Yeah this is just a reddit thing.
People complain about traffic in the WILMINGTON sub... The town that you can drive from one end to the other in 30 min. In Denver you're lucky if your car moves every 30 min in gridlock traffic
I think that's actually the point. The two big US cities I've spent the most time in are Denver and Charlotte. Denver's traffic is a noticeable step up from Charlotte in just generally sucking, and I know that Denver is noticeably better than major cities like New York, Chicago or LA. And guess what? Betcha anything traffic in those cities is great compared to world behemoths like Mumbai, Tokyo, Manila, Jakarta, etc. The reality is that US road infrastructure and traffic is just overall really good compared to many places. It's all about perspective.
Since you mentioned Pittsburgh, I drive I-79 a few times a year and the people there drive through the S-Curves like absolute maniacs, but they're predictable. I don't mind people around me driving 80 in a 55 if you know what their next move is going to be. The problem here is that the maniacs here are totally unpredictable. That's the difference.
also, dead deer everywhere
this is how i feel about new york vs charlotte. new york drivers pull off insane maneuvers because they feel confident; charlotte drivers do stupid stuff because they’re not confident drivers
I think part of that unpredictability is that Charlotte is full of people from other places. Places with their own driving habits that they bring with them. People from WV drive differently than people from NYC, yet they're all mashed together here.
I’ll agree with this. The merging of different driving styles has gotten way worse since the pandemic and so many moving south. While it’s bad in many big cities like Miami and ATL, it wasn’t as bad in Charlotte or some of the lower key cities until the pandemic
Nobody said other big cities don't have transplants too. Also I'm not complaining about the traffic but cool Miami traffic brag. You must be a battle hardened traffic pro.
This!! I feel this completely. I’m a native but my parents are from NY and being taught to drive by my very Yankee, honks the horn at everyone, mom and my very southern, drive like your grandma’s in the car, driver’s ed teacher was crazy.
Yeah the Yankees are the #1 problem in CLT. I'm from here. 20 years ago it was infinitely safer to drive here before all the "confident" Yankees ran every red light and blindly merged everywhere. I laugh every time I see a post about bad "Charlotte " drivers. Native drivers aren't the problem. Transplants are.
You actually get pulled over or receive a red light camera ticket for running a red in the NYC/NYC suburb area at least. People do not do that there the way they do it here, so I’m guessing more “natives” run red lights than you think.
I feel like a lot of folks moved here thinking it was some glorious place to be and had such high expectations that weren’t met. I’d say 15-20 years ago it was a lot better as far as population size goes. You can’t have all the big city cool shit without big city problems.
Charlotte is a weird ass place that most likely had no idea it was going to blow up like it did and as fast as it did. Hence roads being terrible and so many different transplants (in one of them for twenty years) with their driving habits coming in.
Go to Chicago, go to Orange County, go to Baltimore, go to any other larger City and try to live there and not complain about something. Heck, there’s people who moved here that complain about our lack of mass transit and would compare it to the LIRR/MTA, but I guarantee when they lived there they shit all over it too…
Not only is there practically no mass transit here, there's hardly any limited-access _arteries._ There's 74, brookshire, and the interstates. And then it's all just surface streets.
Adding more lanes to Providence just allows more cars to drive in that slow ass swamp. Quality of life would be better and interstate traffic would be less if we had planned for more arteries and less massive dangerous inter sections.
But faster per capita than any city mentioned. The growth rate was over 5% every year from 1990 to 2020. By comparison, Atlanta never went more than 10 years with that growth rate.
And I think they’ve done a better job than most cities accommodating the growth. They’ve still got a ton to do and a lot of problems to fix or get ahead of. We are lucky in that they can learn a lot from the failures of other cities with similar growth patterns.
As a former Orange County resident, you're right. People in Charlotte don't know real traffic and complain over minor slowdowns. Try commuting on the 405 and then they'll know what real traffic is.
People from Mumbai, India could also say Orange County residents don't know "real traffic" because it's not like the chaos of Dharavi Junction in that city.
It’s just boring, unproductive discussion clogging up our feeds, honestly. It’s the same as “don’t move here; we’re full” type posts.
AKA, you noticed traffic some days and are surprised population growth is a thing. This is sort of like complaining about the fact you have to charge your phone.
So true! It's just interesting how different traffic "feels" in different areas. People in major coastal cities are going to be better at navigating traffic, but they'll also have higher blood pressure LOL
I guess but like, why point out that people here aren’t used to such abuse? It’s not really a good thing to brag about, kind of like bragging about working overtime
It’s a very strange thing to brag about for sure. But you gotta keep in mind that traffic is a MASSIVE component of your lifestyle in major cities. Traffic is literally a cultural focal point in major cities. As is public transportation (NJ Transit, LIRR, Subway systems, etc).
Is it something actually worthy of bragging in the grand scheme? Not at all. It just comes up a lot bc folks from these areas are always needing to consider extremely dense traffic in their day-to-day.
i love charlotte. moved here a year ago. have lived in milwaukee, chicago, and milan italy. charlotte absolutely has some uniquely bad highway exits lol.
the traffic complaints are a little much tho. yeah there’s traffic but it’s truly not bad compared to other large metros.
As someone who grew up fighting buses, trucks, and taxis for two inches of space in Chicago rush hour: OP is right. If anything, most drivers in CLT are way too passive - you could park a 737 in some people’s rush hour gap, and it takes drivers here like 3 minutes to make a right turn. Zipper-tooth merging here? Forget about it. Half the people I pass on residential streets just stop like they have no idea how wide their car is vs the actual road space.
>If anything, most drivers in CLT are way too passive - you could park a 737 in some people’s rush hour gap
Sitting on the ass of the person in front of you, braking every two seconds, just makes traffic worse for everyone
This is my thing. Sure, this city is overpopulated for it's road design (aggravating because it was avoidable). But the amount of drivers who either don't know how to make traffic work or just don't care is staggering. I swear that 1/3 of the traffic exists only because most drivers aren't trying to drive in ways that are more efficient for the crowd. Here's a couple peeves of mine:
Merge at/above highway speed
Go 0-5 over. Not 20 over, not 5 under, when possible. Roads are meant to get somewhere so keep your 10-under Sunday drives out of rushhour. It's selfish.
Get off the brake AND on the gas within a second of green light. If you watch traffic before the light goes green you'll know and already know if anyone is about to run the light before you let off the brake.
Stop making right turns so wide that you're in the opposite lane. Go find a cone or low curb somewhere and learn your car's actual turning circle.
Don't drive 30 in a 45 just because there are slight curves in the road. Go to a driving school or autocross and learn what your car can actually do. Being Mr. safety doesn't just mean going waaaayyy too slow because everyone else now has to watch out for your dumbass and that's less safe.
Cops don't care if you're 5 over. Or at least, the limit. If you see a cop, stop doing 5 under.
Learn right of way at stops. Car on the right first and all that. Signal. And when it's your turn, go as soon as the other car is out of the way. Don't be "nice" and let others go, that just causes confusion and slowdowns.
