Seattle occupies list of world's worst traffic cities

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

Dating back to the 1962 Seattle World's Fair, and forward to Seattle's new downtown library and waterfront sculpture garden, promoters have long boasted: This is going to put Seattle on the map.

Seattle IS a world class city, but not in a way to boast about.

Seattle ranks as No. 20 in a CBS News compilation of "Cities with the worst traffic in the world." The Emerald City is just ahead of Dallas and St. Petersburg in Russia, and trails just behind Chicago and Boston.

The striking feature of the "worst traffic" list is that almost all of the cities on it are larger -- sometimes much larger -- than Seattle. Los Angeles is, quite predictably, No. 1. Moscow and New York City are tied for No. 2. Sao Paulo is No. 4. San Francisco is No. 5.

"Washington's largest city has its own share of problems, with some of the worst appearing on Interstate 5 between Northgate and Union Street," said the CBS study. "On average, Seattle drivers each lost 55 hours to traffic during peak times in 2017."


-snip-

The Emerald City is squeezed between two bodies of water, Elliott Bay and Lake Washington. It has just two major north-south highways, Interstate 5 and S.R. 99.

It also features world-class examples of engineering ineptitude, such as drivers coming off state Route 520 (the Evergreen Point Bridge), joining southbound I-5 in the left lane, and having less than a mile to cross four lanes of freeway to exit on Mercer. And vice versa.

Seattle has gained more than 100,000 new residents in the past eight years. Cities north, south and east are growing as well. Gone is the time, 40 years ago, when Seattle Post-Intelligencer columnist Jon Hahn, newly arrived from Chicago, could celebrate the ease of his morning commute from Bothell to downtown.

https://www.seattlepi.com/local/politics/article/Connelly-World-s-cities-with-worst-traffic-12966254.php?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=dailynewsletterspi&utm_term=spi

[liberal N proud]

1. Worse than Atlanta?

[CurtEastPoint]

2. My first thought. I live in ATL and since 72 it has gotten worse and worse.

There can't be enough lanes on the freeways. MARTA has not expanded since 2000. Not very forward thinking of this region.

[subterranean]

6. Not quite. Atlanta is No. 10 on the list.

[montanacowboy]

3. I am very familiar with that Bothell to Seattle Commute

I do it everyday! Poor Seattle, they are totally inept at any type of mass transit they just never got it.

The Mercer mess is something to avoid on pain of death. But all in all, I love this city!

[Haggis for Breakfast]

5. You are too funny - on pain of death

Problem for Seattle is where to place more roads or expand existing roads ? There simply is no place to go. They have tried the HOV lanes, the toll roads, the metered speed limits, but nothing really helps. The best answer IS a good lightrail system, but who is going to pay for that here ?

I lived in SF for almost 10 years. Their public transportation system is great. There is no place in The City that public transportation cannot take you, whether it's the street cars (like the N-Judah line, for example), the cable cars, the bus system (They even have articulated buses.) or BART, which keeps going farther and farther south (one day it will connect SF to LA.) And you can't beat the fares. By comparison to other cities, the rates are pretty cheap, even the transfers.

[JDC]

4. I commute Boston everyday. I'll take the Pepsi challenge w Seattle

[RainCaster]

7. I live in SEA, and spend a lot of time in others each year...

Seattle traffic is worse than LA, Atlanta or Boston. The city council is dedicated to making it the worst place in the world to have an automobile, but it will be the nicest place in the world if you are homeless. A bunch of power hungry socialists with no sense of reality.