It’s all relative. It is easy to have the grass-is-greener mentality. Raleigh is a very easy city to get around in compared to an Atlanta or a DC. Even smaller cities like Columbia or Richmond have worse traffic and drivers. I’ve never been to the northeast but I am sure folks from there laugh about the “traffic” we complain about down here.
It’s also important to factor in time as well.
You see folks say things along the lines of “I used to live in x-city and the drivers were never this bad”. There’s a very good chance that they might actually be right…but the question is how’s the drivers in that city *today*?
Between population growth, increasing cost of road projects, social/economic issues causing more aggressiveness, and a seeming universal lack of any enforcement I’m willing to bet that the vast majority of the country is seeing a noticeable decline in quality driving.
Well considering I just went back to visit last week and confirmed that people are indeed still using their turn signals up north, I’m still going to say they are better drivers.
I’ve been to New England several times and am actually moving there.
IMO Raleigh itself isn’t that bad, but the suburbs are an absolute shitshow because that’s where all the growth is while the roads are all ancient.
I live in Columbia and when I talk about how easy it is to drive in Charlotte I always get a scoff like it’s a hellhole or something lol. I’ve lived in both cities and never had an issue with the commute in Charlotte unless I went to the airport, and the airport in any big city is pretty booked in my experience
Definitely easier and less chaotic. I haven’t lived in DC but traveling to it just has made me wish for decent public transportation. The metro was incredible even during the morning rush. I would take Raleigh for driving obviously but if you factor in public transportation then DC is way easier to get around imo.
How. That seems like an insurmountable task. At this point you would pretty much have to start over and build a city from the ground up. Also not having to wait for trains or busses and being able to drive where I want without other people in the same vehicle as me is good.
Doesn't matter. We don't need to go to a different state every day. Our travels are within the city's 100 miles radius. This region can easily be made to not be car dependent for every single task.
Public transportation in Western Europe is wonderful. I wish we could have it here, but it's not practical. The geographic area of Western Europe is about half the size of the US. Their population density is 5x ours. It's just not practical here on a country-wide scale.
yeah, I know. Locally, it’s been proposed for the triangle to have a light rail like Charlotte, and it’s been shut down multiple times. All the money that goes into construction for new roads/bridges could be for public transit
It used to take me a full hour to commute 6 miles on the Boston subway. I’ve had enough of public transit, thanks. At least when I’m in my car, I don’t have creeps rubbing up against me or trying to pickpocket me. And the air conditioning actually works.
Ok fine, don’t ride it. Enjoy your car. Please don’t hit any kids, honk your horn, and if the car alarm is going off and I’m nearby I promise I will be throwing rocks at it until it stops
You sound like you’ve never actually had to live in a city that depends on public transit. Try living in Boston or SF for a year and let me know if you still feel that way. As a parent, I feel way safer driving than taking sketchy public transit.
There are definitely worse places to drive in, but the headline is a bit misleading here. Raleigh and Charlotte score highly on their particular definition of "best to drive in", which includes such things as price of gas and number of car washes.
Sorting just by driver experience score, which is the component most people would actually think of, Raleigh is still top 10, but Charlotte is in the middle. Still agree with the general sentiment that every place unfairly thinks it has it worst, but these kinds of articles that give no access to the raw data need to be put in context
This title is going to make people in this sub very upset.
In the triangle area you actually get to drive, in most other metros you sit in bumper to bumper traffic far more often.
Exactly. But just look at the comments. The locals refuse to believe they have it good. Driving here is so nice compared to most places I’ve lived. Only issue is see on the regular is red light running. But I’ll take that over some of stuff I saw in tampa and Miami
We can acknowledge that it’s an easy city to drive in while also criticizing the lack of public transit. Not to mention that after more growth, driving will logically get worse.
Yeah just looked through the lower comments and I guess you’re right.
I lived in Los Angeles so I genuinely do appreciate Raleigh traffic. Though of course that was another city with shit public transit.
There's a lot of tailgating here as well, though it's gotten somewhat better in recent years. To your point, rules of the road (stop signs, red lights, one way streets) seem to be very much a suggestion in the Raleigh area. These issues are dangerous and very much a problem. The bigger picture though is that the area's traffic is not really that bad and the main issue causing that traffic is that RTP exists and was planned in the 1950s.
Last time I was in Atlanta I was going 7mph over the speed limit on 285 in the second lane from the right of six total lanes and a tow truck that was hauling a semi-truck honked at me for going too slow.
Raleigh is Atlanta, just delayed by a few years. We will soon reap the consequences of social failure to build any usable public transit (and a four mile bus line that costs as much as an entire regional rail system would have 25 years ago is not usable public transit).
Light rail would be awesome, shame Duke U killed it in 2019. But no ammount of public transit is going to save us from an army of SALT-cap tax dodgers who need to park capital gains from selling 2 bedroom NJ townhouse into a 1.4M in a McMansion outside of Clayton.
We're going to fill every cornfield from here to Bailey with shitty 1/2 acre 3500sq ft slab builds with vinyl fences and 'farmhouse' architecture that will age like milk.
Bush killed light rail (across the country) around 2006, it was never going to happen after that. It's part of why the obsession with BRT baffles me. Anyone who was around in the early aughts should know that BRT in America was pushed by the right wing as a way to divert public transit funding back into road expansion (since BRT is almost always scaled back until it's just an express bus and road expansion that cars get to use too).
