CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Everywhere you go, people complain about the drivers. But which city is actually the worst or the best to drive in?
WalletHub compared the 100 largest American cities over various parameters to determine the ranking, including the annual hours spent in congestion, days with precipitation, the likelihood of a wreck, car theft rate and even average gas prices.
Of those 100 large cities WalletHub studied, five were in North Carolina, including the No. 1 spot. Here are those cities and why they ranked so high:
1. Raleigh, NC
- Total score: 66.96
- Cost of ownership and maintenance: 5
- Traffic and infrastructure: 27
- Safety: 6
- Access to vehicles and maintenance: 43
4. Greensboro, NC
- Total score: 64.37
- Cost of ownership and maintenance: 3
- Traffic and infrastructure: 24
- Safety: 58
- Access to vehicles and maintenance: 30
5. Winston-Salem, NC
- Total score: 64.05
- Cost of ownership and maintenance: 2
- Traffic and infrastructure: 20
- Safety: 29
- Access to vehicles and maintenance: 90
26. Charlotte, NC
- Total score: 59.41
- Cost of ownership and maintenance: 24
- Traffic and infrastructure: 45
- Safety: 51
- Access to vehicles and maintenance: 35
31. Durham, NC
- Total score: 58.94
- Cost of ownership and maintenance: 16
- Traffic and infrastructure: 51
- Safety: 57
- Access to vehicles and maintenance: 86
Each metric was graded on a 100-point scale. Then those rankings were taken and a weighted average was calculated for each category. The numbers noted above reflect the relative "rank" of that city in the 100 analyzed, which means a rank of 1 means it's the best condition for that category.
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