At least in NYC the congestion has many causes: - the continued growth of the population - active measures taken to eliminate lanes and slow traffic (the avg

At least in NYC the congestion has many causes: - the continued growth of the population - active measures taken to eliminate lanes and slow traffic (the avg speed is down to 6mph) - the continued decline of the transit systems (the subway system is dirty, full of homeless people and unreliable... on time arrival has declined significantly) - also its not just the subway, nj transit and lirr both have major reliability and cost problems. I take a train from nj every day and I consider myself lucky if my train isn't cancelled once every other week, leading to 3 hour commutes. I dread the next major tunnel failure leading to a week or more of no transit options - the inability to add more capacity to aging infrastructure. It took over 50 years to add the 2nd ave subway and it still isn't finished. almost everything is packed at rush hour leading to a deeply unpleasant commute - taxi service was artificially limited which led to the proliferation of ride sharing services. They're all subsidized by the companies though, so its hard to know if they're actually viable businesses - recently enforcement has been more strict in midtown. You will see traffic police at most intersections, and drivers are ticketed for blocking lanes. The blatant disregard for laws is a major issue. Cars and cyclists regularly run red lights and people walk into traffic ignoring crossing signals, which leads to cars slamming on their breaks, and then because traffic stops, all the other people on the sidewalk decide to cross, and the whole thing grinds to a halt.