New Ranking of Cities With the Worst Traffic Congestion in the U.S.

According to community-based GPS and traffic navigation app Waze, Portland's increased traffic congestion ranked fifth-worst in the United States.

Waze's driver satisfaction index is based on traffic, road quality, safety, and socio-economic factors like the impact of gas prices on the cost of living. New Geography said that congestion has not increased the share of transit or discouraged people from driving alone when commuting. Money spent on light rail has encouraged commuters onto trains from buses, but not from personal cars and into using transit, per The Antiplanner.

According to Waze, the nation’s worst congestion was in San Diego (scoring 3.1 on a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being least congested), followed by New York and San Francisco (3.7 each), then Portland (4.5), Miami (4.8), and Honolulu (4.9). At 5.3, Seattle was supposed to be less congested than Portland, with Chicago (5.4), Boston (5.5), and Washington (5.5) slightly better still and Los Angeles (5.8) even better.

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