Chapter 15: California

This chapter is entirely dedicated to the great state of California (not that I'm bias or anything). This chapter covers almost everything about California-the physical geography, the climate, the cities, the tourism, the agriculture, the water supply, and transportation. In this post, I am choosing to focus on comparing the transportation and traffic congestion of Washington D.C. and Los Angeles.

LA Traffic

 Having grown up in the L.A. area, I know the automobile culture that is so vital to Californians. The textbook states that, "today, nearly half the central portion of Los Angeles has been surrendered to the automobile, either for roads or parking. A dense system of freeways encourages high speed movement across the metropolitan region." The Los Angeles area has more cars per capita than any other part of the country, and only a minimal pubic transportation system exists. Anyone who has spent a couple hours in L.A. traffic can attest to this.

Even though D.C. has a much better public transportation system and not as many cars as Angelenos, D.C. still experiences a great amount of automobile congestion and traffic.

Going into and out of the city center can be painful. I checked a D.C. traffic report throughout the day, and streets/freeways going into and out of the city center did not change from the stop and go red. 


According to the DCist, in 2007 D.C. was in a three way tie for second place in the contest for the Worst Traffic in the Nation award. They tied with Atlanta and the Bay Area--only Los Angeles beat them out.
Washington D.C. also is one of the worst places to go during Thanksgiving. A study concluded that the interstate 95 corridor between Washington D.C. and New York City made the top slot for worst traffic during Thanksgiving. 

Traffic on D.C. streets

To add to the congestion, any time a foreign dignitary or the president goes somewhere, streets are blocked off and traffic jams are exponentially increased.


A presidential motorcade causes more traffic in D.C.

Though D.C. has a much better public transportation system than LA, the city still endures large amounts of congestion.


Information from:
1. The textbook
2. DCist.com