While the hangover from the pandemic still affect many areas of our lives, it seems city congestion on our roads is back.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, London comes top of the charts. A little more surprising is that this list is international – London is the most congested city in the world!

Chart toppers

Traffic specialists Inrix produce a ‘Traffic Scorecard’ annually.

This shows that drivers in London are losing 156 hours sitting in congestion, 5% above pre-pandemic delays.

In fact, 72% (79 of the 110) of the UK urban areas analysed have met or exceeded pre-Covid delays.

Commuting in London cost the average driver £1,377 in lost time. This was followed by Bristol (£805 lost time) and Manchester (£742 lost time).

Digging deep

Just to add to the misery, the high oil prices mean commuters paid as much as £212 more for fuel in 2022 year-on-year, depending on location. While the average UK commuter spent £707 in lost time, they also paid £122 more for fuel due to oil prices.

Bob Pishue, transportation analyst, is the author of the report. He welcomes  the signs that “civic and commercial life returning to normal”, but the negative is that congestion in many cases is “exceeding, pre-pandemic levels”. With this comes increasing costs, whether that is in time lost, monies paid , or the environment damage.

With the economic crisis, recession and the drag on the economy of both Brexit and the pandemic, he believes we need to be careful how we move forward if we wish to avoid exacerbating the problems.

“We must manage congestion while improving mobility and accessibility in cities to avoid it hurting economic recovery and impacting the quality of life of commuters and residents.”

City scape

Drivers in London (156 hours), Bristol (91 hours), and Manchester (84 hours) lost the most time to traffic congestion in the UK.

Globally, the next most congested cities after London were Chicago (155 hours), Paris (138 hours), Boston (134 hours) and New York (117 hours).

The average UK driver lost 80 hours due to traffic congestion last year – up 7 hours from last year but down 35 hours from 2019.

The cities of Cambridge, Exeter, and Cheltenham – present on the UK Top 10 list in 2021 – fell out of the top 10, replaced by Edinburgh (7th), Leeds (9th) and Leicester (10th).

Capital offence

The top five most congested UK corridors are all found in the capital.

London’s most congested corridor – A219 S/B from A304 Fulham Road to A297 Morden Hall Road – saw drivers lose 47 hours in 2022. This major route out of the city often experiences high volumes of traffic at peak times commuting times. Continuing closure of the Hammersmith Bridge is also contributing to increased delay in the area.

Outside of London, the busiest corridor was in Birmingham – A45 E/B from Bordesley Circus to Henry Road – costing drivers 37 hours.

Much of this congestion occurred due to road works to make improvements to the route that have run throughout the latter part of 2022 and traffic incidents that have occurred on the route.

Worldly ways

Comparing these UK figures to rest of the world may bring some light relief. Relaxation around the world of Covid-19 restrictions in 2022 means more traffic. More traffic leads inexorably to more traffic congestion in cities around the world .

London’s 5% increase is dwarfed by other top 10 cities including Chicago (49%), Boston (72%) and New York City (15%).

The full report can be viewed here.