The Top 5 WORST Cities to Drive Through on the East Coast

if you're familiar with my other channel then you know that I've been to a lot of places and if you're new then here is the map for reference up and down the East Coast all over most of the South and as of right now exploring all over the Midwest whether it's been the urban jungles of Manhattan The Tropical Paradise of Key West or the stunning scenery of the Great Smoky Mountains I've seen a lot many times I'm asked what I think of certain places and on this video I'm going to be discussing the top five worst cities to driveth through on the east coast in order when I say drive-thru I'll be speaking from the perspective of the difficulty in passing through the metro area and route to a further destination not necessarily from the perspective of a local commuter whose destination is within the city or Metro itself to qualify for the list the city or Metro has to be in a state that borders the Atlantic Ocean with the exception of Pennsylvania for reasons of course so hit the like button and let's talk about these difficult to Traverse cities number five was actually the toughest one on the list to pick I chose to go with Baltimore for this one though it was a choice between Baltimore and Philadelphia Baltimore is a metro area of around 2.8 million people it sits just north of the DC area and a bit south of Philadelphia the major interstate highway here is I95 as it is the one that a distance traveler can use to pass through the area it does have a Beltway known as I 695 but if you're a through traveler you'll find that often it's just faster to use I95 itself to get through this City however I95 does have tolls and I 695 can be used as an alternate for those looking to trade their time for money I70 and i83 are also major interstates in the area but I70 ends at a pathetic parking ride just inside the city while i83 which hasn't been too busy in my experience is an ancient roadway that dumps into city streets and looks like it hasn't been touched since it's original construction there's also the to I 895 which can get you around downtown Baltimore but you'll still still have to eventually get back on to I95 to get through the area I gave Baltimore denied over Philly due to I 695 being one of the more heavily backed up belts at times making East West Mobility occasionally an issue around Baltimore while Philadelphia has superb north south Mobility thanks to i295 and a New Jersey Turnpike combined with an impressive I 95 on the Pennsylvania side the good thing about Baltimore from a traffic standpoint though is that it has a sluggish population growth making it easier for Maryland officials to manage and address traffic issued in that area in fourth place on the list is the nation's capital of Washington DC Washington has a metro population of around 6.2 million and consists of the Capital District of Colombia a vast number of suburbs in Maryland and Virginia as well as a small portion of West Virginia Washington's freeway network is mainly anchored by the might of I95 alsoa I 95 travels Northbound into the area joins the capital Beltway around the Eastern side of the city and continues North into Maryland towards Baltimore other major freeways in the area include i66 I 270 I 395 and us50 the unsigned I 595 from looking at the map of the DC area you can already see where the problem here lies lack of options the vast majority of people traveling through DC will be Crossing it in a north south Direction and this pretty much means I 95 Washington makes up the southernmost node of the large boswash Northeast megalopolis is sort of the connection between the Northeast and the Southeastern US unless you decided way back when you were in the Carolinas to hop on i81 or us3 then you have little other choice than to go with I95 and the capital Beltway to get around DC now to their credit the capital Beltway has been expanded to a wide modern facility and on the Virginia side even uses a design which separates local and through traffic moving through the area however despite this the DC area suffers from the double whammy of a large fast growing local population as well as handling all the through traffic of Americans traveling between the Northeast and the southeast to his credit though at least in my personal experience the capital Beltway was wasn't too bad outside of peak hours East West Mobility isn't as much of an issue in the area Washington is more of a destination city than a through City for East West Travelers meaning most people using i66 I 270 the do tow road or us50 are traveling to and from destinations within the DC area rather than long distance to other locations in third place is a unique case and that I wouldn't necessarily say it's a city but rather a region that region is I 95 in South Carolina specifically the section between The i26 Interchange and the Georgia State Line This section of I95 is one of the worst on the entire Interstate looking at a map you can see that it doesn't travel through any cities of significance so what is the problem here well this section of I95 in South Carolina is simply outdated it's the same roadway from the original 1950s design two lanes on each side meant to handle like rural traffic with the explosive growth of Florida Georgia the Carolinas and the number of people traveling between these states and Northeast the pressure on I95 has skyrocketed South Carolina traditionally a state with a very low gas tax and poor roads has not been able to afford upgrades to the route it not only handles virtually all traffic passing between Florida and the Northeast but it also handles Florida bound Travelers via i26 and I77 from Charlotte and as far north as Ohio if you're coming from the Tennessee or Midwest of Florida then you really don't have much Choice here it's either take your chances with I95 or deal with trying to get through Atlanta it gets bad down here guys I recall heading to Orlando from Charlotte one Friday after work and no kidding I95 was literally stop and go from The i26 Interchange all the way down to the Georgia state line speaking of which Georgia has widen and modernized its section of I 95 to six lanes and things flow smooth as butter through that state South Carolina does have plans to upgrade this portion at some point but as with I 73 and i26 in South Carolina those will remain as only plans for the foreseeable future at number two on the list the runner up is none other than Atlanta Georgia Atlanta sits at the crossroads of several major Rail and roadway corridors in the Southeast and is considered by many to be the cultural economic and overall most dominant City in the southeastern region all three interstates that go through the area are major divisible by five interstates I20 I75 and I85 it has a perimeter Beltway around the city known as Interstate 285 and a few other random freeway Spurs here and there and who can forget about the good old Atlanta autobond AKA Georgia 400 what makes Atlanta so difficult