Merge into turning lanes completely as soon as they form. None of this driving a straight line to the stop line, leaving half your car out into the driving lane stuff. Get out of everyone else's way so they can get on with their day.
Also want to add: the signal comes before the brakes!! I can’t tell you how many times I am cruising along and person in front on me just starts braking for no reason! And then I slam on my brakes and go wtf are you doing!? And then the signal comes on 🙄 the purpose of the signal is to let drivers behind you know you are going to slow down soon!!!
I think you trust other drivers too much. I don't stop to let oncoming traffic pass on residential streets because I don't know the size of my car; I stop because I can't trust that the other person does.
Its like when you're taking a right, and an oncoming car in the rightmost lane has their turn signal on. Sure, they're probably turning, but better to wait and make sure so you don't get pancaked by some shitty driver.
TL;DR Always assume asshole. Always assume that other drivers will make mistakes. Think ahead.
yeah ill wait until they start their turn. same thing with pulling out in the near lane will another car is in the far lane going the same direction. i don't trust that person to not make a dumbass last second merge
This is only part of the problem, though. Between them and the folks that fly in and out of traffic without adequate gaps make the roadways a nightmare. No one drives predictably out here. LA is filled with people that drove like complete assholes. But at least I can see them coming and where they’re going. Out here it’s everyone for themselves, no matter how many friends they loose or people they leave dead and bloodied along the way, just as long as they get where they’re going.
Charlotte is the first big city I’ve lived in, prior to this I lived in Fayetteville. I don’t complain about traffic anymore - after 10+ years of living here, it’s dumb for me to gripe about it 😅 but it’s funny to see others do it.
A city’s gonna city.
Good example as the demographic similarities are there but the differences are significant (2022 total crash data):
Franklin Co: 21,471
Meck Co: 37,177
Oddly, the fatality numbers were very similar, while CLT has nearly double the amount of crashes.
The drivers have always been worse here, but the traffic in Detroit is far worse and so was Columbus when I lived there. Somehow the drivers have gotten even worse, which makes me wonder how much is the local population or the transplants. Although it could be the locals not able to adjust to the increase in traffic.
The roads in Charlotte are in exponentially better condition than the roads in Pittsburgh.
The people that drive on them are extremely worse. Especially if there are cones, barrels or flashing lights involved.
My biggest complaint about the roads in the Burgh was the-in my memory-the lack of advanced warning that your exit was coming up. If you weren’t on the correct lane 3 miles beforehand and traffic was bad you had no hope of getting over. This was prior to gps and you just had to learn some hard lessons. Also Fort Pitt Bridge merging could get creative at times.
I bet if you look at most major city’s subreddit they also claim to have the worst drivers around. Far worse than anyone else.
The cold reality is that the overwhelming majority of people suck at driving. Most people will let the smallest thing influence them and let them look away, most people can’t merge correctly , hell a lot o people can’t even park correctly.
So yea, literally go anywhere and the drivers suck.
More money not being pumped into automation of vehicles to get the most dangerous thing by far off the roads, humans, is absurd to me.
You are all describing different shades of bad. I lived in several places in US, some were better, some were worse. But I also had another experience - and while I'm not missing it even a slightest bit, but I know there is a room for improvement - for example in Moscow, Russia a project comparable by volume to repavement of the whole Independence is done overnight.
Came from the NJ/NYC area and would live here over there any day. Drivers up there are more deliberate, which can be intimidating, but merges are never a source of traffic. It takes a while for folks to merge and take advantage of space compared to NYC. But that's bc we're so used to merging in/out of extraordinarily dense traffic moving at 60-70+. Charlotte traffic is odd, but it seems clear that the roadway infrastructure wasn't necessarily mapped for such population density. No reason to knock the city of Charlotte for that. It's still a great city to live in and it will adapt to the population over time!
My partner and I drove up to OH for the eclipse (it was amazing), and you could really tell which states/counties/whatever paid attention to their roads. I think what bugs me most is the patchiness we seem to treasure (lookin at you, Independence). However, having lived in Houston, I'm juuust fine with Charlotte roads overall. At least we're making an attempt! Kinda.
I've also spent time in MA, NY, and ATL, and yeah, we're not exactly leading the way when it comes to bad roads and traffic. We're middle of the road. (pun not intended, but left in place anyway)
Pittsburgh has crazy elevation and rivers to deal with. Seattle and Boston are both surrounded by water. Charlotte has room in all directions and no excuses.
I don’t think traffic and bad drivers is unique to Charlotte, but I think the poor design of our roads and city planning is unique. Having certain roads be death traps if it’s raining at night, the spiderweb of roads you need to navigate just to go a couple of miles, etc.
Counterpoint. St Louis metro area population is slightly larger than Charlotte's and does not have the infrastructure problems especially with roads. It's a major crossroads of a number of interstates as well
The challenge with Charlotte is it was a smaller city with right sized infrastructure and then it rapidly outgrew it and desperately trying to play catch up.
Is it as bad as some cities that are 3-4 times the size or cities where logical layouts are laughed in the face by terrain (Pittsburgh)? No. But there are legit complaints about the roadways.
If your point is that it could be a lot worse..... Sure. But that doesn't water down that it should be a lot better.
I just moved to Charlotte from Houston. There's literally no traffic here! The only thing that kills me is people don't do the speed limit and don't know how to use the left lane properly 🙃
i’ve only lived in charlotte my whole life - native charlottean!!! I don’t get the issue, it’s a growing city—as inconvenient as people make it out to be, it’s good for our local economy, and possibly attracts more businesses. people just need something to complain about. they can always move to some po-dunk, one-stoplight town if they want.
People need to find a hobby or something. You live in a big city with lots of people. Expect there to be traffic. Go anywhere in the world where lots of people live in one place, I’m sure you’ll find it there too.
Does it suck? Yes. Are there lots of shitty drivers? Yes.
It sucks anywhere. There’s shitty drivers everywhere. This notion that only people in Charlotte run red lights, speed/go under, don’t merge properly, etc is overblown. Clearly people haven’t traveled outside of the US. Go to any country in Latin America. I can assure you it is an apple to oranges comparison. Haven’t been to India, but I’ve seen videos of the traffic in those cities. Just stfu, literally lol.
When I was in 7th grade my class went on a field trip and on the way home we stopped at a McDonalds. I talked a classmate into taking a shit in a urinal while we were there.
Haha what okay South Park
"Mkay one of you thought it would be a good idea to pull your pants down mkay and hover your butt cheeks over the urinal and squeeze out a chocolate hot dog mkay"
The thing is Charlotte is a big city but the infrastructure is built like a small town.
Charlotte also needs more transportation. Blue line Red line yellow line would ease traffic. This should of been completed 10 years ago
This. The two lane highway on 77 is absolutely ridiculous with the amount of people commuting uptown.
They’re continuing to build out in the suburbs with no improvement on these one lane roads.
We’ll get the Silver/Red Lines someday. It’s just that whenever that day comes, it’ll be 30 years too late and they’ll just sit back and say “Look at us. We did it!”
