This Dangerous Road In China Will Make You Wish For Your Normal Traffic Jam

There are some routes so treacherous you wouldn't even travel them by foot, much less by car. The Guoliang Tunnel Road is one such place, found high up in the Taihang Mountains of China. This narrow, hand-carved tunnel traces along a sheer cliff face for 1.2 kilometers (about three-quarters of a mile) of white-knuckle driving. At its widest, the road is just 4 meters (13 feet) across and 5 meters (16 feet) high. For reference, sedans are only about 6.5 feet wide. With those measurements, there's no way two-way traffic could work on a stretch of road like this. One traffic jam and you'd be yearning for rush hour in LA or San Francisco.

Driving through a narrow tunnel is one thing, but this road also features gaping open sections with no guardrails to keep you from veering over the precipice if you're not careful. It's not hard to see why it carries the clunky nickname "the road that does not tolerate mistakes." There are more than 30 of these irregularly shaped openings cut into the cliff to let light and air filter inside. Reports of vehicles colliding or plunging off the mountainside have surfaced over the years, but comprehensive data is limited thanks to China's national security laws and regulations. This should come as no surprise, considering the country's frequent technology bans.

The reason for such a wild Mario Kart track of a road is actually pretty simple: It links the once-isolated village of Guoliang to the outside world. And, believe it or not, the road in place before this one was even more dangerous. Before construction began in 1972, villagers had to use a near-vertical stone stairway of 720 steep, narrow steps carved into the mountain without handrails. The path was the only connection between Guoliang and the surrounding communities in Huixian County. That's just how things were before modern roads and highways.

Ironically, the Guoliang Tunnel Road is the safer alternative. It took 13 local men five years, and thousands of chisels and hammers and a dozen tons of steel drill rods to create it. At its most difficult, workers only advanced one single meter (just over three feet) every three days. After half a decade of hard labor, the tunnel opened to traffic in May 1977. Today, the Guoliang Tunnel serves as both a route to Guoliang and a popular tourist attraction in one. Visitors come from all over China (not to mention the rest of the world) to witness the engineering feat and experience its terrifying turns firsthand.