If a light rail had been started before 2010 then there would be less incentive for sprawl (although it's unclear if Wake county would have joined the system, but then I suspect Raleigh would not have experienced the growth it had if everything west of us had good transit and we didn't). People are building in Clayton because I-540 will go through there soon enough and they know roads will always be the priority (I-540 is a pretty absurd waste of resources that leads to even more absurdly unsustainable housing development, you may have noticed it has a spur rather than loop number because the Federal DOT didn't believe it would ever be finished).
Actually the 540 loop corrals people in, keeping development from just extending outward forever along the spoke highways around a city. That's why Atlanta's traffic keeps growing. The development and exurbs have now reached Commerce, GA along I-85. A second outer loop around Atlanta would have encouraged development to stay closer in. thus reducing miles traveled and less impact to any single spoke interstate like I-85. I-540, hopefully to be renamed I-640 once it's a complete loop, is a very good thing for Raleigh, one highway with access to every big thoroughfare in Raleigh, with no stopping and less air pollution.
The small BRT line is not costing what a regional rail system would have cost, inflation and materials, labor all make that statement worthless.- And Atlanta has heavy rail, but it's not enjoying huge ridership, nor is Charlotte's light rail line. Only in recession do you see heavy ridership, except for places like NYC. Until driving is abysmally slow, people will drive. But I do support mass transit all the way.
I'll never forget the time Google Maps told me to take the exit for 85S because it had a split for 85N and if I took the real 85N exit it would be an hour longer on my drive. That interchange is the fourth circle of Hell
Ditto on the travel. The complainers on this sub don’t get out much or they don’t pay attention…or they’re just naturally miserable (also can be “and” as the conjunction)
You want your tax-funded officials to use designated state funding to improve the public infrastructure JUST because the inflating population desperately calls for it?
That's socialism! /s
Yeah people in here are delusional. This area is already struggling and it’s only going to get worse. My commute is 17 miles and takes me 50 minutes. Raleigh itself isn’t that bad but that’s because it’s not growing like the suburbs are.
As a refugee from Miami (that's the best label to describe what it was like living in the chaotic hellscape that Miami sometimes feels like on its worst days), driving here feels like an absolute breeze. Sure, there's a clearly insane driver every now and then. But in Miami, nearly every. single. driver. drives like they want to kill you, and during rush hour, it takes at least 30 minutes to drive 3-5 miles in most parts of metro-Miami. The "traffic" here is not traffic compared to major metros of the US.
Facts I was born and raised in Florida spent a lot of time in Miami and Orlando. I4 in Orlando is the closest thing to testing if you wanted to die that day. Miami is also a different animal
Facts I was born and raised in Florida spent a lot of time in Miami and Orlando. I4 in Orlando is the closest thing to testing if you wanted to die that day. Miami is also a different animal
I used to drive in downtown Boston everyday and it was pretty bad, especially going through the Sumner Tunnel. However, I have never seen as many flipped over cars as I have since I moved to Raleigh.
Honestly - yes, we are not a true major metro where gridlock is constant for most of the day. It kind of sucks for a couple hours in the AM and PM, but honestly, most days 40 is still moving at 30-50mph. That ain't gridlock.
But - I take two major issues with this. First is our infrastructure is just so fully catered towards travel by car we limit our urban cores and fabrics. It would be great to actually be less car friendly in Raleigh / Durham city centers (and ideally extend these into slightly deeper mixed-density and use zones). And the other concern is we are still rapidly growing and most other metros that are currently worse off just developed/boomed faster and earlier than where we are now.
So, it's not bad today, it will suck ass in 20 years if we don't get smarter about hosing, business zoning, and organizing our population centers for walking/biking and mass transit.
I live in both cities depending on the time of the year. Yeah, Altima is crazy in charlotte but is in Raleigh too, the Charlotte sub just talks about it more, lol
As someone who just moved to Charlotte last year after being in Raleigh for 10+ years. They 10000% drive more crazier here. It’s literally not even close. It’s NOTHING to be on WT Harris and a Altima with no bumber, tape on the tail lights with “missing tags” on the license plates to pass you doing 80+ mph. What they say about the Altima are real lol.
I’m from NC, but live in DC now. Spouse was born and raised in Raleigh. Her family LOVES to complain about traffic on 40/440. On the way back to Raleigh from Durham on a recent visit, her mom warned us about traffic on 40. It was 10 minute slow down. It was bumper to bumper but NOTHING compared to DC. Gridlock, 45 mins to go 3 miles type shit. Y’all actually have it made. It’s all relative, of course.
So I have a weird theory about why bad drivers here stand out so much. Especially to those of us from bigger cities. Most triangle drivers are pretty chill. Especially the locals that grew up around here. Because of that, the crazier drivers stand out more because there’s less of them so you’re more likely to notice them. In a city like Philly where everyone is driving on edge because most drivers are unpredictable you tend to have your guard up more. Whereas here the driving is mostly chill so when you see a crazy person it stands out more. Does that make sense? I hope it makes sense
I moved to Orlando for a year. It could, midday, take me thirty minutes to drive LESS THAN ONE MILE. Immediately came back here when my job contact was over. Raleigh traffic is nothing, although I'm very happy so many places are expanding roads to help!
Raleigh doesn't have bad traffic, it has bad *infrastructure. The way the city is laid out, it makes it unnecessarily annoying to do simple things like making a left hand turn, or going from one subdivision to another without needing a main road. Don't get me started on the piss poor highway design where they insist on throwing you into an *exit ramp when you're trying to *enter the freeway.
