r/BeAmazed • u/doopityWoop22 • Sep 09 '26
Place Baldwin Street, in New Zealand, is the world's steepest street. It has an average slope of about 1:5.
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u/SplinterRifleman Sep 09 '26
The hill my dad walked up on his way to school
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u/Lil_Shanties Sep 09 '26 edited Sep 09 '26
Both ways
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u/DanGleeballs Sep 09 '26
Barefoot 🦶
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u/JohnPoet27 Sep 09 '26
In the snow but with 45° C heat somehow
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u/salty_drafter Sep 09 '26
With a cow to carry their trumpet and had to carry the cow home bc it died.
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u/TheLastRiceGrain Sep 10 '26
Then had to cook for the entire family when he got home.
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u/thusnewmexico Sep 10 '26
To be clear, he was cooking the dead cow.
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u/snertwith2ls Sep 10 '26
so, not the trumpet?
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u/play_it_sam_ Sep 09 '26
And there were venomous snakes on the way hiding on the grass, waiting for him to make a mistake
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u/MaximumPegasus Sep 09 '26
Venomous birds, bro. NZ has no snakes.
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u/CptJustice Sep 09 '26
That you know of.
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u/MaximumPegasus Sep 09 '26
Only rare native sea snakes, no land snakes in NZ. But when I was a kid there were haast's eagles in NZ, the world's largest eagles. Occasionally someone wouldn't turn up to school, and you'd know that an eagle got them.
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u/toxcrusadr Sep 09 '26
Don't forget the onion.
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u/MaximumPegasus Sep 09 '26 edited Sep 09 '26
Oh yea! We used to carry those around to keep the eagles away, as was the style at the time.
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u/Kind_Piglet8531 Sep 10 '26
Roll call was like
“Caruthers…”
“Caruthers…”
“Who can tell me where is Caruthers?”
“Eagle got him, Miss.”
“Davies…”
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u/Odd_Dragonfruit_2662 Sep 10 '26
Well not anymore. He had to kill all the snakes on the way home from school with just a toothpick.
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u/NeedsMoreYellow Sep 09 '26
Lol. I used to live in Australia and did actually have to watch out for snakes in the grass on my way to school. Ran over a tiger snake once. It surprised both of us and I just kept running home, but with scream-mode activated.😅 My brother said the snake was still there about 5 minutes later, so it probably wasn't as bothered by the surprise as I was. 😂
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u/huggylove1 Sep 09 '26
And an army of carnivorous snails that could speak telepathically through their shells causing a slimey film on the tarmac at an alarming rate.
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u/Curiouspiwakawaka Sep 09 '26
Most NZers go barefoot.
Source: am a barefoot Kiwi
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u/BeatsAndSkies Sep 09 '26
I guess technically possible, since he could have gone to Ōpoho primary. But you’d have to sneak through a couple of back yards to get up to Evan’s Street. Though North East Valley Normal is only a couple blocks further down North Road so you’d probably send your kids there instead.
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u/Fun_Management8484 Sep 10 '26
The Evans Street back yard you'd be sneaking through was my mums. When she went to DNI it literally was the hill she took on her way home.
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u/Top-Waltz5244 Sep 09 '26
My dad swam to school both ways…in a hurricane…during winter…and then climbed a hill like this
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u/harbinger-nz Sep 09 '26
I have driven up this in a Prius and let me tell you it's no joke. Was crapping myself as there is no proper u-turn or ending to The road so you end up u-turning in somebody's driveway on an awkward as angle wondering if the car will tip
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u/ctothel Sep 09 '26
I rode my motorbike up and down it once. It was actually a bit intimidating. There’s no way I could have turned around half way up.
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u/Penfold_for_PM Sep 09 '26
It's funny watching people go up and realise they have to turn around. I applaud you doing it in the Prius. I had family live on it & it was tricky in the manual. We used their Ford Escort instead of our Valient (lesson learned quickly), fun days.
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u/WackyRacketeer Sep 10 '26
I had to climb an insane slope in a tiny rental manual SUV on an island in Thailand. The sloppy gearbox sure didnt help, but darn did I have a time.
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u/NZcfman1998 Sep 10 '26
I used to have to drive up there twice a week in a rubbish truck to empty the bins at the top
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u/no_talent_ass_clown Sep 10 '26
Wow, that sounds frightening!
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u/NZcfman1998 Sep 10 '26
Going up wasn't too bad, turning around and coming back down, that was fairly interesting in an 8 ton truck
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u/OGWriggle Sep 10 '26
But for dunedin, is it even top 10 sketchy streets to drive a rubbish truck up?
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u/restroom_raider Sep 09 '26
There's a driveway forming a T intersection right at the top, on the relatively level section - most people turn around there.
