Robert F. Kennedy was working hard for the labor vote in his quest to win a United States Senate seat when he accidentally discovered a new campaign issue: traffic.
Kennedy showed up 70 minutes late for an appearance before the electricians’ union and complained, “There must be some way to get from one side of the city to the other in less time than it takes to get to the moon.” He called for a $2 billion federal mass transit program to build parking lots at commuter rail stations so people wouldn’t have to drive into Manhattan.
It took Kennedy a little more than an hour to go from Madison Avenue and 76th Street to Eighth Avenue and 35th Street, a distance of about two and a half miles, The Times reported. City officials were unable to say how that compared with average traffic speeds in 1964, but it’s certainly slower than modern-day Manhattan traffic, which has sped up over the last few years to an average of 9.3 m.p.h. as of 2012, according to the city Department of Transportation.
A different measure comes from the Texas A&M Transportation Institute, which has tracked traffic congestion in major American cities since 1982. Although New York City, like most urban areas, is more congested now than it was then, it compares favorably with others in its class: Of the 15 largest metropolitan regions in the country, only four — Boston, Detroit, Philadelphia and Seattle — have better traffic flow, according to the institute’s most recent report.
According to the institute’s roadway congestion index, which measures the intensity and duration of congestion, Los Angeles has consistently been the nation’s most congested metro area, while Philadelphia is now the least. Miami, Dallas-Fort Worth, San Diego and Washington have seen the greatest increase in congestion since 1982, while Atlanta and Seattle are among the cities that have made large improvements in recent years. (Detroit and Phoenix have also seen large declines in congestion since 2005, but that may be attributable to their struggling economies as much as anything else.)