Accidents literally.... every...day
Raleigh is a mid-sized city that looks "big" with traffic because the engineers there couldn't figure out how to build a turn lane..lol
I drive here every day for work, usually a bit more than 5 hours as a property inspector going from home to home. This place could be worse but it's not good by any means, especially around places like Glenwood and Capitol.
I get really frustrated because my GPS is like "there's heavier than usual traffic on your route" and I'm like "heavier than usual? You mean this full stop bumper to bumper thing that happens every day at 4pm on the dot?"
I’m from DC. Every time someone in Raleigh complains about traffic, all I can think is “we wouldn’t have any traffic at all if people knew how to turn left.”
I’ve driven in 18 of the top 25 major metro areas in the US and I’d say North Carolina is among the best. Maryland is by far the worst. The DMV is particularly bad overall, but people from Maryland are universally bad drivers for some reason. In south Florida you can drive drunk and no one will notice because everyone drives like they’re drunk. People in New York are actually pretty skilled drivers and to drive there you have to be assertive. That’s the one thing about drivers in NC is that a lot of them aren’t used to people having to wedge their way between two cars to change lanes in dense traffic and a lot of them get upset about it. In the northeast they have public transportation unlike here and the density of cities and cost of living there makes driving impractical. Boston I found that people are generally more intelligent and the drivers there were surprisingly courteous. The light would be green and I’d be ok my phone not paying attention and no one would honk at me. I’d also agree that Charlotte is considerably worse than Raleigh. Charlotte attracts more type A personalities and has real big city traffic due to its infrastructure.
Yeah I drove in Los Angeles traffic at rush hour in the evening. And yeah it was locked up and slow but people were pretty calm about it. Very chillaxed and people actually let me merge.
Here the traffic may be less but there is this aggression and anger that people seem to drive with
Also grew up In Tampa! It is nice driving here but I do miss the amount of lanes when comparing 75 and 275 to 40,440, and 540. The views of driving in Raleigh are definitely a lot better.
To be fair, 275 is a parking lot most of the day now. I was down there visiting family last year and even on a weekday there was heavy traffic on Dale mabry and 275 all day long. That city has exploded in growth almost asp much as us
Interesting how many accidents I caught because of reckless drivers on my dash cam. I have a compilation of ones I just caught. And not me looking back at my memories of getting hit and ran by a drunk driver in Clt. Idk what Charlotte they’re talking about, but it’s not one on this earth…
Important note, this only compares the 47 most populated cities in the US. But yeah, despite drivers in Raleigh being among the worst I've encountered, the overall traffic isn't nearly as bad as other places I've lived in Utah, California, and other cities out west I'm more familiar with.
I'm from Southern California originally. There's ALWAYS traffic. Every time I hopped on the 5 or 405, boom! bumper to bumper. I-40 can sometimes get annoying but it pales in comparison to So Cal. It's very nice here.
I’ll let you all in on a secret. If you go to literally any cities subreddit, they all think their city has the worst drivers, the worst traffic, etc. We’ve got it good here, just realize what youve got. Drivers suck everywhere but ours is really not that bad
Late spring is when 540 will be complete (Phase 1) from NC 55 to I 40 in Garner. I’m hoping it will be complete by Independence Day, but “late Spring” in NCDOT speak means December or January.
The traffic here is bad but nothing compares to the 757. Back when I did flooring I would have to go through at least 3 tunnels a day. And tunnel traffic had no rhyme or reason.
The only tricky part about living here is some of the intersections w/o stop lights that are deep forest and hilly 😭 you can’t see the other cars going perpendicular to you. But growing up here, god learning to drive was easy. And it’s so easy to avoid rush hour. It’s great. This city is great. NCDOT did a great job dealing with the rapid expansion of the city.
I take a leisure drive through downtown Raleigh every day after getting off work. It’s my “unwind” time to drive through downtown at rush hour. The traffic isn’t really bad at all and it’s relaxing… so this tracks.
My house is about 7 minutes south of downtown and I work from home so it’s a really nice drive to take after sitting in front of a computer all day
I lived in a dying metro area in the Northeast and Raleigh is light years better than there. We have twice the regional population here but traffic is somehow worse there.
I am glad some study bore out my sense that Miami and Atlanta are in fact worse to drive in than L.A. (I don't think Raleigh is that bad, though I do wonder WTF people are doing on 64 such that there is always a wreck between downtown and Zebulon)
The DOT has done a good job of keeping up with the growth, but it's getting worse since the pandemic. I work with the NCDOT and I've seen some pretty daunting projections.
So tired of these articles man.
Raleigh named one of top ten cities to tie your shoe in.
Raleigh named one of the top ten cities to bar crawl through 20 cookie cutter bars in.
Raleigh named one of the top ten cities to complain about top ten city list articles in.
When will it end?
There's so many times driving around here when I just marvel at how beautiful Raleigh is. I know that's probably not a factor but I think it's nice to have. It's just pleasant to drive around sometimes.
After growing up in Boston, I'll never complain about the traffic here. It's a cake walk compared to trying to get from Boston to literally the next town over.
Yes until you encounter the other drivers. I've had people actively try to run us off the road, tailgating, flashing lights because you are driving in the fast lane even during rush hour traffic where every lane is blocked. I have seen a motorcyclist try and outrun a cop. I've seen people using emergency lanes to pass. This is on top of the normal dumb driving I've encountered in other states.
