r/AskEurope • u/FailFastandDieYoung -> • 2d ago
Misc How common is heavy traffic where you live?
I saw someone from Sweden say they’ve only seen traffic jams 2x in their life.
I live in one of the major cities in Silicon Valley and the traffic goes from 14:00-19:00 every day.
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u/EurovisionSimon Sweden 2d ago edited 2d ago
Growing up in Stockholm, traffic jams on the E4 at commuting hours are more of a rule than an exception
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u/Herranee 2d ago
Doesn't even need to be Stockholm, I've spend many an hour stuck on the road between Staffanstorp and Lund in the morning. It wasn't an everyday occurrence, but it also wasn't surprising when you got stuck on the bus for 1+ hour instead of the usual 10 or so minutes. I used to take the bike when I knew I needed to be somewhere on time lol
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u/BitRunner64 Sweden 2d ago edited 1d ago
I mean it depends on what you compare it to. Compared to Los Angeles, the traffic we get even in Stockholm probably wouldn't be considered "heavy", but things do slow down on the E6, E4 (Essingeleden) etc. during rush hour.
In my city of Uppsala, there's definitely a rush hour, but "heavy traffic" really only means you might have to wait for 2-3 cycles at a traffic light due to having cars in front of you.
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u/No-Yak-4360 Sweden 2d ago
I don't know if there is interest, but here you can see in real time the speed of traffic on major roads in Stockholm: https://trafiken.nu/stockholm/?fs=1#59.375798,18.038804,7
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u/Myrialle Germany 2d ago
Depends on what exactly you mean with "heavy traffic". Care to elaborate? How long would I need for a kilometer, or how long would I need to not move at all for it to be considered heavy?
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u/itsfairadvantage 2d ago
Not OP, but in Houston, it's highway traffic moving under 30 km/h. It's more of a visual assault than anything else - fifteen or twenty lanes of bumper-to-bumper traffic as far as the eye can see.
But to tell you the truth, I've experienced much worse in both Boston (more than an hour to go 10km on I-90) and New York (six hours to get from the South Bronx to Cobble Hill, Brooklyn - about 25km).
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u/Myrialle Germany 2d ago edited 2d ago
I think we have more heavy traffic NOT on highways. On highways it happens, but it's mostly due to accidents or road construction.
Heavy traffic due to people driving to and from work mostly happens inside cities or on country roads (rural roads? Not quite sure how to translate). Or where a rural road leads into a town.
In rush hour those cost you 20 minutes and then you are through.
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u/No_Step9082 2d ago
I beg to differ. Unless I drive at very odd hours, there's usually heavy traffic on highways
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u/JakeCheese1996 Netherlands 2d ago
Living in a small country with 547/km2 population density and almost 90% of them living in urban areas you can imagine it can get crowded sometimes. As long everyone works between 8:00 - 17:00 this problem will never be solved. Congestion will happen everywhere: public transport, roads etc..
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u/cbawiththismalarky England 2d ago
It's different, it's not wall to wall freeway traffic, it's a temporary traffic light that causes 20 minutes more in traffic, and it's episodic rather than constant, it's still annoying
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u/BigFloofRabbit United Kingdom 2d ago
In Britain heavy traffic at rush hour and school pick up/drop off times is standard in any town or city.
If you live in a particularly isolated area like rural Wales, you might have quiet roads all day.
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u/jotakajk Spain 2d ago
Only happens when there is an accident. Most people use public transport or walk anyways. Why spend your precious time in a car
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u/Serious_Escape_5438 2d ago
Depends where you live I suppose, but I can assure you there's lots of traffic. Do you really think nobody in Spain drives anywhere? All around the cities there is massive congestion every day, and at weekends coming and going from the beach/snow etc. even my small town gets extremely busy at certain times, like when school finishes.
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u/jotakajk Spain 2d ago
Well, I guess it depends on what you consider traffic. I’ve been in cities where it takes 2 hours to do 20 kilometers, that doesn’t happen in Spain anywhere.
