So often as car enthusiasts, we pontificate and fantasize about our favorite driving roads. Oh, there’s that squiggly one in Italy, and the glory of the touge in Japan. But I want to ask you something altogether more irritating—what’s your least favorite road?
I’m not asking in the general sense. Yes, we all hate city streets that don’t have car parks where we need them. We all hate that annoying cul de sac where our ex lived where you could never turn around without making a six-point turn. But I want you to be more specific. What road, what singular stretch of sign-posted tarmac earns your undying enmity to this day?
I raise this because for me, the answer is very easy. It’s a long, asphalted turd that wears the imaginitive moniker of South Road. That’s because the South Australian government didn’t think this hateful piece of infrastructure deserved any more attention than that during the naming process. Why is it so bad? Oh, let me tell you.
“Uh, this is it.” Credit: YellowMonkey via CC BY-SA 4.0
You don’t care about the geographic specifics because you’re not from my hometown of Adelaide. So I’ll just tell you why it sucks. It’s because it’s a major highway that technically stretches a full 117 kilometers in length. That might make you think it has a broad, multi-laned layout where you travel at high speeds with a minimum of intersections and traffic lights. Oh, buddy. No, it’s the opposite!
In the southern suburbs of Adelaide, this thing becomes a regular street. It goes down to two lanes in each direction. There are shops, side roads, and houses all over the place, and traffic slows to an absolute crawl. It’s so thick that for a good 12 hours a day, it’s virtually impossible to turn across traffic. Most of the time you can’t even do a U-turn, so you end up pulling into a shopping center’s parking lot and then pulling back out onto the road.
I hate this damn road so much because for a good six months, I had to commute on it a full three days a week. I’d spend a good ten kilometers of my journey just inching along, bumper to bumper, agonizingly making my way to work. And this wasn’t even in peak hour—this was at midday.
I will get over it in time. I’ve moved a long, long way from South Road. But still, it remains one of the biggest thoroughfares in the city of Adelaide and it’s just an absolute pain in the butt.
Anyway, I’ve raged long enough. That’s my least favorite road. Now you should tell me yours. Let your hatred run free like the waters of the Nile. Then let it go. You deserve peace.
Image credits: YellowMonkey via CC BY-SA 4.0, Lewin Day, Government of South Australia – Department for Infrastructure and Transport, Albert Stoynov via Unsplash License
I hate Beach Drive, but it’s only because of its potential; it’s a wonderfully twisty road through scenic stretches, but the visibility around turns is poor and it’s perpetually clogged with cyclists and pokey locals, so you don’t dare drive it with anything approaching spirit. It’d be maddening if it weren’t so predictable.
Any EFFing road that has TOLL attached to it. Houston needing an alternative route to I45 north convinced citizens to fund a toll road with the promise that after it was paid off it would become free. Of course after it was paid for it was sold to Middle East interest and the Toll was raised. I never drove The Tardy Toll road again!
I’m surprised the citizens of Texas fell for that- after so many other states did the same thing since the ’50s
Come on, it’s Texas, The Lone Star State!
Which is also it’s Yelp rating.
Here we have the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority, a quasi-municipal entity that has, for 60 years, grown into a behemoth that spends more on construction contracts than any 5 southern states added together. They were supposed to be paid off by 1975 and turned over to IDOT.
Highway 200 through eastern Montana. We were driving from Theodore Roosevelt National Park to Glacier National Park, and holy crap that road was boring. Montana gets a lot of credit for being gorgeous, and it is, but only in the west. The eastern 2/3rds of the state is flat, boring, and nothing going on for like 400 miles. It’s awful.
Hey Philly people is the surekill distressway still horrid? I have not been on it in over 30 years.
Yes.
My husband used to live near Philly and hated Route 309 with a passion.
I left a year ago, it’s still awful. They really need some better mass transit options there.
If you have to ask me on experience it is a conflicted one.
Nevada State Route 341
I lived in Washoe Valley for 33 years. When Shit hit the fan it was normally 395 now I-580, you HAD to go through Virginia City.
Now The road up and into Virginia City was and still is a REALLY fun twisty and glorious route between the end of Reno starting in the VC foothills up and down to the fine-ish town of Dayton. Trust me the way up and down is a treat. Don’t forget this is the Virginia City Hillclimb/Specter 341.
Anytime 395 got shut down. You had to go up to VC and back down, through Mound House (Appropriately were all the working ladies…worked) and through Carson City.
SO MANY idiots not being able to actually do the climb would break down trying to bypass an important corridor.
…
That being said, hey any other day, that drive is alot of fun: I’d recommend it in non emergency scenarios.
Normally called Geiger Grade, it was what most ox-carts had to use to reach the main-railroad in Reno.
