Top 30 worst cities with traffic jams in the U.S.
Written by: Admin
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) earlier this week declared greenhouse gases as dangerous. Thousands of environmental enthusiasts and governmental officials are meeting at Climate Conference in Copenhagen this week to find solutions to reduce greenhouse gases.
While all that is happening during this busy global climate week, TomTom released a report last week with a list of worst U.S. cities with traffic jams. Traffic jams are not limited to negative economic impacts only. Traffic jams put a tremendous pressure on the environment as well. Traffic jams cause increased idling, acceleration and braking, which results into wasted fuel, increased air pollution and carbon dioxide emissions. All of these can very well contribute to global warming.
According to the press release, “Cities* were ranked as most to least congested according to how fast cars could travel on the street network. A city’s traffic was defined as congested if drivers could travel at only 70% or less of the posted speed limit, meaning on average an hour long commute included 20 minutes or more of significant delays”.
So, which city has the highest traffic jams? It’s not the obvious Lost Angeles or New York.
Here is the Top 30 U.S. cities with the worst traffic jams:
| Rank | CITY/REGION | % of congested roadways |
| 1 | Seattle, WA | 43% |
| 2 | Los Angeles, CA | 38% |
| 3 | Chicago, IL | 37% |
| 4 | Montgomery County, MD | 37% |
| 5 | San Francisco, CA | 35% |
| 6 | New York, NY | 31% |
| 7 | Washington, DC | 30% |
| 8 | San Jose, CA | 29% |
| 9 | Alexandria, VA | 28% |
| 10 | Oakland, CA (Alameda County) | 28% |
| 11 | Atlanta, GA (Cobb County) | 27% |
| 12 | Boston, MA | 27% |
| 13 | Fairfax County, VA | 26% |
| 14 | Philadelphia, PA | 25% |
| 15 | Austin, TX | 25% |
| 16 | Phoenix, AZ | 25% |
| 17 | Long Island, NY (Nassau County) | 24% |
| 18 | Portland, OR | 23% |
| 19 | Houston, TX | 23% |
| 20 | Contra Costa County, CA | 23% |
| 21 | Arlington, VA | 23% |
| 22 | Orange County, CA | 20% |
| 23 | New Orleans, LA | 20% |
| 24 | Norfolk County, MA | 20% |
| 25 | Denver, CO | 20% |
| 26 | Morris County, NJ | 20% |
| 27 | Miami-Dade, FL | 20% |
| 28 | Dallas, TX | 20% |
| 29 | Charlottesville, VA | 19% |
| 30 | Minneapolis/St. Paul, MN | 17% |
December 9th, 2009 at 5:01 pm
Those are pretty much the densest population areas in the US ranked. It actually looks as though the company that compiled this data will use it with turn by turn GPS systems to route people around everyone else. How long before that backfires?
Our Government should just build subways and light rail in all of these cities.
January 15th, 2010 at 4:06 am
they already have them in Seattle. People still got to drive unless they make lightrails the drop you off at work and then at your house.
January 19th, 2010 at 12:34 pm
At last, I found your post once again. You have few useful tips for my school project. Now, I won’t forget to bookmark it.
February 15th, 2010 at 8:26 am
interesting article. I would love to follow you on twitter.