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'Insane' Los Angeles Traffic Video Goes Viral Amid Thanksgiving Travel

A video showing bumper-to-bumper traffic in Los Angeles, California went viral with people online calling it "insane."

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A video showing a Los Angeles highway littered with cars traveling for Thanksgiving has drawn attention from people on social media calling it "insane." While the populated California city is known for its bad traffic on any given day, this video showed just how busy the roads can get in the days leading up to a major travel holiday. The video was posted by FOX 11 Los Angeles on X, formerly Twitter, on Tuesday night along with the caption: "'Twas the traffic nightmare before Thanksgiving as commuters sat through bumper-to-bumper traffic on the 405 Freeway in LA." Cars in the video were moving at a slow speed with barely any pavement in sight. From the aerial shot, people saw lanes of white headlights next to lanes of red rear lights, indicating the flow of traffic on the highway. People on social media were in awe over the bumper-to-bumper traffic. An X user who goes by Caption Ron wrote: "That is insane. Why would anyone live in L.A.?"
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"That's crazy," another X user by the name of Mike said. The online gambling company Bovada replied to the video on X: "An actual horror movie." Meanwhile, others did not seem to think that this type of traffic was out of the ordinary for the busy city. "Looks like a regular night in LA ....." X user @LAConserv18 said. Another X user by the name of Piker wrote: "That looks like a normal tuesday." Some people compared the red and white car lights to holiday lights. "Ahhh! I love moving Christmas lights! These ones have people in them!" X user @BartemyS wrote. Another X user who goes by CD74 said: "So festive looking."
LA traffic
A motorcycle officer weaves through traffic on a Los Angeles freeway during the evening rush hour on April 12, 2023 in Los Angeles, California. A video showing a Los Angeles highway littered with cars traveling... Frederic J. Brown/AFP via Getty Images
The video caught the attention of the Guinness World Records who re-posted the clip and wrote: "An incredible traffic jam, but we do have a record for the largest ever: A traffic jam of 18 million cars crawling bumper-to-bumper was reported on the East–West German border on 12 April 1990. "When the Berlin Wall fell on 9 November 1989, thousands of Germans streamed across the borders that had divided East from West for decades, attracted by the prospect of seeing relatives and rediscovering parts of their country that had been out of bounds for so long," the Guinness World Records wrote. Richard Grenell, who served as Acting Director of National Intelligence for former President Donald Trump's administration in 2020, used the traffic video in a political attack against democratic Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass. "Traffic is worse under @MayorOfLA Karen Bass," Grenell said in part. Meanwhile, on Monday, Bass announced the re-opening of Interstate 10, a major traffic route for downtown Los Angeles. Part of I-10 was shut down following a storage yard fire on November 11. Vice President Kamala Harris, who is from California, wrote on X on Sunday: "@POTUS and I are rebuilding our nation's infrastructure—including right here in California. The I-10 will reopen tomorrow morning, weeks ahead of schedule. This is what we can accomplish when we invest in America."