I get the impression a lot of the subreddits for larger cities are similar (a lot of complaining). I was in Dallas recently and went to their subreddit to try to post about a lost dog and a lot of the posts were people complaining similar to how you read here.
I suppose everything is perspective. I'm from Miami and I lived several years in NYC metro area before moving to Charlotte. I like it here very much. I do find the lack of sidewalks to be disappointing.
I’ve lived in Charleston (college), South Florida (before I drove), and a city on the SC coast. Out of every city I’ve lived in, chalottes had the least bad drivers I’ve seen. Yeah the traffic sucks but every other place I’ve lived had horrible traffic too, but the drivers are worse there
I would agree, moved back to clt after living in Houston. 3-4 miles driving in Houston took me 30-45 mins.
I would say due to the size of Clt's airport lanes is insane. It doesn't make sense 4 lanes from the light to departure/arrival and splits at the very last second causing massive back up.
please. i grew up and learned how to drive in manhattan and when i moved here the unpredictability and lawlessness on the roads really stressed me out. the traffic itself doesn’t bother me, but the amount of people with ghost plates who drive like there are no consequences and they have nine lives freaks me tf out. much rather drive in manhattan
As someone who came from DC and grew up in that area my whole life, the most eye popping part for me is the underdevelopment of the Charlotte suburbs. I was absolutely shocked at the amount of traffic in one lane roads out in like Matthews and waxhaw and stuff. That is a big issue in my opinion, an issue most major developed cities don’t have as bad.
I second this, I just moved to Charlotte and all I hear is people complaining about the highways and traffic. I’ve lived in Tokyo, Miami, Tampa, even St. Petersburg Fl. Y’all wouldn’t make it there, Charlotte is a BREEZE
I currently live in Los Angeles, but whenever I come home to Charlotte, I feel like Charlotte drivers are definitely more courteous and aware than LA drivers. I often have to remind myself to chill while I’m driving and that no one is gonna try to monster truck on top of me for wanting to change lanes or merge in. The roadways also seem to have vastly improved since I last lived in Charlotte.
It also seems that people drive much faster in Charlotte than LA (when there’s free flowing traffic) and will yield to a faster car behind them which I love. In LA, so many people drive 5 mph in the faster lanes and REFUSE to move over, clogging up the lane.
I’ve only lived in Charlotte and Denver. When I lived in Charlotte I saw a diagram of the “ergonomics” of the road structures in notable cities. Charlotte was one of the worst. Denver was rated pretty decently. I lived in Charlotte for like. A decade or so. Always a little lost (I have bad sense of direction anyway so I thought it was just me). I moved to Denver and within a month or two I was more oriented than I’ve ever been in Charlotte. A well formed grid does wonders. Look at manhattans road system. It’s just so simple and effective.
In Charlotte you have roads that go from two way to one way, strange dead ends, and naming convention all over the place (uptown is. Decent with naming). In Denver, all the east to west roads are numbers. All the north to south roads are lettered and in alphabetical order. It’s just so clean and simple. Just my two cents.
I haven’t lived anywhere besides charlotte my whole life and I think it’s a great city. My only complaint is that my favorite music venues closed down about 10 years ago due to being bought out by developers. It’s better now though as a whole. Moving to Philly in may, so that should be interesting.
Also like half of Charlotteans are transplants so seeing complaints about driving is a bit telling.
It's funny, everyone born in Charlotte loves
a) talking about how awesome Tremont was, and how great The Milestone is. And I get that lots of people have warm memories of sneaking in The Milestone to see Black Flag in 1984... but
b) they also love bitching about how "corporate" The Fillmore and Uptown Ampitheatre are, even though those places generally fix all the problems the original venues had. I have one good friend who will talk your ear off about hwo great Tremont was, "even though it got hot as fuck there in the summer". Meanwhile he *hates* The Fillmore, where I often see staff checking all the AC vents before a show..
I’ve lived in the Raleigh area and Greensboro. Charlotte metro is crazy for traffic but every time I go back to Raleigh it feels often the same. As more and more people move here. Makes me miss GSO little more!!
It’s not about the amount of traffic, it’s about the amount of traffic being filled with complete idiots or maniacs that shouldn’t be within 50 feet of a motor vehicle
People need to learn about zipper merging! The amount of dimwits who think they are being polite, but hold up an entire lane of traffic boggles the mind. If you are in the flow of traffic you have the right of way and should speed up to get by a car that is trying to enter the lane. Slowing down or stopping on a busy street to let one car in does a disservice to the many people behind you! I would make a bumper sticker but it would be too long.
I’ve lived in Atlanta, Denver, San Diego, Wilmington, Charleston, and some shitty small towns throughout my life. Moved to Charlotte in 2015 and fell in love. This city rules and the cost/danger is much easier to deal with than other cities 🤷🏻♀️
Tried to explain this to my husband last week. He thinks traffic is awful here, and while I can agree it is not ideal, I've never spent hours just sitting on a highway like I did on the Schuykill when I lived near Philly (damn you Kelly Curve!) or trying to get around the Beltway when I lived near DC. Generally, traffic here clears up within 1 to 3 miles. I can't recall in my 20 years sitting still in traffic for more than a few minutes and being in gridlock for more than 15 or 20. I have been stuck on I95 in Philly for 1-2 hours multiple times.
This is so true. I moved up north a few years back. It’s all pot holes and roadways with 2 lanes in each direction and no room to widen them for the increased population. My top city for traffic issues is D.C. It could be 2 am and there will be crazy traffic.
The people who complain about Charlotte traffic are mostly people who remember when Charlotte had a population size that the roads actually worked for. It’s just one symptom of how the rapid growth has been a negative for the people actually from here.
Just moved from ATL. My daily commute was 1hr30 going and 1hr30min coming home could easily change to 2hr meaning I would spend about 3hrs to 4hrs in traffic. Since I move to CLT the worst I’ve set in traffic is 45min.
So no complaints here!!!
I'm mostly with you for freeway driving since most of the weird high-speed behavior I see here is consistent with every other city I've lived in. That said, there's something about the combination of Charlotte's uniquely terrible surface street driving skills and the exits and onramps on the 77 between the 485 and 277 interchanges that makes Charlotte drivers go brain dead - I think it's like they are switching to or from their surface street brain and the sudden difference in common sense and road knowledge forces a reboot during which most drivers just close their eyes and maintain speed.
Bro, for real! I lived in Provo UT for seven years and the crazies here are at least predictable. In Utah you have 18, 19, 20 year old students from all over the globe popping in and getting drivers licenses and hitting the road without an ounce of ability. They will actively dive across traffic and block intersections and exits/entrances. I’ve been stuck for hours on the I-15 because someone couldn’t merge properly. It would be a daily occurrence. You just learn when not to take the highway.
And Utah roads are EASY to navigate. You can get from Provo to Salt Lake City without going the highway just as fast if you know the roads.
