Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 22 March 2016   TomTom (TOM2) today released the results of the TomTom Traffic Index 2016, the annual report detailing the cities around the world with the most traffic congestion. And the big news this year is that Istanbul has been knocked off the top spot by Mexico City. Drivers in the Mexican capital can expect to spend on average, 59% extra travel time stuck in traffic anytime of the day, and up to 103% in the evening peak periods versus a free flow, or uncongested, situation – adding-up to 219** hours of extra travel time per year.

Next in the rankings are Bangkok (57%), Istanbul (50%), Rio de Janeiro (47%), and Moscow (44%), making up the top five most congested cities in the world.

Using data from 2015, the TomTom Traffic Index looks at the traffic congestion situation in 295 cities in 38 countries on six continents – from Rome to Rio, Singapore to San Francisco. TomTom works with 14 trillion data points that have been accumulated over eight years. This is the fifth year of the TomTom Traffic Index.  

Congestion Up, Globally

Looking at TomTom’s historical data, it’s clear that traffic congestion is up by 13% globally since 2008. But, interestingly, there are shocking differences between continents. While North America’s traffic congestion has increased by 17%, Europe as has only increased by 2%. It could be suggested that this points to economic growth in North America, and Economic depression in the rest of Europe. This European figure could be heavily influenced by Southern European countries such as Italy (-7%) and Spain (-13%) where there has been a marked drop in traffic congestion in the past eight years.

Ralf-Peter Schaefer, VP TomTom Traffic, said: “The TomTom Traffic Index is released every year to help drivers, cities and transport planners to understand traffic congestion trends but, most importantly, how to improve congestion globally. We really want everybody to think about how they can lower the amount of time they waste in traffic every day – and to realise that we all need to play a part. If even just five per cent of us changed our travel plans, we’d improve travel times on our major highways by up to thirty per cent***. Collectively, we can all work together to beat traffic congestion.”

People can find out more about the TomTom Traffic Index, and discover where their home city ranks at www.tomtom.com/trafficindex. There’s also helpful advice on beating traffic congestion, as well as independent analysis. And, for the first time, a selection of ‘Profile Cities’ provide insight into what they are doing to improve mobility.

Ranking of the most congested cities globally in 2015 (Overall daily congestion level – extra travel time – population over 800,000):

Ranking of the most congested cities in Europe in 2015 (Overall daily congestion level – extra travel time – population over 800,000):

Ranking of the most congested cities in North America in 2015 (Overall daily congestion level – extra travel time – population over 800,000):

*Since 2008 when TomTom’s records started

** Extra travel time during peak hours compared to an hour of driving during free flow conditions, multiplied by 230 working days per year

*** Reference: https://people.hofstra.edu/geotrans/eng/methods/highwaysfd.html