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u/harbinger-nz Sep 10 '26
Problem was there was a guy already doing a 10 point turn in his Prado. Decidedly average experience 😂
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u/honeywhereismypenis Sep 10 '26
My 2005 honda civic literally could never lmao. I smoked the clutch trying to get up a mountain path in Utah and I'm pretty sure it wasn't that steep. I have gained new respect for the prius.
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u/Angryferret Sep 10 '26 edited Sep 10 '26
I once backed a trailer into a driveway on Baldwin Street
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u/werewere-kokako Sep 10 '26
PSA: you're not supposed to drive up just for lookieloos. It's a residential street, there's no good place to turn at the top, and it's a bitch and a half to resurface the road.
I lived across the road, so I'd walk up a few times a week. I watched an influencer-type take a taxi to the top then yell at the driver to get out of the background of her selfie. Then she yelled at him to drive back up again so she wouldn't have to walk maybe 10m downhill...
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u/Eclipsed830 Sep 10 '26
I used to have to park my Prius on a hill like this, and there were times where from a stop it simply could not move and if have to reverse. Felt so bad for the car. Lol
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u/Iterata2 Sep 09 '26
How long is this road?
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u/ThatAstroGuyNZ Sep 09 '26
350 meters or approximately 328.5 bald eagles in length
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u/Fine-Try9876 Sep 09 '26
Not sure in meters, but it feels like a million miles when about half way up...
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u/werewere-kokako Sep 10 '26
Joggers used to pass me on my way up, then I'd pass them, reach the top, and walk all the way back down without seeing them again. I just assumed they gave up and went home, but maybe one of the more fearsome mail boxes was eating them
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u/Useful-Problem-1725 Sep 10 '26
I'd feel pretty good about it in a car with a bunch of heavy batteries under the floorboards.
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u/griffo-666 Sep 10 '26
I used to drive rubbish trucks up it, had to go really early before the tourists showed up or they'd get in the way...
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Sep 09 '26
[deleted]
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u/wxnfx Sep 09 '26
Heroes get remembered, but legends never die.
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u/chavez_ding2001 Sep 09 '26
Apparently this one did.
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u/ms_saint Sep 10 '26
No, his memory lives on. That's the whole point of the saying.
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u/ImDoingItAnyway Sep 09 '26
Great song.
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u/greggreggreg1gregg Sep 09 '26
I love that you know this as a Four Year Strong song and not the Sandlot quote lol
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u/One-Bird-8961 Sep 09 '26
Sadly, this is correct. A university student.
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u/Choice-Strike1 Sep 09 '26
Surely was wasted beyond
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u/normalmighty Sep 10 '26 edited Sep 10 '26
I remember the national discussion at the time being about how to stop all the students there from binge drinking at parties and doing shit like this every day
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u/New_Combination_7012 Sep 09 '26
Someone skied down there a few weeks ago.
Skiers hit world's steepest street, Baldwin Street, as Dunedin roads turn to slopes in snow | RNZ
Dunedin generally gets a single snowfall each year, its distance from the equator is similar to cities like Milan.
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u/Accomplished-City484 Sep 09 '26
Why are so many people in robes? What time of day did he do this?
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u/New_Combination_7012 Sep 09 '26
Students having a snow day. Snow isn't common, people and the city aren't prepared for it. Everything shuts down.
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u/adisarterinthemaking Sep 10 '26
I see people in those kinds of robes quite often in the supermarket here.
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u/Simbians Sep 10 '26
I lived in dunedin for a year and one of my favorite memories is watching people being towed down the streets behind cars, on snow boards in winter.
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u/MaeveOathrender Sep 10 '26
That's my cousin. And yet people are still doing it. Every now and then another close call happens and the local news trots out the interview with her mother telling other teenagers not to be dumbasses.
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u/elgigantedelsur Sep 10 '26
I was at uni then, mate’s flatmate. Actually really fucking sad. Just a couple of students being silly and a consequence that was massively out of proportion.
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u/HappycamperNZ Sep 10 '26
Im our defense this is the town with a large uni population and a drinking problem.
I may or may not have also considered it it my younger days, but down Trias in Auckland.
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u/abetheschizoid Sep 10 '26
Unfortunately, some brainless students still ride wheelie bins down the street.
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u/thenerdwrangler Sep 09 '26
He didn't die. The girl who was in the bin with him did.
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u/reddits- Sep 10 '26
What a non-sensical correction? The commenter said that someone non-specific died, and you say "no he didn't, someone else did"..?
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u/WhatTheHellLol1313 Sep 09 '26
Fixed it!
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u/123DaddySawAFlea Sep 09 '26
I tried driving up it in my old front wheel drive corolla. Tires started spinning about a quarter of the way up.
