Whether you are a combustion engine advocate or an e-car fan, all drivers can probably agree on one thing: being stuck in a traffic jam with the car of your choice is pretty much the most annoying thing that can happen on the road. One of the most popular cities in Germany is hit particularly hard.
Whether on the way to or from work, on vacation on the motorway or in the traffic chaos of some big cities: Drivers know traffic jams – and usually enough of them. The well-known map and navigation service TomTom knows where German drivers are hit particularly hard.
Hamburg in 1st place: TomTom proves that drivers on the Elbe spend the longest time in traffic jams
After evaluating the data – they come from TomTom’s navigation devices, navigation systems integrated in vehicles and the navigation app – in Germany the Hamburgers in 1st place the congestion statistics. Compared to the normal traffic situation in Hamburg, the traffic jam level increases by 31 percent. TomTom considers a normal traffic situation to be a time when there are no problems obstructing traffic.
Means: The travel time for a certain route in Hamburg in 2021 was on average 31 percent longer with traffic jams than without. Wiesbaden is the only other German city that also achieves 31 percent, but there were fewer traffic jams here, which is why the Hessian capital came in second. In both cities Drivers spend an average of 71 hours or almost exactly three days per year by car without being able to go forward or back significantly (source: TomTom).
Unsurprisingly, the top 3 is completed by Berlin (30 percent). In addition to other large cities such as Bremen, Munich or Cologne, some smaller ones such as Nuremberg or Münster also appear in the ranking – this is the German top 10:
- Hamburg
- Wiesbaden
- Berlin
- Aachen
- Nuremberg
- Munich
- kassel
- Dresden
- Stuttgart
- Cologne
Internationally, German cities are not doing too badly in 2021: Hamburg ranks 69th compared to the rest of the world. Drivers spent the longest time in traffic jams in Istanbul. According to TomTom’s calculations, the congestion level here is 62 percent, and every driver lost 142 hours a year.
For drivers, a navigation app is part of the standard equipment on the smartphone – which should not be missing:
Congestion level in Germany: Greetings from Corona
Interesting: In 2021, none of the German cities in the TomTom comparison will have a traffic jam level above their respective level before Corona. A large part has increased slightly compared to the previous year in 2020. Compared to 2019, however, there is usually a minus. Bielefeld, Dresden and Aachen are again at the same level as in 2019.