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I’ve lived in Chicago, Boston and the suburbs of Chicago and I find the traffic in Charlotte to be worse than all of these.
This is the best way for me to describe CLT traffic:
Pick a highway anywhere is the US. On that highway, insert a stop light at EVERY EXIT and imagine how that would mess up the system. This is what CLT traffic is like.
Also, in Chicago, when traveling from the suburbs you have the option to take the El/subway, the metra train, the local streets and the Highways. In Charlotte, due to population explosion and poor planning, you only have local streets. No highways, or should I say functional highways, means that school buses, parents dropping kids at school and people trying to get to work are sharing the SAME local streets. It’s a complete nightmare.
I would consistently drive the same route every morning. I would drive 4 miles and it took me 30 minutes. Plus, this is not highway driving which is more relaxed. It’s STOP and GO traffic that you always have to pay attention.
If traffic is part of your consideration for quality of life, choose another city.
Good luck!
If you had lived in Boston like me, you would never say that traffic in Charlotte is worse. I-95 in Boston is nightmarish 24 hours a day. If you live in central Boston, most streets are one or maybe two lanes with the traffic light and stop signs, (and potholes). Chicago is also a nightmare as I drive through there pretty often. There seems to always be construction delaying traffic if you are off the interstate.
I agree that Charlotte traffic is busy, but it seems to flow better than most large cities. Rush hours are nightmarish in most places. Public transportation in Chicago helps but far from eliminates it. Boston subways are pretty limited in my opinion. Many of the stations require a drive and park situation. Seriously, people actually from Chicago or Boston will tell you that it is still much better here in regards to traffic.
IMO, of cities I've driven a bit in, I'd rank the traffic as follows from worst to best (again, just my opinion and I've spent varying amounts of time in them). Among top 50 metro areas in population according to wikipedia:
NYC
Boston
Chicago
Washington DC
..gap...
Atlanta
Baltimore
Philadelphia
Miami
Dallas
...gap...
Orlando
Tampa
Tie - Charlotte, Raleigh/Durham and Nashville
...gap...
New Orleans
Kansas City
Jacksonville
Richmond
Birmingham
Oklahoma City
So tired of the same ole people saying the same ole thing. It has nothing to do with that and you know it GoPhil. You have been saying the same thing since I moved here in 2013 It has nothing to do with the amount of cars on the road. It has to do with the short distance (like 10 miles) that would take what it takes to go 60 miles in one of those bigger cities you mentioned above. It isn't even in the same ball park. We need to be speaking apples to apples here not NYC vs. Charlotte. Give a real review for once will ya. I've been watching what you write since 2013 and its the same story line. Charlotte is wonderful, Huntersville is awesome, the CMS school systems are amazing, the traffic isn't that bad, etc. Every single time someone writes a chain like this you throw in your two cents as if you have actually lived in those places and can speak to it. You admitted yoruself that you drove through them/spent considerable time in them...For what? Flying in and driving around in a taxi for work isn't the same as moving somewhere and then realizing OH WAIT, the traffic here compared to Boston is pretty jacked up....same story, oh people all over the country drive in the left lane or done use blinkers. It is nonsense. I lived in Boston, NY, and Atlanta and in those places a higher percentage (as observed) use more blinkers.. For some reason the CLT traffic is maddening given the short distances and nonsense you need to deal with to get there. For once be more forthcoming with your views otherwise its just an agenda.
So tired of the same ole people saying the same ole thing. It has nothing to do with that and you know it GoPhil. You have been saying the same thing since I moved here in 2013 It has nothing to do with the amount of cars on the road. It has to do with the short distance (like 10 miles) that would take what it takes to go 60 miles in one of those bigger cities you mentioned above. It isn't even in the same ball park. We need to be speaking apples to apples here not NYC vs. Charlotte. Give a real review for once will ya. I've been watching what you write since 2013 and its the same story line. Charlotte is wonderful, Huntersville is awesome, the CMS school systems are amazing, the traffic isn't that bad, etc. Every single time someone writes a chain like this you throw in your two cents as if you have actually lived in those places and can speak to it. You admitted yoruself that you drove through them/spent considerable time in them...For what? Flying in and driving around in a taxi for work isn't the same as moving somewhere and then realizing OH WAIT, the traffic here compared to Boston is pretty jacked up....same story, oh people all over the country drive in the left lane or done use blinkers. It is nonsense. I lived in Boston, NY, and Atlanta and in those places a higher percentage (as observed) use more blinkers.. For some reason the CLT traffic is maddening given the short distances and nonsense you need to deal with to get there. For once be more forthcoming with your views otherwise its just an agenda.