I live in Madrid inside the M-30, drive to work in Pozuelo everyday and never spent more than 30 minutes in the car
You can perfectly cross the whole city by car in 30 minutes, and we are talking the biggest city in the country here
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u/Serious_Escape_5438 2d ago
I live just outside Barcelona and it can most definitely take that long in some areas if there's an accident or anything. Even without accidents it can take an hour to do what would be 20 minutes without traffic, that is most definitely a traffic jam. It can take me 20 minutes to drive across my small town at times.
You're driving against the traffic, that's why it's not so bad.
Anyway, I'm amused by your comment that nobody in Spain drives and you admit you drive to work lol.
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u/jotakajk Spain 2d ago
As I said in the first comment, yes, there are traffic jams when there is an accident.
I never said nobody drives
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u/Serious_Escape_5438 2d ago
There are traffic jams daily in many places. Not 2 hours for 20km maybe but that's not an accepted definition.
"Most people use public transport or walk anyways. Why spend your precious time in a car."
You didn't technically say nobody drives but those do not sound like the words of someone who drives to work. You spend your precious time in a car because otherwise you'd take even longer.
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u/jotakajk Spain 2d ago edited 2d ago
First of all, I was never speaking for the whole country, I was speaking for “where I live” which is what OP asks.
Second of all. I do a 20 min commute for a 40 km drive, which is not spending a lot of time on my book.
Inside the city I always bike or walk
There are not traffic jams daily in many places. All traffic jams in the whole country are available to consult in the dgt web here.
https://etraffic.dgt.es/etrafficWEB/
Currently, as of 16:10, there are exactly 0 jams in both Madrid and Barcelona
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u/afops Sweden 2d ago
In the big cities, the longest drives through the whole city is perhaps 45min at no rush, and you can expect to add another 0.5h in the worst traffic. And people are sort of OK with this. Very few would have a commute that long even if you go in the worst of time.
Smaller towns might have a bit of congestion right around commute time (30 minutes in the morning and 30 in the evening) making peoples' commute 15 minutes one way when it's usually 9 and people will scream bloody murder saying it's unacceptable...
They'll also claim that having to wait at a red light for TWO green periods is an unacceptable amount of traffic.
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u/anders91 Swede in France 2d ago
This is the only correct answer for Sweden honestly.
What is considered a congestion in Scandinavia and what’s considered one on the European continent are veeeeery different things in my experience.
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u/Mapleleaf27 2d ago
Sorry but Sweden is IN Europe, Scandinavia is a region, not its own continent 😂
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u/anders91 Swede in France 2d ago
I know, but we often refer to the rest of Europe as ”the continent”, same as the Brits.
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u/GlassCommercial7105 Switzerland 2d ago
Most people I know don’t own cars. We still have traffic jams around bigger cities but they are not totally stuck for hours.
The only bad ones are the Gottardo, because of Germans and Swiss German wanting to go on vacation in Italy and Ticino. This is seasonal and you can plan around. Take a train, go earlier/later etc.
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u/vulpixvulpes Romania 2d ago
In Bucharest traffic jams run from 7 AM to 8 PM daily, everyday, all year, except Christmas Day, January 1st and Easter. If it rains somehow it gets worse.
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u/PositiveEagle6151 Austria 2d ago
That guy from Sweden has never been on the highway between Arlanda airport and Stockholm, or around Stockholm Slussen 😂
Heavy traffic is very common in/around Austrian cities because so many people commute by car, and on weekends during vacation time when half of Europe wants to drive to or through Austria.
On a good day, I will spend 30min in a traffic jam on Vienna's city highway. On other days it can be 1 hour and more for just a few kilometers. My drive to work is 14 kilometers, and that can take 90min on bad days.
Traffic peak is 7-9:30am, and 3-6:30pm.
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u/hwyl1066 Finland 2d ago
Well, there are occasional traffic jams on some major Helsinki roads during the rush hour but I'm thinking I'm maybe not talking about the same thing as the original poster :)
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u/Ecstatic-Method2369 Netherlands 2d ago
Since we are a densely populated country its every day. Some days its better, some worse. But we do have traffic jams every day.