to cross inadequate Highway routes relative to population and population distribution a poor arterial roadway Network which limits the lack of alternative routes and forces almost everyone to use the highways and a limited Transit Network which doesn't even serve the majority of the Metro's population let's start with the first the highway Network Atlanta does indeed have vast and wide highways all around I20 I75 I85 the perimeter and Georgia 400 are all quite wide and expansive through the city this leads to some confusion by some viewers who get the misconception that Atlanta does have a large Highway Network and lots of capacity when in reality that can't be further from the truth the downtown connector in particular is extremely wide and feeds into this misconception you see where Atlanta lacks capacity is not on the freeways that it has it's the lack of capacity in the form of alternate routes due to political gridlock and nism Atlanta never built additional roadways Beyond its original Interstate plan from the 1950s once it became politically unfeasible to build any more routes Atlanta instead underwent a project called free and the freeways in which they significantly expanded the capacity of all of the existing routes while this sounded like a good compromise on paper the problem arose when Atlanta's population continued to expand at a rapid rate explosive growth north of the perimeter in particular you see when these freeways were freed or wied the interchanges that served them were not significantly upgraded also with the geographic spread of the Metro becoming so vast the lack of additional arteria routes or highways meant the large amounts of local traffic is also pushed down to 285 and other freeways this clogs these roadways with traffic that might otherwise take a surface Road or some alternate Highway for example if you want to go from Marietta to Alpharetta then you're most likely going to have to drive south down to 285 then back up north to Alpharetta rather than Drive East West in a more direct path so attempting to drive through Atlanta you're faced with using 285 and mixing with all the suburbanites who are also using it as their local route trucks are also banned inside the perimeter so that's even more load on 285 you can't really expand these roadways any further as they're already at Max Capacity before you reach those diminishing returns so the logical step would have been a sort of Northern Loop or the once fabled Outer Perimeter but with all the development all the money all the political influence that has now taken shape in Atlanta's Northern suburbs that also might be a pipe dream in Atlanta traffic is just part of the city's identity and now the number one worst city on the east coast to drive through to be expected of no surprise New York City when I first began contemplating list for this video New York was the easiest position to list before we even talk about the roadway network two major factors make New York City very difficult to Traverse number one is the geography the center of New York's economic activity is in Manhattan it is referred to by locals as the City Manhattan is an island completely surrounded by water all outer Ling Burrows are also on Islands except for the Bronx this island layout makes it very difficult and expensive to build Transportation infrastructure around that can handle the insane population of this region which brings us to our next point the population the New York City metro area holds over 20 million people more than any other us Metro by far and almost as large as the Los Angeles and Dallas Fort Worth metros combined over 8 million of them are densely packed into New York City proper with the other 12 million living in relatively dense areas in New Jersey Connecticut Westchester County and Long Island New York so with this combination of urban density and Geographic constraints building large infrastructure for New York has always been a challenge now when it comes to the roads remember that I mentioned that New York is almost as large as Dallas and La combined we'll take a look at how vast the roadway networks are in those two cities individually then take a look at New York does this look like the roadway Network that can handle both of those combined now actually Crossing New York City you have a couple of options there are only two routes across the city proper those are the Cross Bronx Expressway which carries I 95 and the Brooklyn Queens Expressway Brooklyn's only Expressway which carries uh 278 now both of these are well-known parking lots all throughout the day but if I had to say which one is worst then it would be the BQE on the cross bronch you can at least occasionally find times where the traffic might be free flowing for a moment but but the BQE is overloaded 24/7 nights weekends holidays even Christmas day it is in the red it doesn't help that the expressway is falling apart and New York officials closed one of the lanes in order for it to last a few years while they debate spending the money to fix it there is one other option when trying to cross New York and that is Interstate 287 Interstate 287 is a route that forms a sort of horseshoe around New York City's Metro and serves as The Unofficial bypass of the city one could indeed take this route to avoid all the chaos of New York City altogether however the problem with I 287 is this the route's path is quite far out in order for it to go around the New Jersey suburbs so using it is a significantly longer route than the Cross Bronx or the BQE and depending on the time of day you're coming through I 287 can get pretty loaded with traffic in its own right as it is the primary Highway used by new jerseyans who live in one of those seemingly thousands of suburbs in that area so sometimes it could take just as long if not longer than if he would have just drove through the Bronx now New York does boast the largest transit system in America by far and New Jersey with the largest state level transit system in the country however at 20 million strong and all of the roadways inside New York itself being limited to only six Lanes with 1950s interchanges it's just not enough to have any major sort of impact on this roadway traffic if you're planning to drive through New York be prepared to wait but hey at least on the Cross Bronx the locals were kind enough to decorate the buildings and other structures with some interesting artwork for travelers to admire while driving through and there you have it guys the top five worst cities to drive through on the East Coast did any of the cities on this list surprise you or are there any that were left off the list that you would have included does the order surprise you let me know what you think in the comments thanks for watching see you on the next one coming soon to a town near you

Channel: Mileage Mike

Views: 176,874

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Id: x1sBJdiChuQ

Length: 13min 18sec (798 seconds)

Published: Wed Nov 08 2023