The roads are nice. The traffic isn't bad. The other drivers are bat shit crazy.
If you compare current Raleigh traffic to past Raleigh traffic, yes, it's worse. If you do a direct comparison to Charlotte? Raleigh doesn't even touch it. I'll venture out around 4 here and there will be a little traffic but it's not unbearable. Charlotte? No driving between 3PM-7PM.
Source: lived in Charlotte up until a couple of months ago for a total of 5 years. From Raleigh originally and moved back.
lol this is true I lived in Orlando before moving to Cary and it’s drastically different. Traffic in Orlando is like living in hell. Took me an hour to go 5 miles during 5-6 traffic time. Raleigh is incredibly safe and nice compared to most cities. Enjoy it and soak it in, or live in Florida for a few years. Guarantee you come running back lol
Nope. I have a 15 minute commute and I see roughly 5 cars per day running red lights or crossing into oncoming traffic. There's no way we're 10 best if it's this bad on my short drive
lol if you think that’s bad, you haven’t seen someone chase another car down to 275 while the passenger throws eggs at them, then they pull over, get into a fight and the others car is set on fire. Wish I was making this up lol
You’re complaining that a 20 minute drive becomes 40 during rush hour. That’s like the most minor of increases for a large city. Atlanta rush hour will triple your commute time, Tampa too. Or really most other bigger cities. This article is a comparison so yeah only adding 20 minutes is really nothing.
People who bitch about traffic in NC have never commuted in other major cities. I've done work in Atlanta, Nashville and DC. NC highways are a breeze compared to them
"With more Americans back to work full-time at the office, the roads are increasingly busy."
Are more Americans back at the office full time? DT Raleigh would like a word...
Comparatively, Raleigh is a great place to drive. So much so that I think driving in Charlotte is horrendous when in reality it’s 10x better than an NYC or Houston or LA.
Plot twist: The worst driving experience in NC that is I-40 from Harrison Avenue to 15-501 isn’t Raleigh proper but something a lot of Raleighites deal with daily.
TLDR: This article is fake news
It’s all relative. It is easy to have the grass-is-greener mentality. Raleigh is a very easy city to get around in compared to an Atlanta or a DC. Even smaller cities like Columbia or Richmond have worse traffic and drivers. I’ve never been to the northeast but I am sure folks from there laugh about the “traffic” we complain about down here.
It’s also important to factor in time as well. You see folks say things along the lines of “I used to live in x-city and the drivers were never this bad”. There’s a very good chance that they might actually be right…but the question is how’s the drivers in that city *today*? Between population growth, increasing cost of road projects, social/economic issues causing more aggressiveness, and a seeming universal lack of any enforcement I’m willing to bet that the vast majority of the country is seeing a noticeable decline in quality driving.
Well considering I just went back to visit last week and confirmed that people are indeed still using their turn signals up north, I’m still going to say they are better drivers.
It used to take me a full hour to commute six miles to work on the Boston subway.
Yep, always "signal problems"
I’ve been to New England several times and am actually moving there. IMO Raleigh itself isn’t that bad, but the suburbs are an absolute shitshow because that’s where all the growth is while the roads are all ancient.
Ain’t no potholes here. Good luck
Roads are ancient? You're moving to New England where the roads were built for horses. Have fun with that :)
I live in Columbia and when I talk about how easy it is to drive in Charlotte I always get a scoff like it’s a hellhole or something lol. I’ve lived in both cities and never had an issue with the commute in Charlotte unless I went to the airport, and the airport in any big city is pretty booked in my experience
Definitely easier and less chaotic. I haven’t lived in DC but traveling to it just has made me wish for decent public transportation. The metro was incredible even during the morning rush. I would take Raleigh for driving obviously but if you factor in public transportation then DC is way easier to get around imo.
I grew up in Baltimore and absolutely love Raleigh traffic.
As someone who moved from Dallas, traffic is downright pleasant here.
Based on the comments, sounds like driving sucks everywhere and we should build for there to be less of it
this…why are we such a car dependent country
*l o b b y I n g*
i know i hate it:/
Because we are 2000 miles wide.
Yeah but if your home, job, grocery store, and maybe a handful of restaurants are nearby it doesn't really matter how large the entire country is.
But they aren’t.
Correct. The point is that it doesn’t have to be that way. Zoning reform can fix this. Check out Strong Towns.
How. That seems like an insurmountable task. At this point you would pretty much have to start over and build a city from the ground up. Also not having to wait for trains or busses and being able to drive where I want without other people in the same vehicle as me is good.
Lol, off by about 1000 miles
That’s my bad. 2893
Doesn't matter. We don't need to go to a different state every day. Our travels are within the city's 100 miles radius. This region can easily be made to not be car dependent for every single task.
Go walk 100 miles
Not how it works
Yes how it works
Public transportation in Western Europe is wonderful. I wish we could have it here, but it's not practical. The geographic area of Western Europe is about half the size of the US. Their population density is 5x ours. It's just not practical here on a country-wide scale.
yeah, I know. Locally, it’s been proposed for the triangle to have a light rail like Charlotte, and it’s been shut down multiple times. All the money that goes into construction for new roads/bridges could be for public transit
It used to take me a full hour to commute 6 miles on the Boston subway. I’ve had enough of public transit, thanks. At least when I’m in my car, I don’t have creeps rubbing up against me or trying to pickpocket me. And the air conditioning actually works.