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u/agumelen Sep 09 '26
Zigzag
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u/TheTopNacho Sep 09 '26
People always look at me funny when I enter steep driveways at an angle. Glad to see someone else appreciates physics
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u/agumelen Sep 09 '26
We’ve learned from experience. I’ve been driving manual for 29 years.
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u/Fylutt Sep 10 '26
We drove rental Rav4 up that street, traction was ok, but CVT got very very unhappy, it smelled so bad. I was pushing gas to the end, it Rav4 was struggling so much. Next time we travel in our EV around south island- I'm curious to see how my EV will take that street
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u/xordis Sep 10 '26
I remember when I visited this street there was a student dropping her friend off. It was a typical Dunedin day where it had been raining, so the road was wet. They made it about half way up before losing traction and starting to slide backwards. Stopped and the friend got out and walked the rest of the way to their house whilst the friend carefully backed down the hill and turned around.
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u/babysharkdoodoodoo Sep 09 '26
If I am not mistaken, 1:5 reads rise versus run, 1 divided by 5 gives it 20% slope ratio.
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u/Emergency_Bicycle172 Sep 09 '26
that's just the average, the maximum is 35%
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u/RandomAmmonite Sep 10 '26
Thank you. I was puzzled how this was the steepest street in the world because I’ve driven on a bunch of 20+% grades in the mountains. But 35% is seriously steep.
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u/dnnsshly Sep 10 '26
Yes but a "street" suggests a road in an urban environment with buildings along it, rather than a random road in a mountain pass
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u/Decantus Sep 09 '26
And SF has some streets that are far more than a 20% grade.
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u/kiwicoys Sep 09 '26
OP’s numbers are incorrect. The average slope is 1:3.41 & its steepest section is 1:2.86 slope
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u/merlinunf Sep 10 '26
So about the same as my driveway. My drive is only about 260 feet or 79 meters long. I have slid down it several times… never on purpose, and sometimes in a car.
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u/TheBeatGoesAnanas Sep 10 '26
So, a 35% grade at its steepest?
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u/Low_Season Sep 10 '26
Those are the streets at their steepest. The world record requires it be over a 10 meter length because a single point doesn't make a street the steepest, it actually needs to be over a significant enough length
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u/Allaplgy Sep 10 '26
Ever been up the street in Pacifica with the castle at the top, next to Oceana HS? I wonder what that is
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u/uwearclownshoes Sep 09 '26
I’d want to chock my tires parking on that hill.
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u/RickMuffy Sep 09 '26
I'd doubt many people park on this at all.
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u/uwearclownshoes Sep 09 '26
You’re most likely correct. Otherwise it’d be the most well known hill for vehicles rolling down it, I suspect.
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u/mikeyjam4life Sep 10 '26
Its not wide enough to do that, no one parks on the road on the steep bit. you have to pull off into peoples driveways and park there.
FWIW, the footpath up the side of the road is stairs.
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u/ManAndHisFlamingo Sep 09 '26
My parents walked that street to school everyday in the snow
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u/Tcloud Sep 09 '26 edited Sep 10 '26
Fun fact! The space shuttles glide ratio as it was landing was 4.5:1 or it traveled 4.5m horizontally for every meter vertically which is close to the slope of this street.
Edit. Thanks to /r/itsjakerobb for a correction.
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u/imacyber Sep 10 '26
isn't it the other way around for the street? 1:5 instead of 5:1
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u/Ranier_Wolfnight Sep 09 '26
Stick shift must be a doozy on this road
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u/VegetableRound2819 Sep 09 '26
Parking my rental car in San Francisco terrified me. I gave up.
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u/sfocolleen Sep 10 '26
I moved to SF with a stick shift, back in the day. I don’t recommend it.
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u/cbrown6894 Sep 09 '26
The roll starts would certainly be a nightmare but I would almost want one to keep it in low gear as I climb a mountain daily, wtf is this street lol
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u/imacyber Sep 10 '26
you can select the gear in autos though
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u/cbrown6894 Sep 10 '26
You can, but manual gives some more control if you know what you’re doing and used to the vehicle (I’m not a car bro, just a manual advocate lol)
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u/New_Combination_7012 Sep 09 '26
The tipping point between automatic and manuals (more automatic passenger vehicles being registered than manual) didn't actually happen in NZ till about 2010. Even then the majority of new cars sold being sold being automatic didn't happen till the mid to late 2010s.
Hill starts and parking was part of everyone's driving tests.
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u/buntopolis Sep 09 '26
Yeah I thought manual in San Francisco was bad.
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u/Mountainpwny Sep 09 '26
I loved driving my manual Honda Civic in SF. You just need to learn the parking brake trick.
