Mexico City claims world’s worst traffic, second year in a row

Global Business

Mexico City has claimed the crown for the most traffic congested city in the world, for the second year in a row.

Besides driver frustration and productivity loss, the problem comes with a hefty price tag, that could bring the city’s economy to a standstill.

CGTN’s Franc Contreras reports.

The TomTom Traffic Index measures time spent in traffic at congested vs. uncongested conditions.

Many of the Mexican capital’s avenues, boulevards and streets are relatively narrow, like they have been since the late 1500s, when Spanish Conquerors first built roads here.

Modern-day Mexico City’s traffic problem is growing.

City planners around the world said one of the best ways to reduce traffic congestion in urban centers is to reduce the number of parking spaces.

“When you reduce parking spaces or make them more expensive, you change the behavior of the driver: the driver may decide not take the car or to leave it in an area and then take mass transit, because it’s more expensive or difficult,” Bernardo Baranda from the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy Latin America said.

Mexico City mayor Miguel Mancera, who plans to run for Mexico’s presidency in 2018, said he will announce changes to building codes here later this month aimed at reducing the number of available parking spaces.

For now, the annual cost of heavy traffic is estimated at $1.5 billion dollars a year,including loss of productivity, as drivers in the Mexican capital spend a whopping 66 percent extra travel time stalled out in traffic.