Study Finds Bottlenecks Increasing

Traffic “bottlenecks,” or places where drivers spend more than 700,000 hours a year stuck
in traffic, are rapidly growing in number in the United States. The American Highway Users
Alliance (AHUA) reported that bottlenecks have grown in number by 40 percent in the last
five years, from 167 to 233. Some bottlenecks, as in downtown Boston, have been improved,
but new traffic obstacles have worsened in other cities. Los Angeles has four of the worst
bottlenecks on the AHUA’s list of top 20, while Atlanta has three and Washington, D.C., has
two. The worst of all is the intersection of Highway 101 and Interstate 405 in Los Angeles;
five years ago the same intersection ranked fifth. The AHUA is a nonprofit advocacy group
that lobbies for more federal spending on highways and mass transit.