A new survey conducted by AutoVantage, a Connecticut-based automobile membership club, and Prince Market Research reveals which U.S. cities have the worst cases of road rage — and D.C. came in at number five, behind only Los Angeles (#4), Boston (#3), New York (#2) and Miami (#1). From CNN.com:

The most frequent cause of road rage cited in the survey was impatient motorists. Drivers also said road rage can stem from poor driving in fast lanes and driving while stressed, frustrated or angry.

“The best piece of advice is to take a deep breath. Slow down, be aware and be careful,” AutoVantage spokesman Todd Smith said, adding the aim of the survey is to increase driver safety across the nation.

More than 2,500 drivers who regularly commute in 25 major metropolitan areas were asked to rate road rage and rude driving in telephone surveys between January and March.

Call us crazy, but it’s always seemed to us like driving within D.C. was actually fairly polite. Most of the time, you don’t see a lot of speeding on our city’s streets (except on the diagonals leading in and out of the city), and the preponderance of stops and lights has always meant that the chances of being cut-off in such a manner that you’d fly into a road rage situation are pretty slim. But no doubt those of you who commute into the city for work have different tales to tell. The projectile beverage incidents of earlier this year suggest the suburbs could be boiling over with rage that us city dwellers never see. So tell us — is D.C. really one of the top five road rage cities in the country? Worse than Phoenix or San Francisco?

Photo by billadler