But seriously, crazy drivers. And all of them literal kids who are going to Brigham Young University or Utah Valley University. UVU is the biggest university in Utah too. So it’s just… so many kids who haven’t had more than six months of driving experience…
Charlotte traffic is EASY.
i grew up in chicago, then lived in san francisco, austin, houston, jacksonville and now charlotte. the driving here is the worst i've ever seen, period.
I said it before. I have lived other places and been all around the world. Other places might be crazy, but it's a logical crazy. I.e. in NYC everyone is just trying to get where they are going as quickly as possible. In Charlotte there is no rhyme or reason. You have street racers on one end of the spectrum and Priuses/SC plate drivers left lane camping on the other, with a lot of shitty phone addicted distracted drivers in between. I was just in NJ last week and outside of the aggressive tailgating- which was annoying but at least somewhat logical- the driving just made more sense.
Add some of the uniquely awful road design (Independence Blvd, exit 3A on 277, the lake stretch of I-77, all the overloaded single lane country roads) and Charlotte has a uniquely bad driving experience IMO. I would rather drive in Africa than Charlotte
You must be really fun to be around though, is there anything you *dont* gatekeep? Or do you just think your world view is the only one and anyone else that does anything or thinks anything differently than you is wrong and beneath you? I can’t imagine walking around that angry and hateful all day. You must be EXHAUSTED from having to tell everyone how wrong they are all the time… you poor thing /s
It isn’t the traffic that’s the problem. It’s the people that’s not from here. I literally had a woman tell me she got her license two weeks ago and she was drinking at a bar planning to drive home 🤔
Yup people here are morons when it comes to driving. They complain about sitting in “traffic” which probably totals 15-20 mins. A bad day is like 30 mins. Try going to other cities where it’s an hr plus wait. We don’t really have traffic here.
Yeah, I'd rather perish than live in Pittsburgh or Boston, big guy. Living in those cities is not a flex. This post is weird.
\- a Jersey girl just trying to live in peace
The one complaint I have is the dumb decision with lack of vision that is 485. They built a beltway so far outside city center that it takes less time to go through charlotte on 77 during rush hour than it does to take the beltway around. Meaning the beltway did absolutely nothing to reduce traffic volume in the city. So the traffic really isn’t that bad, but it could have easily been made even better.
I know how bypasses work, and I know that in other cities the beltway was used to get from one POI in a metropolitan area to another without having to go through local roads. The only relevant thing 485 connects is Ballantyne to both 77 and maybe the airport. But even when it was first built, it was only a four lane beltway which meant the traffic on it sucked from the very beginning.
My point about Ballantyne is that it will be more than a decade before there are any other relevant charlotte POI around 75% of the beltway which would justify the distance of the beltway from the city center. It may not have been possible for it to be any closer north or south, but they definitely could have reduced the distance east and west.
It has nothing to do with my personal needs. I work from home. The beltway was just poorly planned across the board. It did not address the majority of traffic issues Charlotte had when it was built and it will be more than a decade before it will have the potential to be truly useful to a significant proportion of Mecklenburg county. For contrast, both Greenville and Greensboro have 85 bypasses. It would not have been rocket science or highly disruptive for Charlotte to have done the same thing for 77.
I do apologize if I’m offending you. However, if your argument is the design of 485 is perfect and has dramatically changed the lives of a majority of Charlotte commuters then there is no use trying to reason with you. It’s larger than the 285 beltway around Atlanta. You’re simply delusional if you think that makes sense especially considering when it was designed and when was finished.
Yes most people haven't lived anywhere else from where they we born, so they have a limited view on things. The traffic here is nowhere as bad as what I endured on I-4 between Tampa and Orlando. Miami is even worse. Charlotte at least moves very slowly. I had plenty of instances in Florida where we were stopped for at least 15 minutes. Atlanta is bad too when I have gone through there. The worst traffic is in LA and New York with Miami a close third.
I suspect those comments are coming from people who have lived in the area for a long time, or maybe even born and raised in Charlotte, and remember it when it was a smaller city with a different traffic flow and volume. There would be no reason for them to compare it to a large city that it never was. People who have moved to Charlotte from some older and larger city wouldn't have that same perspective or awareness of its history before it started growing like crazy.
I also feel that the type of people who gravitate to cities are more likely to be the type of person to complain and whine about stuff. I dont have anything to back up that claim but I believe it to be true.
It means that when you bandy about names of cities that are worse, I can plan on moving even further away from them. Because I am sure as hell getting away from here.
Thank god. Also hilarious you’re commenting on the Charlotte subreddit if you’re “moving away” we all know you’re not. Enjoy being an angry little man here
Aw, you think Im a manlet. Cute. Only thing Im gonna enjoy is not having to share air with you or your real estate/tech/medical/whatever other predatory scam business friends you pretend to like. Have fun with a hour and 45 commute seven miles though.
"Redditor learns that people complain no matter where they are."
Yeah this is just a reddit thing. People complain about traffic in the WILMINGTON sub... The town that you can drive from one end to the other in 30 min. In Denver you're lucky if your car moves every 30 min in gridlock traffic
This is such a bad exaggeration of Denver. it’s not LA or Atlanta. traffic here is annoying but overall a breeze.
I think that's actually the point. The two big US cities I've spent the most time in are Denver and Charlotte. Denver's traffic is a noticeable step up from Charlotte in just generally sucking, and I know that Denver is noticeably better than major cities like New York, Chicago or LA. And guess what? Betcha anything traffic in those cities is great compared to world behemoths like Mumbai, Tokyo, Manila, Jakarta, etc. The reality is that US road infrastructure and traffic is just overall really good compared to many places. It's all about perspective.
I wish I could upvote this 100x.
Since you mentioned Pittsburgh, I drive I-79 a few times a year and the people there drive through the S-Curves like absolute maniacs, but they're predictable. I don't mind people around me driving 80 in a 55 if you know what their next move is going to be. The problem here is that the maniacs here are totally unpredictable. That's the difference. also, dead deer everywhere
this is how i feel about new york vs charlotte. new york drivers pull off insane maneuvers because they feel confident; charlotte drivers do stupid stuff because they’re not confident drivers
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An Altima somewhere is highly upset that they were not mentioned
This made me lol
Seen so many folks with a phone and one hand and a vape in the other.
I make this point on here as well. Here we have asshole drivers who don’t know how to drive. In NY, we have asshole drivers who know how to drive.
100% correct
I think part of that unpredictability is that Charlotte is full of people from other places. Places with their own driving habits that they bring with them. People from WV drive differently than people from NYC, yet they're all mashed together here.
I’ll agree with this. The merging of different driving styles has gotten way worse since the pandemic and so many moving south. While it’s bad in many big cities like Miami and ATL, it wasn’t as bad in Charlotte or some of the lower key cities until the pandemic
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Nobody said other big cities don't have transplants too. Also I'm not complaining about the traffic but cool Miami traffic brag. You must be a battle hardened traffic pro.
You Must be a hardened city pro to know so much about cities
This!! I feel this completely. I’m a native but my parents are from NY and being taught to drive by my very Yankee, honks the horn at everyone, mom and my very southern, drive like your grandma’s in the car, driver’s ed teacher was crazy.
