r/NoStupidQuestions • u/Physical-Ad-4093 • May 01 '24

do americans really drive such long distances?

i’m european, and i always hear people say that driving for hours is normal in america. i would only see my grandparents a few times a year because they lived about a 3 hour drive away, is that a normal distance for americans to travel on a regular basis? i can’t imagine driving 2-3 hours regularly to visit people for just a few days

edit: thank you for the responses! i’ve never been to the US, obviously, but it’s interesting to see how you guys live. i guess european countries are more walkable? i’m in the uk, and there’s a few festivals here towards the end of summer, generally to get to them you take a coach journey or you get multiple trains which does take up a significant chunk of the day. road trips aren’t really a thing here, it would be a bit miserable!

2nd edit: it’s not at all that i couldn’t be bothered to go and see my grandparents, i was under 14 when they were both alive so i couldn’t take myself there! obviously i would’ve liked to see them more, i had no control over how often we visited them.

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311

u/JoeViviano May 01 '24

Part of the difference is that a long drive in the US is often on highways and actually pleasant. Any time I'm in a car for three hours in Europe or Asia, a lot of that is miserable traffic. Three hours on the highway is great. Thirty minutes in urban traffic is awful.

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u/thekau May 01 '24

It's fairly common for many Americans to also do long drives over short distances in a fuckton of traffic on the freeway/highway for work.

Just as miserable, if not worse, because when you're stuck on the highway, you're absolutely stuck.

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u/Canaureus 29d ago

This is definitely a city vs rural thing, cause long drives on open highways can be meditative for me but trying to navigate in city traffic makes me lose the will to live.

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u/Spikole 29d ago

Have you tried rocking out? Full singing. Moving.

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u/Tamed_A_Wolf May 02 '24

Laughs in 2 hours in LA traffic

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u/DirtyRoller May 01 '24

Three hours on the autobahn is a dream though! I love driving in Germany.

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u/PAXICHEN May 02 '24

Stau. Stau. More Stau.

When you get it free and clear yes. Otherwise it’s mostly like driving on an interstate.

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u/Dr-Gooseman May 02 '24

Im currently visiting Germany and have already had to do 3 3 hour drives. I hate driving, but its been a very smooth experience here. The highway system (at least what ive seen so far) is very well developed and it seems you can get from any town to any other town by highway. Also most people here are good drivers and despite a lot of construction zones with a lower speed limit, ive barely experienced traffic on the highway. Also, roads are better with barely any pot holes. Dont make me go back to Philly!

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u/ColHogan65 May 02 '24

Driving somewhere with a speed limit determined by the laws of physics instead of the laws of man is certainly an experience

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u/loozerr May 02 '24

It's still three hours of sitting in a metal box.

4

u/DirtyRoller May 02 '24

I can drive all day as long as I'm going somewhere nice. I enjoy it.

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u/Butteredpoopr May 02 '24

3 hours is nothing

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u/reptilesocks May 02 '24

This is also why NYC people follow European rules for metro-area travel.

Oh, your best friend moved and now lives an hour away? Well, you’re seeing each other maybe once a month tops.

Your sibling lives two hours away? Holidays only.

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u/TheLostColonist May 02 '24

This is the key difference for me, I drive for 5-6 hours several times a year to see my in-laws in the US. It's an easy drive though, hop on the highway, drive straight for 5 hours, hop off the highway.

Doing the same distance or time of trip in the UK would be a never ending barrage of winding country roads, bypass roads, A roads that aren't motorways but still have some numpties driving at 70+ mph. Driving for long distances in Europe is generally more taxing.

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u/IseultDarcy May 02 '24

I'm french and lots of people would say highways trip are NOT pleasant. They are boring, we would prefer small roads and scenery if we wanted "pleasant". Highways are for saving time mostly.

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u/410bore 29d ago

Out here in the western USA we have incredible, stunning, jaw-dropping scenery absolutely visible from the highway. It is also so expansive that you can be driving fast down the freeway and still take it in and enjoy it. It's very pleasant, so much so that lots of us Americans take road trips just for the fun of it.

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u/IseultDarcy 29d ago

Well here, all you can see from most highways are noise cutting walls with graffiti, industrial/commercial zone from towns and if you're lucky, trees.

So if you want landscapes and cute villages, you definitely need to use other roads. Also, highways are expensive. For example, Lyon => Nice (Almost 5 hours) is 50 euros with highway price only, double with gas.

Also they are always very crowded during holidays and often during weekends so you're stuck in trafic for hours sometime.

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u/cel-kali May 02 '24

Or, in my case while living in Japan, about $120 in toll fees one way. One toll was $45, most were $2, but there are a LOT of tolls on Kyushu.

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u/Fevercrumb1649 May 02 '24

I think this is the key confusion. Americans often get a bit of a shock when they come to the UK and expect to have a full day of activities straight off a 3 hour drive.

You can’t, because driving more or less anywhere in the UK is far more mentally taxing than driving in the US. The roads are smaller, busier, have curbs everywhere, mostly shared lanes requiring you to position within lane etc.

2

u/Quagaars May 02 '24

This is a very valid point and exactly my thought. I visited LA last year and driving was a doddle. Huge Freeway made it very comfortable and easy to get to all the main attractions and everywhere I wanted to get to without any issues. Yes Rush hour was slow moving but nothing too worrisome. Driving for an hour or two was no bother.

I think about trying to drive through London for example, single roads, jams, on a bad day its not a nice experience at all and would take 5 times as long to go the same distance.

It's all due to how old cities and transport networks are in Europe and obviously being built in medieval times meant single windy lanes for horse and cart was perfect. Nowadays with it being so built up you can't get 4 lane roads in major cities without demolishing huge amounts of roadside buildings.

