[sunikkat]

No wonder Singapore is not even in the list. Sometime back I had turned down an offer in Singapore, and main reason was the cost of owning a car.

[OffRoadFun]

So Norway/Denmark are behind India in ranking? Seriously?

India has wide choice of terrain, scenery etc. but driving is actually a headache, even highways. I always have this nightmare I will be in an accident because of no fault of mine and then it's over to our tribal/lawless system.

Nothing beats the US of course. Cheap gas, cheap cars, wide highways, excellent services.

Yes, there is a kind of monotony in terms of every exit/service area looks the same in that BIG country, diversity of terrain and safe (US has safest record in accidents/Car) kind of makes up for it in my opinion.

[Amrik Singh]

Originally Posted by ringoism

All that said, if we want to speak of vehicular TRAVEL culture, then granted U.S. Interstates are mostly boring

Boring !! I endorse that very much. Sit on the Driver's seat, Automatic Transmission - and you lose the use of Left Leg. Miles and miles of straight roads with most of the vehicles being driven in lanes and fairly constant speed. So no use of brakes. Half the use of Right Leg lost. Use Cruise control and both Legs go to sleep mode.
You are sitting just holding the steering wheel. Modern systems would sound alarm if you hit the lane markers. Hands are not doing much either. Lastly, for someone used to be on Indian roads - no sticking your head out to either spit Paan or swear at other drivers. Nothing to the delights of Indians. Real boring experience.

[Jeroen]

Actually, we found driving on many highways and Interstates in the USA quite the thrill. It is so different from just about anything we had ever experienced.

On the Interstates you are likely to across across very quirky places. You drive from Kansas City to Denver, about 600 miles, across the I70. You will pass villages that host some magnificent treasures such as the largest Van Gogh replica, the largest chair, the largest ball of elastic bands etc. etc. Amazing!

These little towns are amazing, you find yourself driving into a scene from”the Dukes of Hazzard”, I kid you not.

Driving for 600 miles with prairies as far as the eye could see was an unbelievable experience. This vastness was something that is just mind boggling.

Jeroen.

[KANNURAN]

India's ranking and the opinions following may be myopic without first savoring the 14 tortuous hours it takes to traverse the paltry 550Km from Kasargod in Kerala's Northern tip to Trivandrum in the South.

Not that the truckers at 35Kph in the fast lane and onrushing vehicles of all sizes on the wrong side of the road in other parts of India help the ranking.

But as many others pointed out, the most agonizing part of driving in India is the glaring absence of driving etiquette. In my experience, I feel, only Nigeria fares worse.

[ringoism]

Originally Posted by Jeroen

Actually, we found driving on many highways and Interstates in the USA quite the thrill. It is so different from just about anything we had ever experienced.

On the Interstates you are likely to across across very quirky places. You drive from Kansas City to Denver, about 600 miles, across the I70. You will pass villages that host some magnificent treasures such as the largest Van Gogh replica, the largest chair, the largest ball of elastic bands etc. etc. Amazing!

These little towns are amazing, you find yourself driving into a scene from”the Dukes of Hazzard”, I kid you not.

Driving for 600 miles with prairies as far as the eye could see was an unbelievable experience. This vastness was something that is just mind boggling.

Jeroen.

Originally Posted by Amrik Singh

Boring !! I endorse that very much. Sit on the Driver's seat, Automatic Transmission - and you lose the use of Left Leg. Miles and miles of straight roads with most of the vehicles being driven in lanes and fairly constant speed. So no use of brakes. Half the use of Right Leg lost. Use Cruise control and both Legs go to sleep mode.
You are sitting just holding the steering wheel. Modern systems would sound alarm if you hit the lane markers. Hands are not doing much either. Lastly, for someone used to be on Indian roads - no sticking your head out to either spit Paan or swear at other drivers. Nothing to the delights of Indians. Real boring experience.

Hehehe... points well-taken. But in the U.S. the true "Interstates" that GTO and I are referring to here are strictly limited-access roads - there are on-ramps and off-ramps and most were not designed with beauty in mind so much as efficiency and speed. As such, as Jeroen said, you PASS the villages - you do not actually drive directly THROUGH any "little towns" to my knowledge. You have to exit the highway to do that, and very few people have the leisure of time to do that or really want to bother unless that little town happens to house a particular known tourist attraction, as he indicated. So in my view the only way to truly see America - the non-tourist-trap, authentic type stuff - and the only way I finally discovered my own country for myself - was to finally forsake those Interstates and to stick strictly to the state highways and smaller roads. Takes you twice as long to get anywhere and the distances of course can be great there - but it is well worth it if you've got the time. There is SO much of interest out there, truly. And unlike out on the Interstates, you're allowed to pull off and take photos wherever you want... It is not a boring country for travel AT ALL, unless you do it in a boring way.

It is easy to miss a great deal - perhaps most of it - in the process of speeding along.

This was actually the entire point and message of the original CARS animated film. The small towns typically got bypassed, the topography was overrun, and nobody takes the time to really look around and experience their (highly altered and sometimes quite unnatural) surroundings.

There are doubtless some famously beautiful stretches of Interstate highway in the country, but they stand out starkly against the relatively boring, unstimulating majority in my view.

As a backdrop: Travelled (much /most of the time behind the wheel) on a 10,000mile (that's 16,000km) loop around the entire country (plus parts of Western Canada) with family just before my senior year of High School, camping every night but two out of those couple months, visiting most of the notable national parks, etc, mainly travelling on Interstates between points of attraction. And in college made multiple 2500km runs by various routes (all Interstate) between New Jersey and Texas, that was twice a year round-trip for 4-1/2 years, so 40,000+km's there, too. So those are very long routes, okay?

And I can honestly say that I / my companions were rarely if ever fascinated, and saw no more than an extremely miniscule fraction out on the roads, compared to what I did the later times when I took a dual-sport bike and rode first from the Mexican border back up to the Northeast, or later a trip along the mid-Atlantic (of which there is a thread here somewhere). Both times over vast distances never touching Interstates for more than a couple short stretches, though at many points I roughly paralleled them - sometimes the same ones I'd done those tens of thousands of km's on earlier.

But what a difference - just amazing, amazing experiences. Then you REALLY drive THROUGH the little towns, and not just the little towns that are near those major highways. And you also drive through the swamplands, and farms, along the bays and fishing wharves, under the boughs of massive Live Oaks, and through urban slums and beachfronts, and cliffs overlooking the Pacific, beside bustling shipyards, etc, etc. The Interstates seldom if ever can give you any of that. You have to get up on the Blue Ridge Parkway / Skyline Drive, the scenic highways, the coastal roads, but more generally the scarcely known local/ state routes, etc if you want to discover and experience all that.

-Eric

P.S. - as for India, now you guys have me thoroughly rattled, being that I've committed to driving 6,000+kms across the north and back in the coming winter months. We'll see how that goes... And God help us!

[McLaren Rulez]

Originally Posted by OffRoadFun

So Norway/Denmark are behind India in ranking? Seriously?

The UK's road quality score is around 4.86/7. India's is 4.52/7. Having driven quite a bit in both countries, that is one hell of a nonlinear scale they're using!

[vb-saan]

USA on top, I agree, but I would think a close 2nd will be Germany with those driving surfaces that can thrill any palate – you can be cruising on the autobahn, and a quick detour will bring you to nice winding country roads and so on.

[LaRoca]

Australia anytime. Words cannot describe how beautiful every millimeter feels in this continent. Truly a car & driving enthusiast's paradise! I eat less so lack of dhabas are not a dealbreaker for me

[AAD]

Originally Posted by GTO

Call me biased, but my top choice is still India .

Completely agree with GTO - A road trip when seen holistically is more than just the drive. The food, the natural vista's along the way, different cultures amongst the different states and the sheer history available to us is unmatched.

What we do need to work on is Road Safety and enforcing road discipline.

Mera Bharat Mahaan

[Amrik Singh]

Originally Posted by AAD

What we do need to work on is Road Safety and enforcing road discipline.

Can you take your eye off the road to enjoy the nature ? Even with all eyes on the road you have to watch for some idiot cutting in front of you or tailgating you.

[RGK]

As mentioned by many, due to the variety of roads we see, driving in India is always intriguing as opposed to the routine driving in other nations. Today, highway driving in India has also grown a little monotonous.

In other countries, driving is very easy but acquiring a license is very strict. In India, getting a license is simple but driving is challenging.

[chaudh2s]

On public roads, India should be on top of enthusiasts list. The amount of illegal things you can do here on public roads and to your cars to get the thrills is just unparalleled anywhere else. The risks also tag along but isn't that the byproduct of driving enthusiasm? Being safe and enthusiasm never go together. Who calls one an enthusiast by driving at steady 110kmph all day on straight highways? Its sleep inducing! In western world if you call yourself an enthusiast for getting the thrills while driving on public roads, then please look up the meaning of enthusiasm before calling yourself one. You can't modify your car, every year mandatory car fitness checks, strict, heavily penalizing driving fines. Its no fun, just a mundane job that needs to be done to survive. Accessibility to tracks probably got the western world on top of the list.

[hummer]

I have driven extensively in the US and India, but traveled in few Asian and European countries as passenger.

US is one of the developed countries with very well laid out rules and infra for safe and happy drives, you can drive for 100s/1000s on miles of arrow straight roads without getting confused, you feel home everywhere within US, but always at home is boring for my taste, I love variety and connection.

You may call me biased but India gives me what I love as a driver. It's an amazing country, you get to see different food, dialect, culture, terrain for every 500kms almost.

US best for variety of cars and India just for the love of driving whichever car

[jono213]

Originally Posted by RahulNagaraj

According to certain reports

I Can't understand how Germany isn't in the top 3, rich automotive heritage, amazing car culture, and of course, the legendary autobahn and the Nürburgring. Germany comes out on top in my books.