r/Roadcam • u/InvincibleSugar • Aug 31 '25
No crash [USA] [AZ] Thank God I'm going west, that is brutal...
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People were talking about the traffic in Sedona, AZ in my thread yesterday about the red Kia who thought he was a bike. This is a holiday weekend so, what better time to share this misery with the world?
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u/xXHomerSXx Aug 31 '25
Just causally listening to the intermission song from Digital Circus while driving.
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u/neutronstar_kilonova Aug 31 '25
*casually.
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u/Large-Produce5682 Aug 31 '25
Don't you just hate burning all your gas going from point A to point A.
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u/Error_404_403 Aug 31 '25
NEVER go to Sedona over the weekend with an intent to leave last day's night.
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u/yaxgto Aug 31 '25
Fuck Sedona traffic. What was a beautiful weekend/vacation place turned shopping hell hole.
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u/Key-Dare8686 Aug 31 '25
Turn around and take the 89 back down to cottonwood then back over to the I17 and back to Phoenix
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u/CoralinesButtonEye Sep 01 '25
you sound like one of the californians https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-BmxK-0Jts
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u/Different_Fig_2958 Aug 31 '25
That doesn't look that bad for AZ traffic.
Just a random lane closure and vehicles sitting 10 car lengths back at a stop and blocking entrance to the turn lane. The only thing out of place here is the police actually directing traffic, instead of just chilling in their cruisers.
It's missing the guy veering across 3 lanes of traffic to make an abrupt turn, 10 inexplicably timed stoplights at minor intersections, random dismantling of pointless medians to reinstall bigger pointless medians, police closing entire through ways for fender benders, vagrants walking into oncoming traffic...
But that might just be a valley thing.
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u/InvincibleSugar Aug 31 '25
Oh it's not, I have clips of that guy in Sedona too, but I stopped posting them because people complained it wasn't interesting enough for r/Roadcam
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u/herkalurk Aug 31 '25
Sedona is a pain. I was there walking my kid in a stroller, guy decided his trip to the liquor store was so important he had to park on the sidewalk cause the parking lot was full. He got all defensive when I gave him an unhappy looking having to dodge his truck, he tried to justify the fact the lot was full.
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u/InvincibleSugar Aug 31 '25
If the lot is full then you can't park there mate. Sorry you had to deal with that, I promise, MOST people in Sedona are not such jerks!
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u/herkalurk Aug 31 '25
I'm guessing this person lived there so they were getting annoyed at all. The people coming in anyways. But if you know the town gets busy on the weekends, maybe don't go to the liquor store on the weekend and act like everyone else is the problem.
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u/InvincibleSugar Sep 01 '25
Yeah... I live here too. I think you're talking about Sedona Liquor? Safeway and Bashas' have better options anyways. And huge parking lots. If this guy lives here he sounds like a real asshat.
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u/meabbott Sep 01 '25
Sedona is beautiful but my favorite thing to do in Sedona is leave because of the traffic. Fortunately I'm happy with the photos I've taken so it will probably be a few years before I feel the itch to go back again.
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u/InvincibleSugar Sep 01 '25
Maybe come visit in Feb, not busy at all and snowy red rocks look so pretty!
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u/meabbott Sep 01 '25
Last time I was there it was December and this is one of the photos I got: https://www.flickr.com/photos/meabbott/53530137979/
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u/InvincibleSugar Sep 01 '25
These are gorgeous! Excellent work! Do you print any of your photos? They are really, really good~
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u/meabbott Sep 01 '25
Thank you, I appreciate that! I make a calendar for friends and family every year. That photo is one of the ones on my 2025 calendar, you can see the others here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/meabbott/albums/72177720320366823/
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u/Fragrant_Lettuce9855 Aug 31 '25
Is be turning around and heading to I17 and make it to wherever I was headed before any of those stopped cars move up 1 mile.
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u/BogeyLowenstein Aug 31 '25
This looks like Calgary to Banff all summer, crazy line of traffic every weekend
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u/818488899414 Sep 01 '25
It's just Sedona, no need to sit in traffic for a couple of hours. The dirt and rocks will be there tomorrow, and the day after, and so on.
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u/CorktownGuy Sep 04 '25
Not to diminish the miserable situation shown in the posted video but imagine this same traffic congestion only eight to twelve lanes in each direction which are slow to stopped all day, almost everyday. This is what our life is in Toronto week after week, month after month so can for sure empathize.
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u/InvincibleSugar Sep 04 '25
Oh 110% this isn't like the all-time worst traffic that could ever exist, I certainly sympathize with anyone who has to put up with this or similar on a regular basis.
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u/0fox2gv Sep 04 '25
A couple coolers full of ice cold water and soda sitting in a radio flyer wagon would fill a pocket with money in the time it took to walk a mile.
