World’s Most Congested Cities
December 22nd, 2006 Posted in Destination reports, GeneralForbes has put out a story on the world’s most congested cities and for me, looking through it brings back memories of packed-in people, endless honking horns in gridlock, and a staggering level of air polllution. “The cities with the highest level of population congestion are: Manila, the Philippines; Cairo, Egypt; Lagos, Nigeria; Macau, off the Chinese coast; Seoul, South Korea; Dhaka, Bangladesh; Buenos Aires, Argentina; Jakarta, Indonesia; Kaohsiung, Taiwan; and Santo Domingo, the Dominican Republic. To drive a car in any of them might be the ultimate challenge.”
This seems open to debate, as Buenos Aires seems pretty tame compared to Delhi or Bangkok. Plus driving in Mexico City, from what I hear, is far worse than anything I ever encountered taking taxis around Seoul. But I guess the population density and lack of space for new cars is what really matters for these measurements. The common thread is that the number of vehicles has outgrown the infrastructure. Per the Forbes piece:
The list of the worst world cities for traffic is skewed by the growing impact of transportation revolutions in developing countries. It takes time to build a road infrastructure. It takes time to install and maintain a traffic system. Traffic lights have to be coordinated and their power source has to have redundancy. It takes time to train and educate drivers.
The list of the world’s most congested cities centers on many Asian and a few African and Latin American cities that for the most part are playing catch up or trying to. For the moment, at least, their growth is defeating them. Moreover, “traffic is only one of the side effects of growth,” says Roy Barnes, the author and former Georgia governor, who had to contend with his own problems of congestion and growth.
