Most Traffic Congested Cities

Worlds Most Traffic Congested Cities

Which City suffers the world’s worst traffic congestion was a difficult question to answer when I set up DriverAbroad.com in 2011. Very few people used SatNav systems at that point so there was no accurate data on world traffic flows. However, in recent years, the sue of GPS navigational aids has become widespread, and the authority on congestion in cities around the world is now generally accepted to be the World Tarffic Index stats produced annually by SatNav manufacturer TomTom.

The methodology TomTom use is to establish a baseline for travel times within a city, and compare that to the time of journeys undertaken at peak times. From that they come up with a congestion % level. For instance – a 53% congestion level in Bangkok, means that a 30-minute trip will take 53% more time than it would during Bangkok’s baseline uncongested conditions. So the non rush hour journey of 30 mins, when undertaken at rush hour, would take 30 + 53% = 45 minutes.

One obvious shortcoming of this system is that it ignores cities which have horrific traffic congestion at all times of the day, therefore avoids a large differential between peak times and normal traffic. Also, it only uses data from TomTom SatNav systems so will miss countries where few people use a GPS device. In my experience, cities in Africa such as Kampala,Lagos and Nairobi suffer worse traffic congestion at most times of the day than that which I’ve witnessed in Manila and Bogota. The top 10 African cities included in the data are Cairo, plus 9 cities in South Africa. This seems to confirm the fact that most cities on the continent are omitted due to there being very few users of TomTom devices.

2019 Rankings are –

World’s Most Congested Cities

Rank City Country Congestion Level
1 Bengaluru India 71%
2 Manila Philippines 71%
3 Bogota Colombia 68%
4 Mumbai India 65%
5 Pune India 59%
6 Moscow region Russia 59%
7 Lima Peru 57%
8 New Delhi India 56%
9 Istanbul Turkey 55%
10 Jakarta Indonesia 53%
11 Bangkok Thailand 53%
12 Kyiv Ukraine 53%
13 Mexico City Mexico 52%
14 Bucharest Romania 52%
15 Recife Brazil 50%
16 Saint Petersburg Russia 49%
17 Dublin Ireland 48%
18 Odessa Ukraine 47%
19 Lodz Poland 47%
20 Rio de Janeiro Brazil 46%

Europe’s Most Congested Cities

Rank World Rank City Country Congestion Level
1 6 Moscow region Russia 59%
2 9 Istanbul Turkey 55%
3 12 Kyiv Ukraine 53%
4 14 Bucharest Romania 52%
5 16 Saint Petersburg Russia 49%
6 17 Dublin Ireland 48%
7 18 Odessa Ukraine 47%
8 19 Lodz Poland 47%
9 22 Krakow Poland 45%
10 23 Novosibirsk Russia 45%
11 25 Samara Russia 44%
12 27 Poznan Poland 44%
13 29 Kharkiv Ukraine 43%
14 30 Athens Greece 43%
15 33 Edinburgh UK 41%
16 35 Yekaterinburg Russia 41%
17 37 Warsaw Poland 40%
18 41 Wroclaw Poland 39%
19 42 Paris France 39%
20 43 Rome Italy 38%

North America’s Most Congested Cities

Rank World Rank City Country Congestion Level
1 13 Mexico City Mexico 52%
2 31 Los Angeles USA 42%
3 40 Vancouver Canada 39%
4 52 New York USA 37%
5 59 San Francisco USA 36%
6 80 Toronto Canada 33%
7 84 San Jose USA 33%
8 110 Seattle USA 31%
9 113 Miami USA 31%
10 138 Montreal Canada 29%
11 139 Ottawa Canada 29%
12 141 Washington USA 29%
13 148 Chicago USA 28%
14 156 Honolulu USA 28%
15 162 Austin USA 27%
16 180 Baton Rouge USA 26%
17 182 San Diego USA 26%
18 184 Boston USA 26%
19 189 Portland USA 26%
20 192 Nashville USA 26%

Asia’s Most Congested Cities

Rank World Rank City Country Congestion Level
1 1 Bengaluru India 71%
2 2 Manila Philippines 71%
3 4 Mumbai India 65%
4 5 Pune India 59%
5 8 New Delhi India 56%
6 10 Jakarta Indonesia 53%
7 11 Bangkok Thailand 53%
8 32 Tokyo Japan 42%
9 34 Chongqing China 41%
10 38 Guangzhou China 40%
11 39 Zhuhai China 39%
12 46 Kuala Lumpur Malaysia 37%
13 49 Shenzhen China 37%
14 51 Beijing China 37%
15 57 Osaka Japan 36%
16 61 Changsha China 35%
17 64 Taipei Taiwan 35%
18 65 Chengdu China 35%
19 74 Taichung Taiwan 34%
20 78 Changchun China 33%

 

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