As I live in a flyover state, traffic mostly isn’t terrible. That being said, I find Eagle road in Boise to be terrible. Thankfully, I only have to use it or drive west of it maybe 5 times a year at most
There are so many like 19 on the Gulf Coast of FL and all the non-toll highways in Chicago, But the stretch that came to mind is
Highway 10 from the Mississippi River to 35W North,
It is north of the twin cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul. It just sucks. Everyone is driving too fast, and the left exit onto 35 W North is hard to get over to.
Do not get it confused with County Road 10 which runs from the exact same start and end roads and runs parallel to Highway 10 less than a mile southwest. So when driving or giving directions you need to pay attention to which 10 you are getting onto based on the shape of the sign.
I-80 throughout PA, but mostly the hilly sections. There you will find plenty of 18-wheelers doing slow-speed drag races up the hills, the truck doing 6 passing the truck doing 5. Will the 5 mph truck pull it out in the end? Who knows! The drag races will last a good 3-4 miles before someone finally pulls over. Downhill isn’t much better, with the slower truck speeding up and preventing the slightly faster one from moving out of the passing lane.FedEx trucks are the worst as the company conveniently ordered trucks geared for flat roads, and the double trailers barely make it up the hills. For more fun and excitement, the bobbers and weavers wind their way through the slow truck drag races thinking they can make some better time. Then for added fun, PennDOT will randomly close a lane for some random 10-mile stretch while a lone worker mans a lone shovel somewhere in the middle, long abandoned by his coworkers, causing a giant slowdown for 3 miles prior to the constriction point. Some sections of the road are no longer “road” but just a collection of patch material filling the holes that once were the roadbed. Sometimes potholes the size of small towns open up and swallow the losers of the slow truck drag race. There are days when Waze would be quieter just announcing where the potholes aren’t. At least when the trucks fall in, the road gets a little smoother. I hate I-80. I hate it with a passion.
Hello fellow PA resident. I-95 is still worse.
The stretch through the Poconos holds a special place in my heart. New Yorkers doing 80 in a 55, substandard entrance and exit ramps, patches of lunar surface.
100% agree.
Instead of I-80 I usually take _____ to ____ instead.
(Blanked out on purpose because if more people knew about it ya’ll would get in my way)
I-35 between San Antonio and Austin. Something about that stretch causes it to be travelled exclusively by maniacs with no sense of self preservation.
Absolutely! Although I’d extend it all the way through Dallas. But Georgetown to downtown SA is the worst of the worst.
I would disagree with your comments about I-95 in only two respects:
1. It is, more than occasionally, cold and miserable.
B. It is also bad north of DC.
I love dirt roads, and I generally choose them as a preference over nicer roads because I like taking the scenic route. But to hell with Hole-in-the-rock road. I hate it.
https://youtu.be/hsbV0UlWhE4?si=zZt-7s-Ylvn0fUM6&t=164
Bluemound road in Brookfield Wisconsin. Worst segment of terrible city planning anywhere in the state. 8 lanes wide with nothing but massive strip malls on both sides and stop lights constantly, always traffic and always under construction. Just awful
I find a serious lack of thoughtful urban planning on the other side of the Cheddar Curtain.
It’s a toss-up of either I-80 west of Chicago or I-65 from Indy to Gary. Both are flat, straight and badly patched.
Hey now. What about the intersection of 80/94 and 65? Remember when it was under construction for about 15 years? Not to mention you are in northern Indiana? A true hell on earth.
Oh that’s a good one. Gary is one of the worst places I can think of for many reasons, but it’s even awful to bypass it. Bad vibes all around.
Go through Gary on 912, it’s a treat.
What’s bad about 80 west of Chicago? Worth it for Ripp’s Chicken in Ladd.
I-44, specifically from St. Louis, MO to Rolla or maybe as far as Springfield, MO. It’s fairly hilly and can see some interesting weather so the combo of a lot of semis plus the often poor driving habits of the locals makes it a maddening stretch to drive. It’s part of the larger voyage to visit family a few times a year and I grumble the whole way through each time.
Tough choices. I-45 in Houston is tragically awful at all times, but it’s tough to compete against the eternal construction and nightmare that is I-35 from San Antonio to Waco.
Some part of the Gulf Freeway (45 South) between downtown and Galveston has literally been under continuous construction since 1948.
This year, the road to the White House.
I HATE HATE HATE I-95. It’s a neccessary evil to get to see my Brother-in-law, and it seems every time I’m on it, there are multiple accidents causing traffic to come to a crawl for 20-30 minutes at a time.
I always thought it was just bad luck, but everyone I talk to seems to agree.
Close 2nd would be a 30 mile stretch of State Rt. 7 running along the Ohio River from East Liverpool Ohio down to Martin’s Ferry Ohio. It’s been under construction and a heavily patrolled 55mph one-lane-most-of-the-time slog that is just a total drag.