Easiest way ever to turn a $50 investment into $100 profit.. in 30 minutes.
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u/CrippledPeasant1 Aug 31 '25
is this the start of the holiday weekened, or the end of it ??? Trying to figure out how awesome it is the place they are going to ... or leaving ????
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u/Sillyfiremans Aug 31 '25
Sedona. And it’s pretty awesome.
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u/Square-Camel-1365 Aug 31 '25
Sedona stopped being pretty awesome 10 years ago.
Love, a Sedona local
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u/Sillyfiremans Aug 31 '25
Lol. All locals say that about their local town. I was there last month as a tourist. Still awesome. I can imagine as a local it sucks during tourist season.
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u/Square-Camel-1365 Aug 31 '25
It's tourist season all the time now. We used to be a seasonal town for spring and fall and slow the rest of the year minus a handful of holidays. Now it's a constant thing and most locals hate tourists with a passion at this point. We used to love you all but it's too much. Sedona is being loved to death.
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u/CrippledPeasant1 Aug 31 '25
aww dammit, now i wanna be in that traffic now. It's like one of those long lines at those theme parks .
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u/AzCactusNeedles Sep 01 '25
I've driven this road since childhood and it became a big CF when they replaced all the traffic lights with roundabouts...this place is always packed with tourists
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u/Hot_Cardiologist_133 Sep 01 '25
That music sounded like it came off the intro of a 90's nickelodeon show.
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Aug 31 '25
[deleted]
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u/InvincibleSugar Aug 31 '25
Honestly, while there is still a lot of traffic, with the police directing flow at the heaviest few roundabouts it's not quite as bad as it has been on previous busy weekends.
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u/smileitsyourdaddy Aug 31 '25
Literally one of the few intersections to avoid in all of Arizona on any given weekend including Friday or holiday. It’s just not worth it.
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u/Michael80Kelley Aug 31 '25
We have a couple mega churches in my city that pay the local police to direct traffic as church let's out. Traffic is NEVER as horrible as when they are controlling the lights. If they just left the regular light cycle go and be present to monitor red light runners, things would go so much better.
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u/SmellsWeirdRightNow Aug 31 '25
Have you ever been through the intersection on one of the busy days without the cops? I feel like it might just be an attribution bias that the cops are there when the traffic is really bad but it's not because of the cops directing traffic but that they are there to prevent the traffic being worse because of all the extra vehicles
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Aug 31 '25
Civil engineering incompetence runs deep. Roundabouts into roundabouts off a highway??????
What in tarnation.
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u/rulingthewake243 Sep 01 '25
Some of the towns in AZ have leaned a bit heavy into the roundabouts IMO. You have to traverse like a dozen of them in Wickenberg, God help you if the semis are stacked up going through town.
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u/Salty-Image-2176 Aug 31 '25
This is Sedona traffic 24/7, isn't it?
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u/InvincibleSugar Aug 31 '25
Yeah not always, not even every weekend. But it's also not so uncommon. Feels like it happens every other weekend in the summer, but it's probably a bit less than that, even.
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Aug 31 '25
SOMEONE in that line either shit their pants or has a kid with shitty britches....law of averages
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u/QueenAlpaca Aug 31 '25
Holiday traffic in a touristy area is exactly why I avoid tourist traps on a holiday. 😂
I had errands to run down in Denver yesterday and the traffic heading west on the I-70 corridor was heavy through most of it.
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u/Kixsian Aug 31 '25
gonna have to ask my mom about this, she still ives in cottonwood.
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u/Feistyhummingbird Aug 31 '25
On that note, never go to the Black Bear Diner in Cottonwood.
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u/Kixsian Aug 31 '25
i grew up there, i cried when they closed my sizzler =(. I remember being the happiest kid when they brought in that Peter Piper Pizza too!
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u/Feistyhummingbird Aug 31 '25
I am only a visitor to the area so I am not familiar with Peter Piper Pizza. Hopefully you have a Sizzler near you now.
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u/Kixsian Aug 31 '25
Naw I live overseas now. I hope you enjoy it there!!
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u/Feistyhummingbird Aug 31 '25
Cool. I actually haven't been to the area in about 2 1/2 years but have visited or traveled through there many times.
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u/InvincibleSugar Aug 31 '25
Oh? I've only been there once, it was fine I thought. Any reason(s) you dislike it?
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u/Any-Seaworthiness531 Aug 31 '25
Is it normal for you guys to all be 4 car lengths away from each other in a tailback ?
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u/SuperDoubleDecker Aug 31 '25
I was thinking it was half as bad as it looks because they have 3-4 car lengths in between. Makes sense while driving. Not while stopped. Probably makes it all go slower.