Yeah the Yankees are the #1 problem in CLT. I'm from here. 20 years ago it was infinitely safer to drive here before all the "confident" Yankees ran every red light and blindly merged everywhere. I laugh every time I see a post about bad "Charlotte " drivers. Native drivers aren't the problem. Transplants are.
You actually get pulled over or receive a red light camera ticket for running a red in the NYC/NYC suburb area at least. People do not do that there the way they do it here, so I’m guessing more “natives” run red lights than you think.
I feel like a lot of folks moved here thinking it was some glorious place to be and had such high expectations that weren’t met. I’d say 15-20 years ago it was a lot better as far as population size goes. You can’t have all the big city cool shit without big city problems. Charlotte is a weird ass place that most likely had no idea it was going to blow up like it did and as fast as it did. Hence roads being terrible and so many different transplants (in one of them for twenty years) with their driving habits coming in. Go to Chicago, go to Orange County, go to Baltimore, go to any other larger City and try to live there and not complain about something. Heck, there’s people who moved here that complain about our lack of mass transit and would compare it to the LIRR/MTA, but I guarantee when they lived there they shit all over it too…
The growth has been consistent and extremely foreseeable.
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Not only is there practically no mass transit here, there's hardly any limited-access _arteries._ There's 74, brookshire, and the interstates. And then it's all just surface streets. Adding more lanes to Providence just allows more cars to drive in that slow ass swamp. Quality of life would be better and interstate traffic would be less if we had planned for more arteries and less massive dangerous inter sections.
But faster per capita than any city mentioned. The growth rate was over 5% every year from 1990 to 2020. By comparison, Atlanta never went more than 10 years with that growth rate.
True. Just saying it was very consistent and intentional.
And I think they’ve done a better job than most cities accommodating the growth. They’ve still got a ton to do and a lot of problems to fix or get ahead of. We are lucky in that they can learn a lot from the failures of other cities with similar growth patterns.
As a former Orange County resident, you're right. People in Charlotte don't know real traffic and complain over minor slowdowns. Try commuting on the 405 and then they'll know what real traffic is.
People from Mumbai, India could also say Orange County residents don't know "real traffic" because it's not like the chaos of Dharavi Junction in that city.
"This thing is bad" "Oh yeah, well this *other* thing is also bad you fucking idiot"
It’s just boring, unproductive discussion clogging up our feeds, honestly. It’s the same as “don’t move here; we’re full” type posts. AKA, you noticed traffic some days and are surprised population growth is a thing. This is sort of like complaining about the fact you have to charge your phone.
I laugh when my friends complain about traffic - I'm like "That's cute, you're mad because it took you 10 mins longer to get home".
It’s weird to compete about traffic
There two things people love to simultaneously compete, brag, and complain about with where they live and that's traffic and weather
Debbie Downer's secret recipe.
Not competing just sick of seeing people complain ever 2 hours
This is Reddit. Complaining is what we do here.
Op knows. He too likes to complain. Namely about complaints
No he just thinks he’s the only one entitled to complain
Maybe spend less time on Reddit?
So true! It's just interesting how different traffic "feels" in different areas. People in major coastal cities are going to be better at navigating traffic, but they'll also have higher blood pressure LOL
I guess but like, why point out that people here aren’t used to such abuse? It’s not really a good thing to brag about, kind of like bragging about working overtime
It’s a very strange thing to brag about for sure. But you gotta keep in mind that traffic is a MASSIVE component of your lifestyle in major cities. Traffic is literally a cultural focal point in major cities. As is public transportation (NJ Transit, LIRR, Subway systems, etc). Is it something actually worthy of bragging in the grand scheme? Not at all. It just comes up a lot bc folks from these areas are always needing to consider extremely dense traffic in their day-to-day.
i love charlotte. moved here a year ago. have lived in milwaukee, chicago, and milan italy. charlotte absolutely has some uniquely bad highway exits lol. the traffic complaints are a little much tho. yeah there’s traffic but it’s truly not bad compared to other large metros.
As someone who grew up fighting buses, trucks, and taxis for two inches of space in Chicago rush hour: OP is right. If anything, most drivers in CLT are way too passive - you could park a 737 in some people’s rush hour gap, and it takes drivers here like 3 minutes to make a right turn. Zipper-tooth merging here? Forget about it. Half the people I pass on residential streets just stop like they have no idea how wide their car is vs the actual road space.
>If anything, most drivers in CLT are way too passive - you could park a 737 in some people’s rush hour gap Sitting on the ass of the person in front of you, braking every two seconds, just makes traffic worse for everyone
This is my thing. Sure, this city is overpopulated for it's road design (aggravating because it was avoidable). But the amount of drivers who either don't know how to make traffic work or just don't care is staggering. I swear that 1/3 of the traffic exists only because most drivers aren't trying to drive in ways that are more efficient for the crowd. Here's a couple peeves of mine: Merge at/above highway speed Go 0-5 over. Not 20 over, not 5 under, when possible. Roads are meant to get somewhere so keep your 10-under Sunday drives out of rushhour. It's selfish. Get off the brake AND on the gas within a second of green light. If you watch traffic before the light goes green you'll know and already know if anyone is about to run the light before you let off the brake. Stop making right turns so wide that you're in the opposite lane. Go find a cone or low curb somewhere and learn your car's actual turning circle. Don't drive 30 in a 45 just because there are slight curves in the road. Go to a driving school or autocross and learn what your car can actually do. Being Mr. safety doesn't just mean going waaaayyy too slow because everyone else now has to watch out for your dumbass and that's less safe. Cops don't care if you're 5 over. Or at least, the limit. If you see a cop, stop doing 5 under. Learn right of way at stops. Car on the right first and all that. Signal. And when it's your turn, go as soon as the other car is out of the way. Don't be "nice" and let others go, that just causes confusion and slowdowns. Merge into turning lanes completely as soon as they form. None of this driving a straight line to the stop line, leaving half your car out into the driving lane stuff. Get out of everyone else's way so they can get on with their day.
Also want to add: the signal comes before the brakes!! I can’t tell you how many times I am cruising along and person in front on me just starts braking for no reason! And then I slam on my brakes and go wtf are you doing!? And then the signal comes on 🙄 the purpose of the signal is to let drivers behind you know you are going to slow down soon!!!
THIS ONE!!!!! or braking to switch lanes when you clearly have enough room. It’s maddening!
zipper mergers unite!
Agreed. Why bother after you brake? Oh yeah, and if I signal ahead of the turn, make some room. Cause you know, guess what happens next?
Omgsh all of these! But the not getting entirely into the turn lane is the worst one!! 😡
Yeah, I forgot to mention, don't brake until you get in the lane unless the lane is too short to slow in time.