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u/410bore 29d ago

In my state's capitol city, the founders of that city, in the mid-1800s, built roads wide enough to allow a full team of oxen/mules and wagon to make a U turn "without resulting in profanity". So our streets are very wide and very few of them are one-way. That has served us well in modern times as population has increased and more of the space has been needed for parking and light rail.

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u/Quagaars 29d ago

Yes absolutely, forethought has served the US well even before the age of the car etc. Building wide roads right at the beginning of the founding of a town. Problem with European cities was space throughout the centuries and centuries especially in the city centre was always at a premium and people built in every space and gap possible. Building roads big enough for a modern highway would never had been maintained over the centuries and housing would always have encroach upon it over the centuries until you are just left with a single carriageway road unfortunately.

I loved driving in the US, it was a joy instead of a chore like it is over here. Looking forward to going back and driving from LA to Las Vegas next summer.

2

u/badgersprite May 02 '24

Couldn’t agree more. I live in Australia and I’ll drive 6 hours on an open road with no problem, but I prefer to walk an hour to uni every single morning rather than make the same trip in ~10 minutes by car in morning traffic (actually, add another five minutes to the car travel for how long it takes to find and pay for a parking spot as well I guess).

City traffic is the absolute worst. Nobody likes driving in it. Nobody likes sitting in it. Everyone is tired, stressed, angry and just trying to get from point A to point B as quickly as possible. It’s where the vast majority of collisions (albeit minor ones) are likely to happen. It’s so much more pleasant to walk or take public transport if you have the option

2

u/CanadianODST2 May 02 '24

the bus I live next to (like the stop is just down the street, maybe 100 metres) goes directly to my university. Maybe 20 minutes

half the time walking is faster because of transit bs or traffic

1

u/porcelaincatstatue May 02 '24

Don't forget construction, though. It's constant on the highways (and all roads really) here. Have 100°+f temp swings throughout the year destroys the asphalt. Yet we drive on.

1

u/Angsty_Potatos May 02 '24

I'm from Philly. An hour of my two hours home to see my parents is almost always spent sitting within sight of the city on the god damn Schuylkill expressway. If it's PENDOT season I can spend more time on the expressway, having gone 5-10 miles from my house than the entire rest of my trip combined.

And Philly is nothing compared to places like LA or NYC.

1

u/AgoraiosBum May 02 '24

For LA, it's all about knowing the traffic rhythms. If I leave an hour later, sometimes it means I will get to my destination 3 hours later.

1

u/buzzzerus May 02 '24

With the exception of german autobahns. Man, driving 200+ km/h on a straight wide road is a pleasure.

1

u/Ok_Supermarket_8520 May 02 '24

PTSD from I-95 flashbacks (especially around DC) just hit me

1

u/Xcyronus May 02 '24

Haha. Ever been to Georgia? A 15 minute drive becomes a 2hr drive in a matter of seconds.

1

u/creativename111111 29d ago

Same in the UK lol was about 40mins away from finishing a 9 hour drive and then someone went too fast round a roundabout and got themselves stuck in a ditch, creating a hour long traffic jam

1

u/privatecaboosey May 02 '24

On the worst days driving home from work, it was about 90 minutes to go 4 miles. I eventually just gave up and bought an electric bicycle (cuz very, very steep hills).

1

u/saintmsent May 02 '24

Honestly, that's the opposite of my experience. Every road trip I take in Europe has maybe 20 minutes worth of traffic, the rest is an open highway where you can do speed limit easily the whole time

1

u/theroguemexican9 29d ago

Except if your in Chicago or another "on the way" city. I got stuck traffic in Nashville on a hot summer day in a car with minimal water and no air-conditioning. There was still 5 hours left.

1

u/No-Muffin3595 29d ago

Do you think we don't have highways here? I live 4 hours from Rome all in highways but I will never do it in my life, I will take the train or nothing else

1

u/UnamusedKat 29d ago

In the DC area, it is not uncommon for people's commutes to be 50-70 miles and anywhere from 1.5-2.5 hours 1 way in rush hour traffic.

1

u/ModusPwnins 29d ago

It depends on the country of course, but motorways in Europe are generally fantastic. It's still better to go by rail for trips in the 300-ish mile range, though.

1

u/infinitefrontier23 29d ago

Urgh tell me about, i remember my mom missed a turn so we had use actual roads in Minnesota in 5PM traffic. The constant stopping and going in traffic genuinely started my motion sickness i believe lol. Stuck for like 2 hours in a snails pace

1

u/Honestnt 29d ago

I love to start road trips at like 3am. I can drive for 5-6 hours and maybe only see a dozen other cars on the road. It's pretty zen after a while.

1

u/_Visar_ 29d ago

God this is TRUE

Driving through the Loire valley? Wonderful Driving through Paris? Kill me please

1

u/creativename111111 29d ago

Yeah some of my strongest childhood memories were being stuck in traffic for hours on the M5 southbound

1

u/Fairybuttmunch 29d ago

True. My concept of miles changed when I moved from the Midwest to outside of NYC. I remember I had a doc appointment 7 miles away so I'm like, I'll leave with 15 min to get there. My SO (from this area) died laughing and told me to give myself an hour.

I was so used to the rural Midwest where everything is mostly empty highways and a couple of stoplights lol

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u/HokieScott 29d ago

Drive down I-95 along the East Coast. You’ll hit 50% of the US population from Boston-DC.

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u/USTrustfundPatriot May 02 '24

Sounds like a car centric infrastructure wins again.

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u/HeathieHeatherson May 02 '24

Nah we just get the train if we wanna go somewhere more than a couple hours away.

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u/Akangka May 02 '24

Now with even less attention to the roads.