Every winter in Moscow sees terrible traffic jams. Heavy snow, ice, and unsafe driving conditions cause accidents and road closures that frequently bring Moscow traffic to a complete standstill. Over 3 million cars run in the city daily, and thanks to economic upturns, the recent years have seen a significant growth in the number of car ownership in Moscow. But the road conditions haven’t quite caught up to the number of motorists. Add to that Russia's ferocious winter, and you have the perfect recipe for nightmare.
“Driving in Moscow can be a daunting experience for the uninitiated”, says a website called Expat.ru, that has an extensive list of Do’s and Do-not’s when driving in Moscow as well as tips to survive the city’s scariest traffic jams.
“Traffic accidents (and resulting deaths) are more numerous that in North America and most European countries - despite the fact that there still are fewer cars). Russian drivers regularly ignore traffic lights, road signs and traffic regulations as well as pedestrians, so you have to be very careful and drive defensively at all the time. Random stop-n-checks by the Traffic Cops are regular, and you need not have committed any kind of irregularity to be (legally) pulled-over in this way.”
Moscow has been ranked eighth on the list of cities with worst traffic jams. At the same time, experts believe that traffic jam in the Russian capital are the longest in terms of duration. An average jam in Moscow lasts for 2.5 hours.
The following pictures were taken on the night of December 16, 2011 in Moscow by photographer Chistoprudov Dmitry.
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Our capital is pretty bad too. The roads right next to the White House have holes pat hed with giant metal plates that destroy suspension, as well as vents from which escapes a thick white smoke in winter that blocks vision ahead completely! As to traffic, they came up with a solution that works for most (but not all) parts of the city: all lanes but 1 go into the city in the morning and the reverse applies at the end of the day.
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