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u/Ballabingballaboom Sep 09 '26
Is that where you find the biting point (the bonnet goes up slightly) before letting releasing the hand brake?
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u/jkpetrov Sep 09 '26
Yup, also you get used to the right sound when you know your motor has enough juice for launch.
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u/BeatsAndSkies Sep 09 '26
Picked up a skateboard from Facebook marketplace 2/3rds of the way up once. The Micra handled it ok.
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u/HH93 Sep 10 '26
I thought you were going to say that you broke a local speed record for skate boarding
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u/Dragon900x Sep 09 '26
Stepping out in the morning but realising its bin day must go something like this
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u/JColey15 Sep 09 '26
Every single time this gets posted the comments are full of Americans claiming San Francisco has steeper streets or Pittsburgh. Some streets might have steeper sections but they’re such small sections that Guinness doesn’t count them.
Their requirements are that it’s a residential street and it’s measured from the centreline for at least 10m. Otherwise a ramp, someones driveway, or some 4WD track in the middle of nowhere would easily be steeper.
There is no residential street in the world (that Guiness knows about) that gains more altitude in 10 horizontal metres (approx. 33 ft) than Baldwin Street in Dunedin, New Zealand. It might be arbitrary but it’s a very steep street. 10m is not a very long section of street. If you genuinely think some other street is steeper then challenge the record.
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u/Dimps7 Sep 10 '26
Harlech, North Wales briefly stole the record before NZ took it back
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u/elgigantedelsur Sep 10 '26
By measuring on the inside of a curve, from memory, which is so daft that I hope they are proper ashamed
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u/Immortal_Jaz Sep 10 '26
I live in Harlech, our council has no shame. There's a sign at the bottom still claiming the record. See people under it often taking photos after they've walked up it.
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u/Eldudearinony Sep 09 '26
Looks like Ithaca or Pittsburgh streets
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u/PSU632 Sep 09 '26
Funny you say that. Pittsburgh also has a claim to the steepest street in the world (it's very disputed).
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u/kkeller4 Sep 10 '26
Interesting… even compared to San Francisco?
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u/ohnovangogh Sep 10 '26
Yep canton is steeper. Pittsburgh has a shitton of steep streets but it’s not as apparent as SF because SF is relatively flat except for the hills. Pittsburgh is a ton of hills.
Source I’ve lived in both places.
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u/hemorrhoidhematoma Sep 09 '26
Tough place to grow up in a wheelchair at least half of the time.
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u/WildLemonRaider Sep 09 '26
From having lived near this street - it’s well worth walking up (you see people running it as well)
I remember back in the day - someone went down in a rubbish bin for a laugh, it didn’t end well…
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u/New_Complex_5126 Sep 09 '26
At least it is smooth..ish. Unlike the hovis bread advert, push bike and cobbles!
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u/rust_belt216 Sep 09 '26
Nice dry basement.
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u/LevelPrestigious4858 Sep 09 '26
Basements aren’t really a thing in NZ
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u/Waniou Sep 10 '26
They're not uncommon in Dunedin, mainly because most of the city is built on hills so the "basement" is typically just the bit under the house that's not level, if that makes sense
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u/thisrockismyboone Sep 09 '26
As long as youre near the top of the hill. I live in a hilly area and my last house was near the bottom of a hill and we would routinely get an inch or 2 in the basement any time it rained. Just a fact of life. Now I live across town near the top of the hill and rarely have water issues
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u/everyonestupidbutme Sep 09 '26
What does 1:5 mean? Isn't it common to measure such things in degrees?
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u/babysharkdoodoodoo Sep 09 '26
This is a traditional way of measuring a road's gradient or slope, common in the UK and across the Commonwealth. It means, for every 5 units of horizontal distance you travel, the road rises or falls by 1 vertical unit.
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u/everyonestupidbutme Sep 09 '26
So a 20% gradient, or 18*s?
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u/SingularityCentral Sep 09 '26
A 34.5% gradient is the official measure. 1:5 is wrong, it is 1:2.90.
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u/cheshire-cats-grin Sep 09 '26
Actually you are both right 34.5% 1:2.90 is the maximum gradient but the average is 20% 1:5
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u/CletusDSpuckler Sep 09 '26
Hmm. That's a 20% slope. I regularly drive a road with sections at 18%, and it's steep but not some kind of "why did I do this" scary. Something seems incongruous here.
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u/2_short_Plancks Sep 10 '26
It's because the 20% is the average across the whole street, there are steeper sections (with the steepest bit being close to the top).
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u/elgigantedelsur Sep 10 '26
This is just a picturesque bit. The steeper bit is further up and is genuinely pretty steep
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