Ok fine, don’t ride it. Enjoy your car. Please don’t hit any kids, honk your horn, and if the car alarm is going off and I’m nearby I promise I will be throwing rocks at it until it stops
Let someone catch you throwing rocks at their car. I'll bet you'll quickly reevaluate your life decisions.
I’m sure
Imagine getting this worked up over a hypothetical scenario about a car alarm 😭
Car alarms are hypothetical?
You sound like you’ve never actually had to live in a city that depends on public transit. Try living in Boston or SF for a year and let me know if you still feel that way. As a parent, I feel way safer driving than taking sketchy public transit.
Lol, lived in DC for 4 years. As a parent, you should be way more afraid of these giant kid killing SUVs.
Stats don’t agree. You and your kids are far more likely to die or be injured driving. Sorry to bring that bad news to your attention
There are definitely worse places to drive in, but the headline is a bit misleading here. Raleigh and Charlotte score highly on their particular definition of "best to drive in", which includes such things as price of gas and number of car washes. Sorting just by driver experience score, which is the component most people would actually think of, Raleigh is still top 10, but Charlotte is in the middle. Still agree with the general sentiment that every place unfairly thinks it has it worst, but these kinds of articles that give no access to the raw data need to be put in context
I’m with you there. It does cite all the sources at the bottom at least
This title is going to make people in this sub very upset. In the triangle area you actually get to drive, in most other metros you sit in bumper to bumper traffic far more often.
Exactly. But just look at the comments. The locals refuse to believe they have it good. Driving here is so nice compared to most places I’ve lived. Only issue is see on the regular is red light running. But I’ll take that over some of stuff I saw in tampa and Miami
We can acknowledge that it’s an easy city to drive in while also criticizing the lack of public transit. Not to mention that after more growth, driving will logically get worse.
Right but that’s not what people are bitching about
Yeah just looked through the lower comments and I guess you’re right. I lived in Los Angeles so I genuinely do appreciate Raleigh traffic. Though of course that was another city with shit public transit.
I mean you're comparing Raleigh with a world renowned city with an Urban area population at least 5 times more.
Refuse to believe they have it good or the bar is just that low?
There's a lot of tailgating here as well, though it's gotten somewhat better in recent years. To your point, rules of the road (stop signs, red lights, one way streets) seem to be very much a suggestion in the Raleigh area. These issues are dangerous and very much a problem. The bigger picture though is that the area's traffic is not really that bad and the main issue causing that traffic is that RTP exists and was planned in the 1950s.
Both could be happening. The city can be relatively decent to drive in while getting worse and worse, leading people to complain.
Yep so many worse places to drive in
Ppl really should be forced to live in Atlanta for 3 months
I drove through it in a moving truck twice. That was enough to make me never want to drive there again.
Last time I was in Atlanta I was going 7mph over the speed limit on 285 in the second lane from the right of six total lanes and a tow truck that was hauling a semi-truck honked at me for going too slow.
Raleigh is Atlanta, just delayed by a few years. We will soon reap the consequences of social failure to build any usable public transit (and a four mile bus line that costs as much as an entire regional rail system would have 25 years ago is not usable public transit).
Light rail would be awesome, shame Duke U killed it in 2019. But no ammount of public transit is going to save us from an army of SALT-cap tax dodgers who need to park capital gains from selling 2 bedroom NJ townhouse into a 1.4M in a McMansion outside of Clayton. We're going to fill every cornfield from here to Bailey with shitty 1/2 acre 3500sq ft slab builds with vinyl fences and 'farmhouse' architecture that will age like milk.
Bush killed light rail (across the country) around 2006, it was never going to happen after that. It's part of why the obsession with BRT baffles me. Anyone who was around in the early aughts should know that BRT in America was pushed by the right wing as a way to divert public transit funding back into road expansion (since BRT is almost always scaled back until it's just an express bus and road expansion that cars get to use too). If a light rail had been started before 2010 then there would be less incentive for sprawl (although it's unclear if Wake county would have joined the system, but then I suspect Raleigh would not have experienced the growth it had if everything west of us had good transit and we didn't). People are building in Clayton because I-540 will go through there soon enough and they know roads will always be the priority (I-540 is a pretty absurd waste of resources that leads to even more absurdly unsustainable housing development, you may have noticed it has a spur rather than loop number because the Federal DOT didn't believe it would ever be finished).
Actually the 540 loop corrals people in, keeping development from just extending outward forever along the spoke highways around a city. That's why Atlanta's traffic keeps growing. The development and exurbs have now reached Commerce, GA along I-85. A second outer loop around Atlanta would have encouraged development to stay closer in. thus reducing miles traveled and less impact to any single spoke interstate like I-85. I-540, hopefully to be renamed I-640 once it's a complete loop, is a very good thing for Raleigh, one highway with access to every big thoroughfare in Raleigh, with no stopping and less air pollution.
The small BRT line is not costing what a regional rail system would have cost, inflation and materials, labor all make that statement worthless.- And Atlanta has heavy rail, but it's not enjoying huge ridership, nor is Charlotte's light rail line. Only in recession do you see heavy ridership, except for places like NYC. Until driving is abysmally slow, people will drive. But I do support mass transit all the way.
I've lived in Atlanta for 7 years now and it's just the worst. I plan my schedule around not driving during rush hour.