Oh I agree it’s not an apples to apples comparison, I think I’ve pretty much said that at least in the past if not explicitly in this thread, it should be understood that Charlotte traffic isn’t as bad as NYC/DC/Boston/Chicago/etc because those cities are larger and more dense. But for people to suggest that CLT traffic is actually worse than Boston or Chicago is mindblowing to me.
Since you quoted my list, you’ll notice that basically the only metros of comparable size that in my opinion have worse traffic than Charlotte is Orlando and Tampa. You could maybe argue Tampa as pretty comparable to CLT in traffic, but Orlando traffic is horrible IMO.
BTW, I did live in both the Philadelphia and the Baltimore/Washington metros. Yes my experience with the rest of those is mostly work travel but the company I work for has offices in NY and Chicago and my old boss lived in Boston so I was in those cities fairly often. I don’t really take taxis/Uber much I usually rented a car, and other than Chicago we usually had to go to various places throughout the metro so got a pretty good idea what driving around the city/metro was like.
You’re probably right, people in NY are probably more likely to use blinkers. They’re also more likely to cut you off while driving 80+ MPH
Living in the DMV area but being from the Charlotte area, I still am mystified at how many people in CLT still don’t know how to properly merge. The proper way to merge to exhaust the runway lane and then move into traffic, not Helter Skelter merge anywhere you want. Zipper Merging is THE method. https://youtu.be/cX0I8OdK7Tk
The end of the merge point is the last opportunity to merge. When you near the highway, one should start to look for a safe entry point and merge as soon as possible before getting to the end. It is the person merging that has to be wait for the right opportunity to enter the highway. The driver on the highway is often courteous and moves over, but doesn't have to and often doesn't. I sometimes enter South Boulevard in awful traffic from Tyvola Road. Sometimes the driver ahead of me also merging waits until the last minute to merge into a lane despite missed opportunities. I merge the earliest, safe opportunity. When I do that, the guy that drove all the way to the end and missed opportunities usually cuts in on others, and causes problems often. That is very annoying. The thing to know is that merging into traffic can legally be done when there is no solid line indicating "no passing".
The end of the merge point is the last opportunity to merge. When you near the highway, one should start to look for a safe entry point and merge as soon as possible before getting to the end. It is the person merging that has to be wait for the right opportunity to enter the highway. The driver on the highway is often courteous and moves over, but doesn't have to and often doesn't. I sometimes enter South Boulevard in awful traffic from Tyvola Road. Sometimes the driver ahead of me also merging waits until the last minute to merge into a lane despite missed opportunities. I merge the earliest, safe opportunity. When I do that, the guy that drove all the way to the end and missed opportunities usually cuts in on others, and causes problems often. That is very annoying. The thing to know is that merging into traffic can legally be done when there is no solid line indicating "no passing".
That’s contrary to modern traffic/driving expert advice.
To Arthur Skipton and Tarheelhombre -
Both of you are correct, but are referring to different merge scenarios. Arthur is probably referring to on-ramp merging when entering a highway, and Hombre is talking about roads that narrow when a lane ends.
That’s contrary to modern traffic/driving expert advice.
The alternative to merging at the first opportunity is to continue driving to the end of the merging lane and getting stuck there (probably having to stop) while waiting for an opportunity to merge there . What is the "modern traffic/driving" expert advice and, out of curiosity, where is it written? I just read Oldsmobile's comment below and I believe we may be talking about two different scenarios at which we are both correct.
To Arthur Skipton and Tarheelhombre -
Both of you are correct, but are referring to different merge scenarios. Arthur is probably referring to on-ramp merging when entering a highway, and Hombre is talking about roads that narrow when a lane ends.
People are enjoying the lack of traffic. After a series of bad accidents, Highway Patrol increased enforcement on I-485. In one month 2,180 citations for speeding were issued. 1,088 were issued to drivers going 16 - 25 mph over the 70mph speed limit. 164 were going 25mph+ over the speed limit with several 100+mph tickets issued each day.
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Omg
You're both correct
