“We like beating LA, but not necessarily in this category,” said James Rooney, president of the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce, adding that officials must consider new transportation projects to solve the problem. “It demands attention.” Gridlock during the peak of the morning and evening commutes was worse in Boston in 2018 than in any other major metropolitan area, even Los Angeles with its infamous traffic, according to a report from Inrix, a transportation data firm that publishes annual rankings of congestion around the world. It’s probably crossed your mind while grinding through another commute into downtown, or in one of those horizon-bending backups on Routes 128 or 3: Boston must have the worst rush-hour traffic in the country. Now you can back that up with numbers. Advertisement [Seeing Red: A Boston Globe Spotlight Team report on traffic in Massachusetts] Inrix has been ranking areas on congestion for more than a decade, and for this year’s report the company used a new metric that resulted in Boston faring much worse than in previous years. Previously it measured traffic throughout the entire day, and in 2017 LA earned the notorious honor of having the worst, while Boston came in seventh. But for 2018, Inrix looked at how much longer it took to commute during the worst peak periods than when roads are unclogged. Essentially, Inrix measured the time penalty for driving during rush hour, and there Boston topped the list of US cities: Commuters who drove at the worst peak hour conditions would have spent 164 hours in traffic that they would have avoided under regular conditions. On this metric, Los Angeles ranked sixth, behind Washington, D.C., Seattle, Chicago, and New York. “Los Angeles experiences high levels of congestion throughout the day, but its peak severity is less than Boston,” the Inrix report said. Advertisement Inrix collects traffic data from sensors in phones, vehicles, and GPS systems and sells that to trucking fleets, government agencies, and other customers such as billboard operators. Those data are also the basis of its annual ranking of 200 metro regions around the world. In ranking cities around the world, Inrix listed cities both by economic impact and hours lost. On the economic scale, Boston comes in eighth, behind cities in Europe and Latin America, with Moscow topping the list. Bogota had the most hours lost to peak period congestion: 272 in 2018. Analyst Trevor Reed said the Inrix ranking shows how quickly traffic deteriorates during rush hour. A smaller, older, and more compact region such as Boston, he said, simply just wasn’t built to handle a sudden influx of cars. “When you have older street networks like Boston, they clog much faster than in a city that was built around the automobile,” Reed said. “It doesn’t lend itself well to moving vehicles.” Inrix did find an ever-so-slight improvement in Boston traffic from 2017, when it took drivers 182 more hours to commute during rush hour. Even so, that was again the worst in the country. But the Inrix report comes with caveats; and, indeed, the company has been criticized previously for the methodology it uses to rank metro area congestion — using travel speeds to measure the severity of the gridlock, for example, and not total time spent driving. Some transportation specialists have argued Inrix’s approach disadvantages densely built cities such as Boston, where some motorists may spend their entire commute in congestion but aren’t traveling very far. In big metro areas that are more spread out, such as Houston or Phoenix, drivers may spend more time in the car, but not all of it in congestion. Advertisement “All this report does is say, ‘what is the difference between essentially the speed limit and how fast you’re going?’ ” state Transportation Secretary Stephanie Pollack said, objecting to Inrix’s ranking. “What people care about is their total commute time.” Despite all the technology in modern vehicles, measuring traffic congestion appears to be an imprecise science. Indeed, using similar peak-vs.-nonpeak metrics, the GPS company TomTom found that Boston doesn’t even rank among the country’s 10 worst. But Boston-area drivers probably don’t need a hard number to know traffic here is bad — and getting worse, despite billions spent on the Big Dig and other highway improvements. The Baker administration has taken note. “We can’t ignore congestion,” Pollack said. “My biggest concern is that people and businesses have made it clear that we are now experiencing a level of congestion that they are struggling to cope with. That’s what tells me we have to focus on this problem, not if we’re number one or number eight or number 10.” Pollack’s agency is scheduled to release an analysis of the reasons and potential solutions for congestion this spring. Though she declined to discuss details, Pollack said the solutions will likely differ location to location, from changing traffic signals and street markings on certain roads, to new policies on planning road construction or responses to accidents. Advertisement Governor Charlie Baker, meanwhile, has argued the best way to reduce traffic is to improve public transit. But while the administration is spending billions on MBTA repairs and modernization, the agency is also planning to raise fares later this year, which may undercut Baker’s efforts to make the system more attractive. Boston officials said they are primarily focused on improving bicycling and walking options, traffic signals, and getting new fees assessed on Uber and Lyft to encourage customers to use carpool options rather than taking individual trips. But transportation activists said the Inrix results should persuade officials to explore “congestion pricing” schemes, which discourage driving during peak hours by charging new or higher tolls. Last year, Baker vetoed a version of that idea, which would have offered discounted tolls to Mass. Pike drivers at off-peak hours. Ari Ofsevit, of the advocacy group Transit Matters, suggested the state get permission from the