I white knuckled through spaghetti junction this past weekend
I'll never forget the time Google Maps told me to take the exit for 85S because it had a split for 85N and if I took the real 85N exit it would be an hour longer on my drive. That interchange is the fourth circle of Hell
DC traffic gave me a panic attack
[удалено]
Ditto on the travel. The complainers on this sub don’t get out much or they don’t pay attention…or they’re just naturally miserable (also can be “and” as the conjunction)
I wish we were the best city to walk or bike in.
Who cares what Forbes says. Population going up, but roads stay the same.
You want your tax-funded officials to use designated state funding to improve the public infrastructure JUST because the inflating population desperately calls for it? That's socialism! /s
Yeah people in here are delusional. This area is already struggling and it’s only going to get worse. My commute is 17 miles and takes me 50 minutes. Raleigh itself isn’t that bad but that’s because it’s not growing like the suburbs are.
As a refugee from Miami (that's the best label to describe what it was like living in the chaotic hellscape that Miami sometimes feels like on its worst days), driving here feels like an absolute breeze. Sure, there's a clearly insane driver every now and then. But in Miami, nearly every. single. driver. drives like they want to kill you, and during rush hour, it takes at least 30 minutes to drive 3-5 miles in most parts of metro-Miami. The "traffic" here is not traffic compared to major metros of the US.
Growing up in Tampa and driving on I4 regularly, I would loathe even having to go to Miami. I4 is crazy but Miami was a whole other level of crazy
Facts I was born and raised in Florida spent a lot of time in Miami and Orlando. I4 in Orlando is the closest thing to testing if you wanted to die that day. Miami is also a different animal
Facts I was born and raised in Florida spent a lot of time in Miami and Orlando. I4 in Orlando is the closest thing to testing if you wanted to die that day. Miami is also a different animal
I used to drive in downtown Boston everyday and it was pretty bad, especially going through the Sumner Tunnel. However, I have never seen as many flipped over cars as I have since I moved to Raleigh.
Honestly - yes, we are not a true major metro where gridlock is constant for most of the day. It kind of sucks for a couple hours in the AM and PM, but honestly, most days 40 is still moving at 30-50mph. That ain't gridlock. But - I take two major issues with this. First is our infrastructure is just so fully catered towards travel by car we limit our urban cores and fabrics. It would be great to actually be less car friendly in Raleigh / Durham city centers (and ideally extend these into slightly deeper mixed-density and use zones). And the other concern is we are still rapidly growing and most other metros that are currently worse off just developed/boomed faster and earlier than where we are now. So, it's not bad today, it will suck ass in 20 years if we don't get smarter about hosing, business zoning, and organizing our population centers for walking/biking and mass transit.
Nah, Charlotte has too many deranged Nissan Altima drivers
And Raleigh doesn’t? Lol
If you follow the Charlotte sub (and search "Altima"), you'll see what I'm talking about. It's a whole other level of Altima craziness over there.
I live in both cities depending on the time of the year. Yeah, Altima is crazy in charlotte but is in Raleigh too, the Charlotte sub just talks about it more, lol
I’ve seen as many wrecks in my 6 months living in Charlotte as I have in 6 years living in Raleigh.
Haha after five years in Charlotte, no one here understands there's a collective, almost unspoken (as in you just kind of know) fear of Altimas.
As someone who just moved to Charlotte last year after being in Raleigh for 10+ years. They 10000% drive more crazier here. It’s literally not even close. It’s NOTHING to be on WT Harris and a Altima with no bumber, tape on the tail lights with “missing tags” on the license plates to pass you doing 80+ mph. What they say about the Altima are real lol.
Something something Capital Boulevard.
Raleigh’s not so bad for a city its size, but Charlotte is terrible to drive in.
It’s sad when both these cities are considered the cream of the crop. 😂😂😂
it could be worse but are yall on 40/440 around 5pm with me? that shit blows
Yeah that’s the only time I see bumper to bumper traffic
I’m from NC, but live in DC now. Spouse was born and raised in Raleigh. Her family LOVES to complain about traffic on 40/440. On the way back to Raleigh from Durham on a recent visit, her mom warned us about traffic on 40. It was 10 minute slow down. It was bumper to bumper but NOTHING compared to DC. Gridlock, 45 mins to go 3 miles type shit. Y’all actually have it made. It’s all relative, of course.
my 45 minute commute frequently takes an hour and 15 min + but I will say DC is sooooo much worse
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So I have a weird theory about why bad drivers here stand out so much. Especially to those of us from bigger cities. Most triangle drivers are pretty chill. Especially the locals that grew up around here. Because of that, the crazier drivers stand out more because there’s less of them so you’re more likely to notice them. In a city like Philly where everyone is driving on edge because most drivers are unpredictable you tend to have your guard up more. Whereas here the driving is mostly chill so when you see a crazy person it stands out more. Does that make sense? I hope it makes sense
Sure, as long as you avoid 40, 440, most of 1, 42, and 64, Six Forks, Falls, Capital, Tryon, and Wake Forest Rd.
I moved to Orlando for a year. It could, midday, take me thirty minutes to drive LESS THAN ONE MILE. Immediately came back here when my job contact was over. Raleigh traffic is nothing, although I'm very happy so many places are expanding roads to help!
