash, or try the Holy Cross chapel before its 4:30 last car.
5. 5 p.m. Park near Tlaquepaque and walk the courtyards, or take Connect to dinner in Uptown so nobody has to drive home.

Our three-day itinerary lays out a longer version of this. For up to eight people, Sedona Pickler has a driveway for four cars and makes a comfortable base for whichever plan you choose.