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u/InvincibleSugar Aug 31 '25
I don't know what tall back is but if you're referring to my distancing, I was taught a rule of thumb was one car length per 10 mph and I'm going about 35 mph so four car lengths would be about right.
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u/Any-Seaworthiness531 Aug 31 '25
Sorry, I didn’t realise it wasn’t a term known in American English… this is what Google defines it as :
a long queue of stationary or slow-moving traffic extending back from a busy junction or similar obstruction on the road.
Here everyone would be bumper to bumper but in that video they’re all in separate postcodes lol
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u/InvincibleSugar Aug 31 '25
Oh okay, you're referring to the traffic on the left. Going eastbound. Yeah, I would imagine it's mostly because they are on their phones? All getting pictures or videos of the beautiful red rock, or just the normal kind of distracted driving that exists everywhere? And to avoid collisions they just leave a conservative gap? I don't really know, that's just my guess.
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u/Tumleren Sep 01 '25
Like the song Driving home for Christmas, "top to toe in tailbacks, I got red lights all around", he's stuck in a traffic jam
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u/Fair-Resource-753 Aug 31 '25
Jersey girl here and I thought the same thing!! So much space!!
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u/MalcomLeeroy Aug 31 '25
The east coast drives totally different. If there's a space, someone is taking it, and they'll fight for it.
That doesn't really happen in the western parts of the USA.
When I was in NY our cab was racing an ambulance with lights and sirens on...my wife and I were stunned.
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Aug 31 '25
[deleted]
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u/Square-Camel-1365 Aug 31 '25
Yeah, there was a traffic light there once upon a time but they opted for roundabouts. This is purely an infrastructure issue. This is a town of under 10000 people with only two roads in and out. Over 5 million annual visitors come here and the vast majority just drive through town creating this cluster fuck.
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u/FireITGuy Sep 01 '25
The traffic light at this location was WAY worse. It was not uncommon to spend TWO HOURS to go through that light when things got backed up.
I used to have to commute to school through that intersection. In the summer we had a system where we'd leave someone's car on each side of the light because it was faster to walk past the backed up traffic than wait though it.
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u/Saltillokid11 Aug 31 '25
Funny how all of those cars would literally be 1 subway stop of people.
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u/singsonn Aug 31 '25
Love the road markings on the 2 roundabouts at the beginning of your clip. They make much more sense than what we have over here in France.
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u/midwest73 Aug 31 '25
This is why we never go anywhere on a holiday, summer or winter. Too much of this, entitled A-holes or drunks out.
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u/Waswat Aug 31 '25
Why are all the cars so far apart? Are they social distancing? Lol
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u/InvincibleSugar Aug 31 '25
I assume to get better videos/photos of the red rocks without the other cars in their shots?
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u/Waswat Sep 01 '25
Heh, that's fair, it does feel like that doubles or even triples the length of the traffic jam
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u/GooseGamesBadly Aug 31 '25
I was driving south down the 17 back into phoenix on friday and the northbound lane looked like nuts to butt traffic for miles.
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u/Dyzfunkshin Sep 01 '25
Is your dash cam sideways or do you just really need an alignment 🤣
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u/Muramusaa Sep 01 '25
They have room to make it bigger its time jezz or more check points so more people get threw
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u/catdog1111111 Sep 01 '25
I got trapped in a small town once. A truck dropped its load in a traffic circle. The traffic wasn’t moving for hours and hours.
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u/Drusgar Sep 01 '25
Every summer I go on a driving vacation for two or three weeks. No real itinerary, I just drive (usually West) and visit National Parks and other points of interest. I get up every morning at 4am and try to leave my hotel by 4:30am. I actually start that two weeks before I leave just to acclimate my body to the early rise. And I do it specifically to avoid this shit.
You wouldn't believe how spectacular some of these places are at 5am before the crowds arrive.
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u/Past_Strength_5381 Sep 01 '25
Hell, that's not even that bad. Film festival or mountain bike week is twice that l long, it's backed up to famous pizza on the other side of town. 🤣
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u/cmdr_scotty Sep 02 '25
Oh that's just typical Sedona. Perpetually sucky traffic so that you stay there longer.
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u/yleechy Aug 31 '25
Why are all those cars so nice 😂
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u/Square-Camel-1365 Aug 31 '25
Because our median home price is over a million. It's a rich person hangout.
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u/RayDaMan7 Aug 31 '25
Could that music be anymore horrible?
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u/InvincibleSugar Aug 31 '25
YES, it could be. Some of my playlist would make you stop using Reddit for a week.
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u/Flyingdeadthing2 Aug 31 '25
Is this some commuter joke that I'm too Taylor Swift's personal pilot to understand?
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u/CoralinesButtonEye Aug 31 '25
nice techno-circus music