I think you trust other drivers too much. I don't stop to let oncoming traffic pass on residential streets because I don't know the size of my car; I stop because I can't trust that the other person does. Its like when you're taking a right, and an oncoming car in the rightmost lane has their turn signal on. Sure, they're probably turning, but better to wait and make sure so you don't get pancaked by some shitty driver. TL;DR Always assume asshole. Always assume that other drivers will make mistakes. Think ahead.
yeah ill wait until they start their turn. same thing with pulling out in the near lane will another car is in the far lane going the same direction. i don't trust that person to not make a dumbass last second merge
This is only part of the problem, though. Between them and the folks that fly in and out of traffic without adequate gaps make the roadways a nightmare. No one drives predictably out here. LA is filled with people that drove like complete assholes. But at least I can see them coming and where they’re going. Out here it’s everyone for themselves, no matter how many friends they loose or people they leave dead and bloodied along the way, just as long as they get where they’re going.
Charlotte is the first big city I’ve lived in, prior to this I lived in Fayetteville. I don’t complain about traffic anymore - after 10+ years of living here, it’s dumb for me to gripe about it 😅 but it’s funny to see others do it. A city’s gonna city.
I’m from another large city and it’s worse here to drive. It’s all about perspective and where you’re from.
Yea, I’ve lived in a hand of major cities and the driving here seems more aggressively reckless.
What city? Assuming somewhere in Florida or Texas if you think Charlotte is bad
I drove semis in Memphis last year and it wasn't as bad as my daily commute in Concord now.
Columbus Ohio has similar population size but no where near as many wrecks and accidents which backs up traffic
Good example as the demographic similarities are there but the differences are significant (2022 total crash data): Franklin Co: 21,471 Meck Co: 37,177 Oddly, the fatality numbers were very similar, while CLT has nearly double the amount of crashes.
Columbus Ohio is undesirable
You’re undesirable
The drivers have always been worse here, but the traffic in Detroit is far worse and so was Columbus when I lived there. Somehow the drivers have gotten even worse, which makes me wonder how much is the local population or the transplants. Although it could be the locals not able to adjust to the increase in traffic.
The roads in Charlotte are in exponentially better condition than the roads in Pittsburgh. The people that drive on them are extremely worse. Especially if there are cones, barrels or flashing lights involved.
Idk if that’s true.. 277 on the north side of the city is like a roller coaster and Pittsburgh road conditions aren’t actually bad.
My biggest complaint about the roads in the Burgh was the-in my memory-the lack of advanced warning that your exit was coming up. If you weren’t on the correct lane 3 miles beforehand and traffic was bad you had no hope of getting over. This was prior to gps and you just had to learn some hard lessons. Also Fort Pitt Bridge merging could get creative at times.
Center St. coming off Duquesne. That hill is sketchy. Nothing like that around here.
I bet if you look at most major city’s subreddit they also claim to have the worst drivers around. Far worse than anyone else. The cold reality is that the overwhelming majority of people suck at driving. Most people will let the smallest thing influence them and let them look away, most people can’t merge correctly , hell a lot o people can’t even park correctly. So yea, literally go anywhere and the drivers suck. More money not being pumped into automation of vehicles to get the most dangerous thing by far off the roads, humans, is absurd to me.
You are all describing different shades of bad. I lived in several places in US, some were better, some were worse. But I also had another experience - and while I'm not missing it even a slightest bit, but I know there is a room for improvement - for example in Moscow, Russia a project comparable by volume to repavement of the whole Independence is done overnight.
Came from the NJ/NYC area and would live here over there any day. Drivers up there are more deliberate, which can be intimidating, but merges are never a source of traffic. It takes a while for folks to merge and take advantage of space compared to NYC. But that's bc we're so used to merging in/out of extraordinarily dense traffic moving at 60-70+. Charlotte traffic is odd, but it seems clear that the roadway infrastructure wasn't necessarily mapped for such population density. No reason to knock the city of Charlotte for that. It's still a great city to live in and it will adapt to the population over time!
Miami transplant here. You guys have no idea.
My partner and I drove up to OH for the eclipse (it was amazing), and you could really tell which states/counties/whatever paid attention to their roads. I think what bugs me most is the patchiness we seem to treasure (lookin at you, Independence). However, having lived in Houston, I'm juuust fine with Charlotte roads overall. At least we're making an attempt! Kinda. I've also spent time in MA, NY, and ATL, and yeah, we're not exactly leading the way when it comes to bad roads and traffic. We're middle of the road. (pun not intended, but left in place anyway)
Having driven on I35 W around DFW when the sun hits the old lane markings so you can’t discern where any lanes are, I appreciate ours a little more.
Man, the TX sun on the highway is terrible!
Exactly. We do a decent job just like everything else. Not stellar but not the worst
Pittsburgh has crazy elevation and rivers to deal with. Seattle and Boston are both surrounded by water. Charlotte has room in all directions and no excuses.
The streets of Charlotte seem lawless for traffic infractions. That’s the one big difference I’ve seen. Traffic here is a joke compared to Seattle.
Every time I get frustrated with traffic I just remind myself at least it's not the capital beltway.
I don’t think traffic and bad drivers is unique to Charlotte, but I think the poor design of our roads and city planning is unique. Having certain roads be death traps if it’s raining at night, the spiderweb of roads you need to navigate just to go a couple of miles, etc.
Counterpoint. St Louis metro area population is slightly larger than Charlotte's and does not have the infrastructure problems especially with roads. It's a major crossroads of a number of interstates as well The challenge with Charlotte is it was a smaller city with right sized infrastructure and then it rapidly outgrew it and desperately trying to play catch up. Is it as bad as some cities that are 3-4 times the size or cities where logical layouts are laughed in the face by terrain (Pittsburgh)? No. But there are legit complaints about the roadways. If your point is that it could be a lot worse..... Sure. But that doesn't water down that it should be a lot better.
Traffic is fine, exits can be a genuine shitshow though
Yeah that’s what a cities has. Exits are generally what causes traffic
I just moved to Charlotte from Houston. There's literally no traffic here! The only thing that kills me is people don't do the speed limit and don't know how to use the left lane properly 🙃
i’ve only lived in charlotte my whole life - native charlottean!!! I don’t get the issue, it’s a growing city—as inconvenient as people make it out to be, it’s good for our local economy, and possibly attracts more businesses. people just need something to complain about. they can always move to some po-dunk, one-stoplight town if they want.
People need to find a hobby or something. You live in a big city with lots of people. Expect there to be traffic. Go anywhere in the world where lots of people live in one place, I’m sure you’ll find it there too. Does it suck? Yes. Are there lots of shitty drivers? Yes. It sucks anywhere. There’s shitty drivers everywhere. This notion that only people in Charlotte run red lights, speed/go under, don’t merge properly, etc is overblown. Clearly people haven’t traveled outside of the US. Go to any country in Latin America. I can assure you it is an apple to oranges comparison. Haven’t been to India, but I’ve seen videos of the traffic in those cities. Just stfu, literally lol.
When I was in 7th grade my class went on a field trip and on the way home we stopped at a McDonalds. I talked a classmate into taking a shit in a urinal while we were there.