I-71 goes from Louisville to Cleveland, it sucks the whole way, and it goes over the Brent Spence Bridge!
In the Pittsburgh area it is McKnight Road (aka McNightmare). Very high traffic volume, frequent stoplights. Shopping plazas and driveways the entire length. Minimal and poorly marked turning lanes.
I agree I95 may be the worst interstate in Eastern US.
Stereotypical British answer: the M25. Specifically the bits with the variable speed limits, active speed cameras and four lanes. Which I know is nothing to you Americans with your immense freeways, but is anyone ever doing the right speed in the right lane? Dear me. Less stereotypical answer, the narrow road over the hill to the lovely village of Holmbury St Mary that is littered with the remains of many a wing mirror, including mine .
I just had to check that out on Street View. Oh, my. What do you do when you meet oncoming traffic?
The most aggressive person wins.
To be fair, cars are narrower in the UK. A Suburban meeting an F150 up there would be carnage.
M25 is the correct answer, although in the UK the standard of driving goes down as you get closer to London.
Seriously, on the Welsh end of the M4 people indicate, and use the correct lanes etc and it’s fine. The further east you go, people start leaving less space to the car in front, stop using indicators, and tend to stick in the fast lane regardless of the speed they’re doing or the traffic around them.
The intersections of I-294 NB to I-290 WB and I-290 WB to I-90 WB.
Both are substandard decades-old designs that carry an enormous amount of truck traffic bypassing Chicago to travel from downstate or Indiana to Wisconsin and points north and west.
Both are dangerous and prone to heavy backups at any time of day or night.
They’re redoing the 294-290 interchange, but it’s taking FOR-EV-ER!!!!
They of course spent years redoing 90, spent a kajillion dollars on it, but didn’t fix the 290-90 interchange. Idiots!
The Hillside Stangler just keeps on stranglin’.
I-4. Every square inch of it. Makes I-95 seem absolutely pleasant.
I-4 through Orlando sucks majorly. I’ve only had to drive that section a few times but it makes my list of worst roads.
For me? It’s the 401 highway in Ontario, Canada. Specifically the stretch from about Oshawa, all the way across till you clear populated areas.
It’s THE busiest highway in North America. Yes, that includes any road you can name in the USA.
For as long as I’ve been driving, it’s ALWAYS been a gong show and likely always will be.
Oh god I’m so sorry. I’ve been fortunate to not ever had to drive that road (I live in BC and don’t go to the GTA that often)
I thankfully live in the capital and rarely visit the GTA. I just don’t have the patience for the traffic.
I can confirm.
Worlds largest public funded parking lot.
When I lived in St. Catherine’s Ont. and had to drive to Toronto or points north, I never knew that many cars existed in all the world and could plug up all 8 lanes of traffic at 10 pm on a week day with clear weather.
Makes the Damn Ryan in Chicago look like the Nurburgring.
I can name the BQE…
This is the answer.
I always have a little snicker over people complaining about their American highways. I’ve driven most of them, and they pale in comparison.
I remember as recently as 10 years ago, there was actual “rush hour” on the highway in the morning and evening. It doesn’t exist anymore. I’ve been stuck in bumper to bumper traffic at 3am.
And it just keeps getting wider. There’s nonstop construction to widen the road, and fix the bridges, which slows it down even more. When the slow downs free up, then everyone hits warp 9 to make up for time. It’s a highway where people will easily go 140 km/h only to frequently come to a stop for no reason.
In the winter, it bends and twists through areas of extreme white outs to the west of Toronto, and people just don’t slow down. And it’s THE trucking route for goods from Detroit/Windsor all the way to Montreal. Good luck merging! Trucks will not provide any courtesy anymore.
The 401 is the worst road I’ve driven on, and nothing else is remotely close.
+1
But to me, the worst part of the 401 is the stretch between the 400 and the 427.
Mound Rd in Warren Michigan
I should elaborate. This is a 8 lane surface street monstrosity that is necessary for access to many factory and white collar jobs in Warren. There are stoplights at least every mile and they are actually synchronized, but you wouldn’t know this because it is clogged with enough people going just slow enough that you will catch the next red light. Since there is so much heavy industry on the road there is a volume of heavy trucks that basically ensures it is always in need of major repairs meaning they close 3/4 lanes in any given direction.
When I was growing up in the 80s, my uncle lived in Warren off of Mound Road. Even back then it was a disaster.
I-95
I’ll specify I-95 through northern Virginia and DC. That road manages to be a traffic disaster no matter what time of day I drive through the area.
I was just typing this! I-95 south of DC.
Always terrible traffic.
Always terrible drivers.
Always boring.
Usually hot and humid.