Compared the 3 methods
D2_list=[list(range(100))]*100
t1=time.time()
for i in range(10**5):
for j in range(10):
b=[k[j] for k in D2_list]
D2_list_time=time.time()-t1
array=np.array(D2_list)
t1=time.time()
for i in range(10**5):
for j in range(10):
b=array[:,j]
Numpy_time=time.time()-t1
D2_trans = list(zip(*D2_list))
t1=time.time()
for i in range(10**5):
for j in range(10):
b=D2_trans[j]
Zip_time=time.time()-t1
print ('2D List:',D2_list_time)
print ('Numpy:',Numpy_time)
print ('Zip:',Zip_time)
The Zip method works best. It was quite useful when I had to do some column wise processes for mapreduce jobs in the cluster servers where numpy was not installed.