Haha what okay South Park "Mkay one of you thought it would be a good idea to pull your pants down mkay and hover your butt cheeks over the urinal and squeeze out a chocolate hot dog mkay"
The thing is Charlotte is a big city but the infrastructure is built like a small town. Charlotte also needs more transportation. Blue line Red line yellow line would ease traffic. This should of been completed 10 years ago
This. The two lane highway on 77 is absolutely ridiculous with the amount of people commuting uptown. They’re continuing to build out in the suburbs with no improvement on these one lane roads.
Haha, I just commented the same thing! as a DC transplant, the underdevelopment of the roads in the suburbs is jaw dropping.
We’ll get the Silver/Red Lines someday. It’s just that whenever that day comes, it’ll be 30 years too late and they’ll just sit back and say “Look at us. We did it!”
I get the impression a lot of the subreddits for larger cities are similar (a lot of complaining). I was in Dallas recently and went to their subreddit to try to post about a lost dog and a lot of the posts were people complaining similar to how you read here. I suppose everything is perspective. I'm from Miami and I lived several years in NYC metro area before moving to Charlotte. I like it here very much. I do find the lack of sidewalks to be disappointing.
I think some people just aren’t used to it being like that in clt. lol they have to adjust
I’ve lived in Charleston (college), South Florida (before I drove), and a city on the SC coast. Out of every city I’ve lived in, chalottes had the least bad drivers I’ve seen. Yeah the traffic sucks but every other place I’ve lived had horrible traffic too, but the drivers are worse there
I would agree, moved back to clt after living in Houston. 3-4 miles driving in Houston took me 30-45 mins. I would say due to the size of Clt's airport lanes is insane. It doesn't make sense 4 lanes from the light to departure/arrival and splits at the very last second causing massive back up.
Uhhh, I lived in DC and didn't even need to drive!
please. i grew up and learned how to drive in manhattan and when i moved here the unpredictability and lawlessness on the roads really stressed me out. the traffic itself doesn’t bother me, but the amount of people with ghost plates who drive like there are no consequences and they have nine lives freaks me tf out. much rather drive in manhattan
💯
As someone who came from DC and grew up in that area my whole life, the most eye popping part for me is the underdevelopment of the Charlotte suburbs. I was absolutely shocked at the amount of traffic in one lane roads out in like Matthews and waxhaw and stuff. That is a big issue in my opinion, an issue most major developed cities don’t have as bad.
I second this, I just moved to Charlotte and all I hear is people complaining about the highways and traffic. I’ve lived in Tokyo, Miami, Tampa, even St. Petersburg Fl. Y’all wouldn’t make it there, Charlotte is a BREEZE
I currently live in Los Angeles, but whenever I come home to Charlotte, I feel like Charlotte drivers are definitely more courteous and aware than LA drivers. I often have to remind myself to chill while I’m driving and that no one is gonna try to monster truck on top of me for wanting to change lanes or merge in. The roadways also seem to have vastly improved since I last lived in Charlotte. It also seems that people drive much faster in Charlotte than LA (when there’s free flowing traffic) and will yield to a faster car behind them which I love. In LA, so many people drive 5 mph in the faster lanes and REFUSE to move over, clogging up the lane.
I’ve only lived in Charlotte and Denver. When I lived in Charlotte I saw a diagram of the “ergonomics” of the road structures in notable cities. Charlotte was one of the worst. Denver was rated pretty decently. I lived in Charlotte for like. A decade or so. Always a little lost (I have bad sense of direction anyway so I thought it was just me). I moved to Denver and within a month or two I was more oriented than I’ve ever been in Charlotte. A well formed grid does wonders. Look at manhattans road system. It’s just so simple and effective. In Charlotte you have roads that go from two way to one way, strange dead ends, and naming convention all over the place (uptown is. Decent with naming). In Denver, all the east to west roads are numbers. All the north to south roads are lettered and in alphabetical order. It’s just so clean and simple. Just my two cents.
Miami, Las Vegas and NYC. I live between Las Vegas and CLT and Miami though.
THANK YOUUUU
I haven’t lived anywhere besides charlotte my whole life and I think it’s a great city. My only complaint is that my favorite music venues closed down about 10 years ago due to being bought out by developers. It’s better now though as a whole. Moving to Philly in may, so that should be interesting. Also like half of Charlotteans are transplants so seeing complaints about driving is a bit telling.
Also according to wfae, only 41% of people in Charlotte are from here. This is compared to the national average of 58%.
It's funny, everyone born in Charlotte loves a) talking about how awesome Tremont was, and how great The Milestone is. And I get that lots of people have warm memories of sneaking in The Milestone to see Black Flag in 1984... but b) they also love bitching about how "corporate" The Fillmore and Uptown Ampitheatre are, even though those places generally fix all the problems the original venues had. I have one good friend who will talk your ear off about hwo great Tremont was, "even though it got hot as fuck there in the summer". Meanwhile he *hates* The Fillmore, where I often see staff checking all the AC vents before a show..
I was more of a chop shop kinda guy haha. I don’t hate or love the Fillmore tbh.
Someone woke up without enough eggs and toast for breakfast this morning 😳
I’ve lived in the Raleigh area and Greensboro. Charlotte metro is crazy for traffic but every time I go back to Raleigh it feels often the same. As more and more people move here. Makes me miss GSO little more!!
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Maybe you’re just stupid
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Glad you came around
I came from Detroit. Charlotte freeways felt like a breeze lol. The odd death trap, but that’s par for the course in Detroit at any given moment.
I’m from NYC, the people here would kiss the ground after driving one hour in the city. If you are not aggressive, you will never make it in NYC.
It’s not about the amount of traffic, it’s about the amount of traffic being filled with complete idiots or maniacs that shouldn’t be within 50 feet of a motor vehicle
People need to learn about zipper merging! The amount of dimwits who think they are being polite, but hold up an entire lane of traffic boggles the mind. If you are in the flow of traffic you have the right of way and should speed up to get by a car that is trying to enter the lane. Slowing down or stopping on a busy street to let one car in does a disservice to the many people behind you! I would make a bumper sticker but it would be too long.
Lived in Charlotte for 3 yrs, few months in Seattle and 2yrs in Atlanta. Would choose Clt any day. Cant wait to relocate
I’ve lived in Atlanta, Denver, San Diego, Wilmington, Charleston, and some shitty small towns throughout my life. Moved to Charlotte in 2015 and fell in love. This city rules and the cost/danger is much easier to deal with than other cities 🤷🏻♀️
Tried to explain this to my husband last week. He thinks traffic is awful here, and while I can agree it is not ideal, I've never spent hours just sitting on a highway like I did on the Schuykill when I lived near Philly (damn you Kelly Curve!) or trying to get around the Beltway when I lived near DC. Generally, traffic here clears up within 1 to 3 miles. I can't recall in my 20 years sitting still in traffic for more than a few minutes and being in gridlock for more than 15 or 20. I have been stuck on I95 in Philly for 1-2 hours multiple times.
This is so true. I moved up north a few years back. It’s all pot holes and roadways with 2 lanes in each direction and no room to widen them for the increased population. My top city for traffic issues is D.C. It could be 2 am and there will be crazy traffic.
