5 New Jersey Traffic Patterns That Are Like Descending Into Hell

I was driving through the Wall Route 34 traffic circle a few weeks ago, watching my life flash before my eyes, and it I got me thinking: we have an inordinate number of heinous, inscrutable, masochistically-designed traffic patterns in the state of New Jersey.

These are the five that have led me to question all of my life choices.

1. Route 18 & Route 1 in New Brunswick

I've never done that in a commuting time. You're a special people if you have to use that during a commute because it's helllacious at any time. Cars. So many cars. So many cars trying to slide across three lanes of bumper to bumper traffic.

2. Route 295 South Leading up to the Delaware Memorial Bridge

You thought you were taking a road trip to Florida and would finally get to see Bucc-ee's, but you just got off on the wrong lane and you have no idea how to get back. Maybe you're just going to live in South Jersey forever among the tomato plants and corn fields. Maybe that's your life now.

3. Route 22. All of It.

I know this isn't a traffic pattern. It's more a reflection of all of New Jersey's worst possible engineering and land use planning impulses. Or lack of planning.

"Let's just throw as many strip malls in as dense an area as we possibly can," New Jersey's past elected officials and engineers seemed to say. "And let's have cars exit from the middle island or from the right into oncoming 50-mile-per-hour traffic. It will be the glorious chaos carnival of our dreams! Mwahahaha..."

4. Leaving the Driscoll Bridge on Garden State Parkway North Toward Exit 127

Maybe you're going to New Brunswick. Maybe you're going to Staten Island. You've got to decide fast or the world's going to decide for you.

5. Newark Airport: Routes 1 & 9 and I-78 and Route 22 and Existential Dread

In my opinion, the worst traffic pattern in all of New Jersey are the serpentine routes around Newark Airport. I believe this is a test designed to build your resilience for the experience of going through Newark Airport because there's no other reason for this.

What did I miss? What's a horrible traffic pattern in New Jersey that makes it zero sense but it's just there. We just we just accept it.

The only thing worse than New Jersey traffic is New Jersey property taxes. Keep reading to find the towns with the highest: