Daijiworld Media Network - Bengaluru

Bengaluru, Jan 15: Despite the stringent lockdown that was induced amid coronavirus, Bengaluru has made it to the list of world's most congested cities. The TomTom Traffic Index 2020 released on January 13 has said that Bengaluru has the sixth-worst traffic in the world and the second-worst traffic in India. In the same list, Mumbai ranked second-worst in the world, preceded by Moscow and followed by Bogota, Manila and Istanbul.

 

Among the 416 cities spread across 57 countries, capital of India, New Delhi fares slightly better at the eighth position in the pandemic year. The lockdown induced due to coronavirus brought an improvement of 20% from 2019. In 2019, the same index had found Bengaluru to be the worst among 416 cities.

 

As the world saw a decrease in traffic during the lockdown, Bengaluru too witnessed a dip of traffic jams by 20%. As per reports, the traffic was lower by 35% in the morning and 32% in the evening. The data further showed that in April traffic congestion was the least, while in January it was the most. While congestion levels in Bengaluru were 70% for January and February, it dropped to 50% in March as the city was put under lockdown.

Ralf-Peter Schäfer, TomTom’s vice president of Traffic and Travel, said, “Last year, we announced that global congestion levels in 2019 had increased for the ninth consecutive Traffic Index. In 2020, we saw a vastly different picture. From lockdowns to closed borders, people movement changed – and it changed very fast.”

The data for the index is generated through 600 million connected devices which the company says is an authoritative indicator of people movement, economic activity levels, among other activities.