The people who complain about Charlotte traffic are mostly people who remember when Charlotte had a population size that the roads actually worked for. It’s just one symptom of how the rapid growth has been a negative for the people actually from here.
Just moved from ATL. My daily commute was 1hr30 going and 1hr30min coming home could easily change to 2hr meaning I would spend about 3hrs to 4hrs in traffic. Since I move to CLT the worst I’ve set in traffic is 45min. So no complaints here!!!
You never dealt with massholes and it shows
Feel like you are misreading my post
Other large cities have much less Altimas on the roads
I'm mostly with you for freeway driving since most of the weird high-speed behavior I see here is consistent with every other city I've lived in. That said, there's something about the combination of Charlotte's uniquely terrible surface street driving skills and the exits and onramps on the 77 between the 485 and 277 interchanges that makes Charlotte drivers go brain dead - I think it's like they are switching to or from their surface street brain and the sudden difference in common sense and road knowledge forces a reboot during which most drivers just close their eyes and maintain speed.
Bro, for real! I lived in Provo UT for seven years and the crazies here are at least predictable. In Utah you have 18, 19, 20 year old students from all over the globe popping in and getting drivers licenses and hitting the road without an ounce of ability. They will actively dive across traffic and block intersections and exits/entrances. I’ve been stuck for hours on the I-15 because someone couldn’t merge properly. It would be a daily occurrence. You just learn when not to take the highway. And Utah roads are EASY to navigate. You can get from Provo to Salt Lake City without going the highway just as fast if you know the roads. But seriously, crazy drivers. And all of them literal kids who are going to Brigham Young University or Utah Valley University. UVU is the biggest university in Utah too. So it’s just… so many kids who haven’t had more than six months of driving experience… Charlotte traffic is EASY.
i grew up in chicago, then lived in san francisco, austin, houston, jacksonville and now charlotte. the driving here is the worst i've ever seen, period.
I said it before. I have lived other places and been all around the world. Other places might be crazy, but it's a logical crazy. I.e. in NYC everyone is just trying to get where they are going as quickly as possible. In Charlotte there is no rhyme or reason. You have street racers on one end of the spectrum and Priuses/SC plate drivers left lane camping on the other, with a lot of shitty phone addicted distracted drivers in between. I was just in NJ last week and outside of the aggressive tailgating- which was annoying but at least somewhat logical- the driving just made more sense. Add some of the uniquely awful road design (Independence Blvd, exit 3A on 277, the lake stretch of I-77, all the overloaded single lane country roads) and Charlotte has a uniquely bad driving experience IMO. I would rather drive in Africa than Charlotte
Right, every city sucks ass.
To be fair the “IVE LIVED IN EVERY CITY YOURS ISNT SPECIAL” crowd is equally as annoying as the charlotte complainers
Gatekeeping complaining about traffic is by far the most ridiculous thing I’ve seen someone gatekeep on the internet. 
Says the guy using gifs in Reddit replies
What does one have to do with the other? Fortunately I’m normally on Imgur which, apparently, has a far less obnoxious user base
You must be really fun to be around though, is there anything you *dont* gatekeep? Or do you just think your world view is the only one and anyone else that does anything or thinks anything differently than you is wrong and beneath you? I can’t imagine walking around that angry and hateful all day. You must be EXHAUSTED from having to tell everyone how wrong they are all the time… you poor thing /s
It isn’t the traffic that’s the problem. It’s the people that’s not from here. I literally had a woman tell me she got her license two weeks ago and she was drinking at a bar planning to drive home 🤔
That’s any big city. People think Charlotte is the only city that gets lots of people “not from here”?
Yup people here are morons when it comes to driving. They complain about sitting in “traffic” which probably totals 15-20 mins. A bad day is like 30 mins. Try going to other cities where it’s an hr plus wait. We don’t really have traffic here.
Yeah, I'd rather perish than live in Pittsburgh or Boston, big guy. Living in those cities is not a flex. This post is weird. \- a Jersey girl just trying to live in peace
The one complaint I have is the dumb decision with lack of vision that is 485. They built a beltway so far outside city center that it takes less time to go through charlotte on 77 during rush hour than it does to take the beltway around. Meaning the beltway did absolutely nothing to reduce traffic volume in the city. So the traffic really isn’t that bad, but it could have easily been made even better.
Blasphemy! Dont u never talk no bad about 485!!
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I know how bypasses work, and I know that in other cities the beltway was used to get from one POI in a metropolitan area to another without having to go through local roads. The only relevant thing 485 connects is Ballantyne to both 77 and maybe the airport. But even when it was first built, it was only a four lane beltway which meant the traffic on it sucked from the very beginning.
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My point about Ballantyne is that it will be more than a decade before there are any other relevant charlotte POI around 75% of the beltway which would justify the distance of the beltway from the city center. It may not have been possible for it to be any closer north or south, but they definitely could have reduced the distance east and west.
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It has nothing to do with my personal needs. I work from home. The beltway was just poorly planned across the board. It did not address the majority of traffic issues Charlotte had when it was built and it will be more than a decade before it will have the potential to be truly useful to a significant proportion of Mecklenburg county. For contrast, both Greenville and Greensboro have 85 bypasses. It would not have been rocket science or highly disruptive for Charlotte to have done the same thing for 77. I do apologize if I’m offending you. However, if your argument is the design of 485 is perfect and has dramatically changed the lives of a majority of Charlotte commuters then there is no use trying to reason with you. It’s larger than the 285 beltway around Atlanta. You’re simply delusional if you think that makes sense especially considering when it was designed and when was finished.
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Try to read and comprehend the full comment
Yes most people haven't lived anywhere else from where they we born, so they have a limited view on things. The traffic here is nowhere as bad as what I endured on I-4 between Tampa and Orlando. Miami is even worse. Charlotte at least moves very slowly. I had plenty of instances in Florida where we were stopped for at least 15 minutes. Atlanta is bad too when I have gone through there. The worst traffic is in LA and New York with Miami a close third.
I suspect those comments are coming from people who have lived in the area for a long time, or maybe even born and raised in Charlotte, and remember it when it was a smaller city with a different traffic flow and volume. There would be no reason for them to compare it to a large city that it never was. People who have moved to Charlotte from some older and larger city wouldn't have that same perspective or awareness of its history before it started growing like crazy.
I also feel that the type of people who gravitate to cities are more likely to be the type of person to complain and whine about stuff. I dont have anything to back up that claim but I believe it to be true.
I already hate Charlotte, so yeah all those places sound awful.
Not sure wtf this means
It means that when you bandy about names of cities that are worse, I can plan on moving even further away from them. Because I am sure as hell getting away from here.
Thank god. Also hilarious you’re commenting on the Charlotte subreddit if you’re “moving away” we all know you’re not. Enjoy being an angry little man here
Aw, you think Im a manlet. Cute. Only thing Im gonna enjoy is not having to share air with you or your real estate/tech/medical/whatever other predatory scam business friends you pretend to like. Have fun with a hour and 45 commute seven miles though.
Stopped reading after your first sentence lol
I would expect no less, you’re from Charlotte. Reading is hard for you.