LOS ANGELES—Millions of Southern California residents will be hitting the road or boarding airplanes for the winter holiday season, with the travel crunch expected to begin as early as tomorrow at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX). According to LAX officials, roughly 3.5 million people will be passing through the airport’s terminals between Thursday and Jan. 3, doubling the number from last year’s pandemic-impacted holiday season. The peak travel days are expected to be this Friday and Sunday, and Dec. 26 and Jan. 2. The Auto Club of Southern California, meanwhile, is predicting that nearly 8.8 million Southern California residents will be taking holiday trips between Dec. 23 and Jan. 2, making it the third busiest year-end holiday season on record locally. The number is down from the 9.3 million people who traveled for the holidays in 2019, and just under the number from 2018. “Last year at this time, many …