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Are those the only three cities you've ever been to?
Los Angeles is the worst for sure, but I can say without a doubt that DC, Miami, and New York are worse than Chicago and Atlanta.
NY is bad too but it has good public transportation so it mitigates some of the problems.. I think the traffic in Chicago and Atlanta is a bit worse compared to DC and Miami..
While I'm not surprised it's not mentioned here, Birmingham has some shockingly bad traffic for a city of its size. Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, is either on I-65 or US-280 every workday. People from as far as 75 miles away drive to Birmingham to work every M-F and there's just not many alternate routes you can take, effectively clogging every main artery in the city. There are no plans to build a light-rail system or even an extra bypass spur to alleviate the traffic, and the southernmost portion of I-65 won't be widened for at least 4 or 5 more years (though it badly needs it now). Worst of all, most of the hillbillies that live here have absolutely no clue on how to properly operate a motorized vehicle. Part of me wishes that Birmingham would just go back to horse and buggy.
It takes a greater degree of personal experience to be able to add anything meaningful to this type of discussion. As a lifelong Chicagoan, I would have to think Chicagoland rush hours are among the five worst nationally. It takes my dad 1.5-2 hrs one way to make a 30 mile commute (drive) from Chicago's southwest suburbs (one of the lighter arteries feeding Chicago's loop) to the loop each day (leaving before and after peak rush hours). Even after factoring in Downtown Chicago's 57% transit commuter mode share, there are still 215,000 car commuters driving to the Loop each day, which ranks second nationally.
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Los Angeles is definitely the worst city and metro for commuting that I've ever witnessed. The lack of viable public transportation options in the region is a joke. New York is obviously going to be one of the worst. Aside from the occasional short visit, I can't say I can effectively comment on too many other cities.
1. Los Angeles by far. Where in the other cities in generally slacks off aside from peak hours and is tolerable, LA can be bonkers 24/7.
I nominate these as the runners up:
2.Chicago
3.New York
4. Houston
5. Atlanta
6. The rest.
I'm only including cities I've driven in. I'd go Chicago, then:
2. LA
3. NYC
4. DC
5. Boston/Philly?
First 3 are close, bad for different reasons. Have never driven in ATL. While I wouldn't put Houston that high, it is definitely a hassle getting anywhere in that city. Seems like everything is so spread out and everything takes forever and you just want to $^&*@ scream. Miami is bubbling under. Toronto would rank fairly high here if we were to include Canada.
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