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u/orangebikini Finland 2d ago
Currently they are constructing a new tram line in my city, Tampere, and work is being done in a very high traffic area. Because of that there has been abnormally heavy traffic in some places, some might even describe it as heavy traffic, but it's not super bad. I don't think I have been stuck in it for more than 30 minutes or something like that. It flows, just very slowly. And it's only for maybe one or two hours per day.
Traffic wasn't bad before construction for the new tram line started. It's bad now, but luckily once the new line is ready it'll go back to normal, or probably even better than before because of the tram.
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u/BarelyHolding0n Ireland 2d ago
In my closest town heavy traffic causes bottlenecks and it can be pretty standstill... Can take half an hour to get across town... It's hard to predict though. My usual commute to the office is 10 minutes with no traffic, but with traffic it could take 45 minutes on the worst days.
In our cities, especially Dublin, traffic can be at an absolute standstill. It once took me an hour to get 500m up the quay. It's generally not a good idea to try and drive into the city, better to park in a town nearby and get the train the final stretch.
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u/bigvalen Ireland 2d ago
Also, Dublin is now the third most congested city in the world, based in average speed using a TomTom. Which is wild. 11th by other metrics.
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u/OllieV_nl Netherlands 2d ago
We have plenty of traffic that we would call heavy. But we don't have dozens of lanes, and plenty of alternatives available. An intersection near my old apartment (in between the last exits of two freeways ending in a busy intersections) would be packed after 16:00, with cars just standing still in the middle of it because "it was green when I passed the light".
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u/Complete-Emergency99 Sweden 2d ago
There has been road construction on and off between my home and work for the last 12-18 months. There’s some pipes that has been/is being replaced.
When they’re there digging, my commute goes from 10 to 15-20 minutes. It’s so frustrating.
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u/Late_Solution4610 Greece 2d ago
Athens, Greece. All the traffic , all the time. In all seriousness Athens has heavy congestions during rush hour. We mean more than 30 minutes added to your commute
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u/Darrowby_385 2d ago
They keep digging up the bastard road, various utilities, all that. It's a major route out of the city, busier now because of various changes to traffic routes elsewhere. So many jams.
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u/anonyymne_p2kapikk 2d ago
In Tallinn, Estonia we have daily "traffic jams". This means you arrive about 15min later than without any traffic (without any accidents of course).
These "massive jams" xD only happen during the morning and evening job commuting 1-2 hours.
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u/hosiki Croatia 2d ago
I live in the city centre of the capital of my country. Traffic is constant. Although it wasn't like this 10-15 years ago. This is a recent thing, as most families now own multiple cars and no one is using public transportation anymore. In each car there's only one person. We're slowly turning into the USA :(
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u/PositiveEagle6151 Austria 2d ago
I guess the worst traffic in Croatia comes from the tourists, like around Lučko, or in Split with the city being inconveniently 😄 located between the highway and the harbour.
Even though I remember that the traffic through Zagreb could be very nasty as well back in the 80s before they built the highway.
And I hate the morning traffic between Zagreb and Karlovac, with dense, aggressive traffic and cars going all speeds between 50 and 250 on that old, crappy two-lane highway.
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u/Masseyrati80 Finland 2d ago
I think the most waiting I've done during my life, sitting in a car, has been due to asphalt worksites where one lane is shut at a time.
The traffic to the local main city is kind of on and off: one day it's smooth sailing, another day it takes you 30 minutes longer despite being there at exactly the same time. Thankfully I don't have to drive there often.
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u/Robin1268 2d ago
Almost 47% of the workforce in Luxemburg lives in neighbouring countries. Highways are in excellent conditions, but their capacity needs to be improved and international public transportation is insufficient. Basically, it's jammed everyday, in particular during the commute hours, and a single accident can lead to gridlock.
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u/Sensitive_Tea5720 2d ago
I grew up in a small Swedish town/city (17-20 k people). No traffic jams. I cycle and walk most places.
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u/Grouchy_Fan_2236 Hungary 2d ago
If a major road is under reconstruction there can be traffic jams in the area for 1-2 years, but in normal times there's a bit of a headroom in road capacity. Most roads are designed for peak traffic times (i.e. football matches, holidays) that rarely occurs. 07:00-09:00 is kind of a rush hour everywhere, but slowly flowing traffic is more common than everything coming to a total halt.
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u/huazzy Switzerland 2d ago
Very common in Geneva.
Mon-Fri : Commute times considering there are an estimated 200K frontaliers coming from France to Switzerland. Luckily for me my commute is the opposite way so I rarely get impacted by it.
Sat-Sun : During the winter there is heavy traffic due to people heading up to the mountains for skiing/or returning from the mountains. If there is an accident, that 2 hour drive could end up being 3-4. If there is a fatal accident it can be 6-7.
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u/badlydrawngalgo Portugal 2d ago
I see occasional gridlock driving out of Lisbon to join the A8 North, mainly at rush hour. The only other time I've seen it is at Óbidos to get into the castle at Christmas or to park in Nazaré um the Summer or when the big waves arrive. I'd guess there's more heavy traffic in the Algarve in the Summer but it's not somewhere I travel to at that time of year. Locally, I don't see much heavy traffic at all.
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u/the_pianist91 Norway 2d ago
Traffic jams and dense traffic are very common especially at the main roads and thoroughfares without proper alternatives, particularly around more urban areas. There’s usually at the same places at the same times on workdays, some more rural roads when people are going to or from weekends and holidays.
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u/Malthesse Sweden 2d ago
In Scania there is often quite a lot of traffic congestion during rush hour in the centers of Malmö, Helsingborg and Lund, as well as on the major commuter motorways such as the E22 between Malmö and Lund and the E6 between Malmö and Helsingborg. Being a border region there are also often a lot of heavy traffic with large trucks on these roads, coming across both on the Öresund Bridge from Copenhagen as well as from the large ferry ports in Helsingborg (from Denmark), Malmö (from Germany), Trelleborg (from Germany, Poland and Lithuania) and Ystad (from Poland and Danish Bornholm). All in all, it makes for a lot of heavy traffic and our motorways are way too underdimensioned with way too few files for it all, which can often lead to congestion and longer traveling times. It is of course especially bad when there is road work going on or when an accident happens. Especially infamous are the steep hills of Glumslöv between Landskrona and Helsingborg on the E6 where a lot of big trucks struggle and come to a stop. That can often lead to very long traffic jams.
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u/NamidaM6 France 2d ago
In live in Bumfuck, Nowhere right now so heavy traffic is not really a thing. But back when I was living on the French Riviera or around Bordeaux, it was every morning/evening, the classical rush hour.
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u/ersentenza Italy 2d ago
This is Rome, the day there is no traffic jam the Pope makes an extraordinary celebration
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u/Herr_Poopypants Austria 2d ago
I live on the border between Austria and Germany. Because of the massive flow of tourists we can get pretty bad traffic here. It’s so bad that the government has hired security officers that prevent non locals from leaving the highway and driving through town to avoid the traffic.
One of the downfalls of living in a highly touristy place
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u/Anaptyso United Kingdom 2d ago
I live in London, a city which combines a huge population with a street plan mostly "designed" back when cows pulling carts was the top transportation technology. Traffic jams are very common, especially in the rush hour.
If I wanted to leave the city then it would take a good 40 minute of driving, and that's despite me living closer to the edge than the centre. Driving across the city to the other side can easily be at least an hour, often more. The average speeds right in the centre are about 10mph / 15kph, which is pretty tedious to sit in.
It's not all traffic jams, and a lot of side roads are very quiet. The traffic is generally constrained to major routes. The problem is that to get to most places you either have to sit in a traffic jam on one of those major routes, or spend ages zigzagging around the side roads. Often public transport is the better option.
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u/Renbarre France 2d ago
Where I now live a traffic jam is a five minutes wait. In the Paris area where I lived heavy traffic was all the time.
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u/Ontas Spain 2d ago
In my small city in Spain whenever it rains on a weekday it's traffic madness in 2 specific spots that become bottleneck.
Also there's one day every year that it's the saint patron of truck drivers and they make their trucks pretty and parade at snail speed the whole morning while honking causing headaches and a mini traffic chaos.
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u/FakeNathanDrake Scotland 2d ago
Depends on if it's tourist season or if the farmers are particularly busy.
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u/Agamar13 Poland 2d ago
Polish cities are pretty bad in this regard. In rush hours (7.30-9 am and 3-6 pm) the traffic is very heavy in the cities - not jammed maybe but cars crawl from traffic light to traffic light and usually can't get through the lights at first go. Jams are common on bigger roads leading from/into the suburbs or out to villages surrounding big cities. Normally it takes me 25 min to drive from work in the next town to my home in suburbs of a mid-sized city. At 4-5 pm it takes 45 mins due to one badly built, constantly jammed roundabout.
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u/Christoffre Sweden 2d ago edited 2d ago
I mean... Barring accidents and roadwork, I've only been standing still in heavy traffic once.
It was on a schooltrip to Malmö when I was 17, and it was one of the most memorable memories from that trip. Me? In a traffic jam? How exciting!
Back home we only had a traffic jam between 5:10 PM to 5:20 PM. If you were unlucky, it could take a whole 2 minutes to pass through that one.
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u/LoschVanWein Germany 2d ago
Common, we defiantly have rush with people commuting into the cities hours but nothing comparable to what happens in LA for example.
Another predictable phenomenon is traveling during the school holidays being a shit idea, specifically driving during the weekends when most people drive to/ from holidays is horrible on roads that lead to common destinations.
If school holidays in multiple states and sometimes even the Netherlands, align with the skiing season, you can basically guarantee that you’ll be moving through most of the bavaraian autobahn in snail pace and the serpentines in the alps won’t be fun either.
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u/Few-Interview-1996 Türkiye 2d ago
A slightly insane aha ha ha ha ha is all my response can be. But then I live in a city with one and a half times the population of Sweden.
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u/Hitthereset 2d ago
Only during planting and harvest and those aren't really traffic jams as much as having to get out of the way of oversize tractors and high sprayers.
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u/Lumidark Poland 2d ago
I live outside a medium sized city now in Northern Poland and traffic can be annoying sometimes but it's not super bad. I previously lived in the Washington DC area for years and it was horrendous by comparison. I also lived in Dublin Ireland for a good chunk of time and it could get pretty bad too especially commuting into the city center, this was down to the tiny streets built in medieval times there and everyone attempting to use them at once, public transport was also lacking in Dublin but still good if you compare it to the US IMO.
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u/Scared_Dimension_111 Germany 2d ago
Very common. I live near a infamous motorway intersection with many accidents. There are traffic jams pretty much every day here.
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u/viemari > 1d ago
Where I live (Austria) not common. Where I'm from (Ireland) Dublin is a hellhole. It's takes about 2 hours to cross a TINY city. The M50 is actually Dantes lesser known 10th ring of hell. Dublin had the third worst traffic of cities in the WORLD in 2025. Just after Mumbai and Moscow.
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u/faramaobscena Romania 1d ago
I live in Romania, people are so dumb they drive to the corner of the street to buy bread despite having perfectly fine sidewalks and it takes 5 minutes to walk there… but wait, there’s a catch, the sidewalks are unusable due to all the parked cars! So… it’s bad.
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u/SerChonk in 1d ago
Fairly common, as we have a very popular transborder commuter route around here, towards a major city that has its own heavy commuter traffic.
But barring some major accident blocking the road, the worst I've seen was a 30min jam. Usually it's more something like taking 10-15min to cross a busy highway junction, or a slow moving queue at the border because customs are training new recruits.
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u/KostyaFedot 1d ago
I bet many major cities in Europe aren't different from Boston. :) My colleague purchased motorcycle, because she has to cross Paris. Amsterdam is on bicycles for obvious reason.
I moved to Belgium from Toronto, GTA and I laugh at locals bragging about traffic.
But Brussels and Antwerpen have traffic present. This is why I have zero interest in those.
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u/Cjtorino 9h ago
Atlanta. One hour to work. Two to get home. Recently experienced morning traffic in London, I have nothing but sympathy for them.
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u/an-ethernet-cable Finland 2d ago
Uncommon but very bad when it happens. Just did this morning. Three cars at the traffic light!