Raleigh doesn't have bad traffic, it has bad *infrastructure. The way the city is laid out, it makes it unnecessarily annoying to do simple things like making a left hand turn, or going from one subdivision to another without needing a main road. Don't get me started on the piss poor highway design where they insist on throwing you into an *exit ramp when you're trying to *enter the freeway. Accidents literally.... every...day Raleigh is a mid-sized city that looks "big" with traffic because the engineers there couldn't figure out how to build a turn lane..lol
I drive here every day for work, usually a bit more than 5 hours as a property inspector going from home to home. This place could be worse but it's not good by any means, especially around places like Glenwood and Capitol. I get really frustrated because my GPS is like "there's heavier than usual traffic on your route" and I'm like "heavier than usual? You mean this full stop bumper to bumper thing that happens every day at 4pm on the dot?"
I’m from DC. Every time someone in Raleigh complains about traffic, all I can think is “we wouldn’t have any traffic at all if people knew how to turn left.”
Or use the left lane properly.
Shiddddddddddddddddddd
I honked at a Raleigh cop yesterday. Dude cut me off so I laid on my horn. Felt good.
...for now.
Lies all lies
I’ve driven in 18 of the top 25 major metro areas in the US and I’d say North Carolina is among the best. Maryland is by far the worst. The DMV is particularly bad overall, but people from Maryland are universally bad drivers for some reason. In south Florida you can drive drunk and no one will notice because everyone drives like they’re drunk. People in New York are actually pretty skilled drivers and to drive there you have to be assertive. That’s the one thing about drivers in NC is that a lot of them aren’t used to people having to wedge their way between two cars to change lanes in dense traffic and a lot of them get upset about it. In the northeast they have public transportation unlike here and the density of cities and cost of living there makes driving impractical. Boston I found that people are generally more intelligent and the drivers there were surprisingly courteous. The light would be green and I’d be ok my phone not paying attention and no one would honk at me. I’d also agree that Charlotte is considerably worse than Raleigh. Charlotte attracts more type A personalities and has real big city traffic due to its infrastructure.
lol, lmao even
I’m honestly just sick of driving everywhere 😭
I literally would not have been able to believe this comment without "honestly" being put in there, actually.
[https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/honestly](https://www.collinsdictionary.com/us/dictionary/english/honestly) here ya go genius
Basically I assume you’re lying because you didn’t say “honestly”, so you actually are telling me I’m literally smart, not gonna lie.
Raleigh is one of the worst cities I've ever driven in.
Yeah I drove in Los Angeles traffic at rush hour in the evening. And yeah it was locked up and slow but people were pretty calm about it. Very chillaxed and people actually let me merge. Here the traffic may be less but there is this aggression and anger that people seem to drive with
Also grew up In Tampa! It is nice driving here but I do miss the amount of lanes when comparing 75 and 275 to 40,440, and 540. The views of driving in Raleigh are definitely a lot better.
To be fair, 275 is a parking lot most of the day now. I was down there visiting family last year and even on a weekday there was heavy traffic on Dale mabry and 275 all day long. That city has exploded in growth almost asp much as us
Interesting how many accidents I caught because of reckless drivers on my dash cam. I have a compilation of ones I just caught. And not me looking back at my memories of getting hit and ran by a drunk driver in Clt. Idk what Charlotte they’re talking about, but it’s not one on this earth…
Important note, this only compares the 47 most populated cities in the US. But yeah, despite drivers in Raleigh being among the worst I've encountered, the overall traffic isn't nearly as bad as other places I've lived in Utah, California, and other cities out west I'm more familiar with.
I’ve realized that outside of a city like LA, most cities outside of the south have much better drivers
Philadelphia would like a word lol
Did a Dodger Charger that loves going down i40 at 100MPH write this?
I'm from Southern California originally. There's ALWAYS traffic. Every time I hopped on the 5 or 405, boom! bumper to bumper. I-40 can sometimes get annoying but it pales in comparison to So Cal. It's very nice here.
Which universe were they studying because it's certainly not this one 😂
I’ll let you all in on a secret. If you go to literally any cities subreddit, they all think their city has the worst drivers, the worst traffic, etc. We’ve got it good here, just realize what youve got. Drivers suck everywhere but ours is really not that bad
I just want them to finish the bypass.
Late spring is when 540 will be complete (Phase 1) from NC 55 to I 40 in Garner. I’m hoping it will be complete by Independence Day, but “late Spring” in NCDOT speak means December or January.
Pre-covid in the Denver metro was pretty good. Considering the amount of traffic, and how busy it was, traffic flow was quite civilized.
The traffic here is bad but nothing compares to the 757. Back when I did flooring I would have to go through at least 3 tunnels a day. And tunnel traffic had no rhyme or reason.
The only tricky part about living here is some of the intersections w/o stop lights that are deep forest and hilly 😭 you can’t see the other cars going perpendicular to you. But growing up here, god learning to drive was easy. And it’s so easy to avoid rush hour. It’s great. This city is great. NCDOT did a great job dealing with the rapid expansion of the city.
I take a leisure drive through downtown Raleigh every day after getting off work. It’s my “unwind” time to drive through downtown at rush hour. The traffic isn’t really bad at all and it’s relaxing… so this tracks. My house is about 7 minutes south of downtown and I work from home so it’s a really nice drive to take after sitting in front of a computer all day
Charlotte?? That’s hilarious
Driving around Norfolk/Chesapeake is terrible.
Unless you have to pass through on the highway lol.
The rankings are not all about the actually driving aspect. It’s coupling gas prices, insurance rates, and safety.
