Even with all the potholes and constant construction, and high gas prices, Illinois has been ranked as one of the top 10 states in the country to drive in, so how did it end up so high on this list?

Get our free mobile app

WalletHub.com has officially ranked all the states from which states are the best to drive in and which are the worst to drive in, and to my surprise (a lifelong Illinoisan) Illinois ranked as the 9th best state to drive in! The reason why Illinois made it into the 9th place behind only states like Iowa which came in 1st place, followed by Oklahoma, Kansas, North Carolina, and Texas to round out the top five is that Illinois ranks really high in a couple of key "driving" categories...

Illinois ranked 4th in car repair shops per capita, 7th for car dealerships per capita, and most impressive Illinois ranked 6th in overall safety a category which factors in things such as traffic deaths, laws for safety, animal accidents among others. Illinois could have ranked higher BUT Illinois finished poorly in categories such as road quality 26th overall, traffic and infrastructure 36th,  and overall cost of ownership 34th.

To see the full list of stats for yourself click here!

For our listeners, on the other side of the Mississippi River, Missouri comes in at 42nd on the list struggling mainly because of a 49th overall rating in safety.

I am honestly shocked Illinois ranks this high, this list must put more weight on things like safety, and laws for safety over actual cost, road conditions, and traffic. I have driven in Illinois my whole life and I can honestly say this is not one of the best 10 states to drive in, speed limits are too low, plate stickers are DMV charges are wayyyy to high, and conditions in the winter stink with all the potholes, and don't even get me started on Gas Prices! I gotta disagree with this list.

LOOK: See how much gasoline cost the year you started driving

To find out more about how has the price of gas changed throughout the years, Stacker ran the numbers on the cost of a gallon of gasoline for each of the last 84 years. Using data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (released in April 2020), we analyzed the average price for a gallon of unleaded regular gasoline from 1976 to 2020 along with the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for unleaded regular gasoline from 1937 to 1976, including the absolute and inflation-adjusted prices for each year.

Read on to explore the cost of gas over time and rediscover just how much a gallon was when you first started driving.

See the Must-Drive Roads in Every State

More From KHMO-AM 1070, News-Talk-Sports