federal government to put tolls on highways that don’t have them — such as Interstate 93. That may win political support from drivers on the Massachusetts Turnpike and other toll roads who believe they have been unfairly targeted, while discouraging traffic into Boston on other highways, he said. Baker recently said the state will reconsider congestion pricing but remained reluctant because it could be unfair to low-income drivers who have no choice in their commuting. Pollack is skeptical, too, noting that Inrix’s data show cars in London — which has been levying congestion tolls for a decade — are today moving slower than in Boston. However, other studies have shown London traffic fell by 15 percent after the charge first went into effect. Advertisement And Mayor Martin J. Walsh has all but rejected a congestion charge for Boston — even though it was one of the recommendations that an environmental commission submitted to his office in January. “I don’t know how it got in there,” Walsh recently said during a recent speech, drawing laughter from a crowd of business executives. Correction: This article was updated to correct Boston’s ranking among cities worldwide. Adam Vaccaro can be reached at adam.vaccaro@globe.com.<doc-sep>Bumpah to bumpah: Boston has worst rush-hour traffic in country, report says If you spend a lot of time in bumper-to-bumper traffic you're not alone. A new report says Boston has the worst rush-hour traffic in the country.The study from transportation data firm Inrix said gridlock during morning and evening commutes in Beantown was worse than any other U.S. metro area.Commuters spend an extra 164 hours in traffic during rush hour, as opposed to making that trip during off-peak hours.Boston Mayor Marty Walsh said the study “prioritizes fast driving over steady progress and punishes older, denser cities, where distances are shorter and alternatives to driving are more plentiful.”Walsh said fewer than 50 percent of commuters travel by car so a "drive-time study is telling less than half the story. "The city is working on ways to reduce congestion on streets in Boston, Walsh said. Some improvements include adding adaptive traffic signals, bike lanes and dedicated bus lanes for the MBTA. If you spend a lot of time in bumper-to-bumper traffic you're not alone. A new report says Boston has the worst rush-hour traffic in the country. The study from transportation data firm Inrix said gridlock during morning and evening commutes in Beantown was worse than any other U.S. metro area. Advertisement Commuters spend an extra 164 hours in traffic during rush hour, as opposed to making that trip during off-peak hours. Boston Mayor Marty Walsh said the study “prioritizes fast driving over steady progress and punishes older, denser cities, where distances are shorter and alternatives to driving are more plentiful.” Walsh said fewer than 50 percent of commuters travel by car so a "drive-time study is telling less than half the story." The city is working on ways to reduce congestion on streets in Boston, Walsh said. Some improvements include adding adaptive traffic signals, bike lanes and dedicated bus lanes for the MBTA.<doc-sep>An early 2019 report said that Boston had the worst rush-hour traffic congestion in the U.S. of A. Other reports have reached similar conclusions and have shown that not only is the city’s gridlock particularly awful but that its commutes are particularly long. Why is that? Myriad reasons. Topography Boston isn’t just “Boston.” The City of Boston is part of a densely packed confederation of cities and towns that stretches for dozens of miles, and that together contains between four and five million residents, depending on where one draws regional boundaries. If the Boston area were in fact its own city rather than a collection of municipalities, it would be more populous than any U.S. city save New York. Another thing about this regional melange is that transportation policy, particularly when it comes to signage and speed limits and road width—and bike lanes and bus lanes—can vary. The lack of coordinated planning can foster, and has fostered, congestion. Relatively bountiful and cheap parking Several municipalities in the Boston region—including most significantly the City of Boston itself—distribute free resident parking permits like candy on Halloween. Or they charge relatively low fees such as $25 per household for an initial parking permit. Plus, metered parking here is some of the cheapest in urban America. And condo and apartment developments invariably include parking (though all of this is slowly changing). It’s only when drivers have to resort to private garages that it begins to pinch to park financially. Garage parking rates here can be comparable to those in nationwide-leading New York City. Population growth Boston proper is still off its 1950s population peak, but it’s getting there. The city expects its population to swell to as many as 724,000 residents by 2030. It’s 685,000, give or take, now. Meanwhile, surrounding municipalities such as Cambridge and Somerville are growing as well. Based on these trends, then, the Boston region could crest 5 million residents in the next few years. A lot more people can mean a lot more people driving, or taking app-hails such as Uber and Lyft or more conventional cabs. Speaking of app-hails ... They’re everywhere. Or at least there are a lot more of them than there used to be. The number of rides in Massachusetts through app-hail companies such as Uber and Lyft increased about 25 percent in 2018, to 81.3 million, compared with 2017, according to a recent report from the state Department of Public Utilities. Eight in 10 of those 2018 rides began in Suffolk and Middlesex countries, which host most of the Boston region, including the City of Boston itself. In fact, 42.2 million—or more than half—of the Uber et al rides started in Boston. Cambridge had the second-highest total of 2018 originations with 7.8 million. Boston and Cambridge also saw the biggest jumps in app-hail originations, with 7.3 million and 1 million more year over year, respectively. Somerville saw the third-biggest increase, with nearly 600,000 more than in 2017. Sure, it’s convenient. But more such rides means more traffic. Along the same lines as app-hails ... Amazon Prime is super-convenient too as is Instacart and other home-delivery services, which can drop goods big and small in building lobbies and on front porches via a few mouse clicks. But such vendors and such services mean that many more vehicles—trucks especially—on the roadways. What’s more, various delivery companies, including UPS and FedEx, have a formal agreement with Boston proper protecting their trucks from ever being booted no matter how many tickets they pile up for blocking lanes, double-parking, etc. Old roads Boston is America’s oldest major city and its region the nation’s oldest major metropolitan area. Many of its roads are old, then, and not equipped to handle today’s volume of traffic. The region’s highways—particularly I-93 and I-90—are big and modern, and relatively easy to navigate. But in many instances, especially from the region’s outer reaches, those modern highways can only be reached via thin, poorly marked, shoulder-less ribbons of often crowded and cracked asphalt. Public transit problems Chronic challenges galore confront the Boston area’s public transit system—the T—including aging infrastructure, frequent delays-slash-breakdowns, escalating operating costs, and a seemingly ceaseless run of fare hikes. A Red Line derailment in early June, and its aftermath of delays and reroutings, highlighted the problems. Oftentimes it can be so much easier and faster to Uber it or to just hop in the car. Housing costs The Boston region is one of the most expensive in the nation for buying or renting. It has long been so, and it appears that that will be the case for some time to come. That reality (and the myriad causes behind it) has pushed, and continues to push, residents that much farther out in search of housing that is affordable and decent. No wonder the region has one of the greatest shares nationally of supercommuters—those commuters who spend at least 90 minutes one way getting to and from the workplace. It’s free! Like other U.S. cities, barring major construction or a Super Bowl parade or a police action, the roadways are open 24-7 in all parts of the region in all kinds of weather. And, unless they’re paying Interstate tolls, it costs drivers the same to drive into downtown Boston at 7 a.m. on a Sunday as it does at 7 a.m. on a Monday—in other words, nothing, whether it’s rush hour or not. Might this change via congestion pricing—charging motorists to drive into busier areas during busier parts of the day? Stay tuned.<doc-sep>
A week after the latest sports championship parade, Boston gets another title. This one, though, is unwanted. Greater Boston has the worst rush-hour traffic among 60 urban areas in the United States, according to the latest annual report from the transportation analytics firm INRIX. The region's drivers who traveled last year during the worst parts of the morning and afternoon commutes "lost" 164 hours to congestion, INRIX calculated. That's worse than Washington, D.C., Chicago, Seattle and New York City, which round out the top five. Like what you're reading? You can get the business latest news (and other stories Boston is talking about) sent directly to your inbox with the WBUR Today newsletter. Subscribe here. Additionally, compared with the other urban areas, Greater Boston drivers who commuted during peak gridlock "experienced the greatest costs from congestion at $2,291 a year," the report said. For the area at large, the total annual cost of congestion added up to $4.1 billion. (Courtesy of the INRIX Global Traffic Scorecard) INRIX cautions that its methodology changed with this new report, as it focuses more specifically on severe rush-hour traffic. Last year, with the old methodology, Greater Boston checked in as the seventh-most congested urban area in the U.S. The analytics firm says that city age, density and geography are factors for traffic during peak times. As The Boston Globe notes, some transportation advocates say INRIX's methodology disadvantages dense cities like Boston, since a drive could be more congested, but shorter overall than a trip in a sprawling region. "Another traffic scorecard is claiming a 60 minute uncongested commute is far superior to a 10 minute congested one," Beth Osborne, the director of Transportation 4 America, said on Twitter. Added state Transportation Secretary Stephanie Pollack, when speaking with the Globe: “All this report does is say, ‘What is the difference between essentially the speed limit and how fast you’re going?’ What people care about is their total commute time.” The Department of Transportation is in the midst of a six-month study of the region's traffic, eyeing ways to help alleviate it. "We didn't really need a report from INRIX to tell us that congestion is a growing problem in Massachusetts, particularly in Boston," Secretary Pollack told State House News Service. "I think our goal is to understand why. Why is congestion worse? Because then for every why, there's something we can do differently." Research has shown that ride-hailing services like Uber and Lyft are exacerbating traffic in many urban areas. A 2018 survey of ride-hailing passengers, by a Greater Boston planning agency, came to the same conclusion. The INRIX analysis found that I-93 southbound, stretching from the Mass. Ave. Connector to Braintree, is among the most congested roadways in the U.S. A WBUR survey in 2016 found that nearly 1 in 6 residents said they had considered leaving the region to get away from the traffic. Commuting long hours has been linked to various negative health effects, like heart disease, and car travel has a major impact on greenhouse gas emissions. In Massachusetts, the transportation sector accounts for more than 40 percent of emissions. In December, Massachusetts joined in a multi-state compact to try to reduce transportation emissions.