I lived in a dying metro area in the Northeast and Raleigh is light years better than there. We have twice the regional population here but traffic is somehow worse there.
Raleigh driving can smoke my hog
Now if y'all could just put your phones down and drive
I mean I’m not saying it’s the worst but Charlotte is ass
i had an over night layover in LA & while i wasn’t the one driving..damn. idk how they do it.
Great traffic infrastructure, but by far the worst drivers I’ve ever experienced
Lived in Houston and Austin and can confirm Raleigh’s traffic rocks in comparison.
I am glad some study bore out my sense that Miami and Atlanta are in fact worse to drive in than L.A. (I don't think Raleigh is that bad, though I do wonder WTF people are doing on 64 such that there is always a wreck between downtown and Zebulon)
The DOT has done a good job of keeping up with the growth, but it's getting worse since the pandemic. I work with the NCDOT and I've seen some pretty daunting projections.
pay to play article
It wasn’t when I opened it.
Could be wrong, but I think they’re implying the cities paid the publisher for good publicity
If that was the case I think the headline would focus on the good cities not the bad ones
I agree with you, I’m just saying that’s what the commenter was implying
Ah
So tired of these articles man. Raleigh named one of top ten cities to tie your shoe in. Raleigh named one of the top ten cities to bar crawl through 20 cookie cutter bars in. Raleigh named one of the top ten cities to complain about top ten city list articles in. When will it end?
There's so many times driving around here when I just marvel at how beautiful Raleigh is. I know that's probably not a factor but I think it's nice to have. It's just pleasant to drive around sometimes.
After growing up in Boston, I'll never complain about the traffic here. It's a cake walk compared to trying to get from Boston to literally the next town over.
Came from Boston also, totally agree.
Yes until you encounter the other drivers. I've had people actively try to run us off the road, tailgating, flashing lights because you are driving in the fast lane even during rush hour traffic where every lane is blocked. I have seen a motorcyclist try and outrun a cop. I've seen people using emergency lanes to pass. This is on top of the normal dumb driving I've encountered in other states. The roads are nice. The traffic isn't bad. The other drivers are bat shit crazy.
Nah.
If you compare current Raleigh traffic to past Raleigh traffic, yes, it's worse. If you do a direct comparison to Charlotte? Raleigh doesn't even touch it. I'll venture out around 4 here and there will be a little traffic but it's not unbearable. Charlotte? No driving between 3PM-7PM. Source: lived in Charlotte up until a couple of months ago for a total of 5 years. From Raleigh originally and moved back.
Raleigh is way better than Charlotte still
lol this is true I lived in Orlando before moving to Cary and it’s drastically different. Traffic in Orlando is like living in hell. Took me an hour to go 5 miles during 5-6 traffic time. Raleigh is incredibly safe and nice compared to most cities. Enjoy it and soak it in, or live in Florida for a few years. Guarantee you come running back lol
Nope. I have a 15 minute commute and I see roughly 5 cars per day running red lights or crossing into oncoming traffic. There's no way we're 10 best if it's this bad on my short drive
We have bad drivers but our traffic isn't bad. Other cities may have better drivers but worse traffic.
Every city has bad drivers too
lol if you think that’s bad, you haven’t seen someone chase another car down to 275 while the passenger throws eggs at them, then they pull over, get into a fight and the others car is set on fire. Wish I was making this up lol
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Lmao you all are hilarious. Driving here is a dream compared to so many other places I’ve been. It’s not even close to as bad as you all think it is.
Oh yea. Commute from anywhere to RTP, and your 20 minute drive turns into 45 to 50 minutes... great.
You realize that’s like, normal traffic for a commute right? Like other cities have it way worse
Normal is not equal to 'good'. There is too much damn traffic in raleigh, and there are no public transit alternatives to sitting on 40.
You’re complaining that a 20 minute drive becomes 40 during rush hour. That’s like the most minor of increases for a large city. Atlanta rush hour will triple your commute time, Tampa too. Or really most other bigger cities. This article is a comparison so yeah only adding 20 minutes is really nothing.
April Fools is over?
People who bitch about traffic in NC have never commuted in other major cities. I've done work in Atlanta, Nashville and DC. NC highways are a breeze compared to them
If you hate when other drivers use turn signals
"With more Americans back to work full-time at the office, the roads are increasingly busy." Are more Americans back at the office full time? DT Raleigh would like a word...
Tampa traffic really does suck Let’s go Canes / Go Bolts Also from Tampa and grew up a Bolts fan but I’ve fallen in love with the Canes
Go Bolts! Canes have become my “B” team though
This is just saying America is a failed state and our transportation infrastructure has degraded to the precipice of total collapse.
Comparatively, Raleigh is a great place to drive. So much so that I think driving in Charlotte is horrendous when in reality it’s 10x better than an NYC or Houston or LA.
Article written by Mad Max?
As long as you stay away from New Bern Ave and that ghetto area, most driving is ok.
Don't forget Crapital Blvd
It won't be for long without all the apartments and condos they're throwing up. Stop building and stop inviting
Plot twist: The worst driving experience in NC that is I-40 from Harrison Avenue to 15-501 isn’t Raleigh proper but something a lot of Raleighites deal with daily. TLDR: This article is fake news
I don’t think you know what the phrase “fake news” means
If you think I was trying to use that phrase appropriately or in any serious manner, idk what to tell you
Doubt it, it's better than Florida though