As you contemplate the bit of your life spent in between home and work during the week, it’s easy to feel like the trip between home and work is getting more and more grinding with every passing day.
And the answer is yes. Yes, you’re correct. It is.
The Australian Automobile Association have released a new report (entitled, with impressive clarity, Road Congarestion In Australia – 2019, just in case anyone thought it might be an undiscovered Harry Potter story) and the results are not that everything is getting better.
First up, your morning and evening commute has gotten measurably longer in the big capital cities with speeds dropping 1.5 per cent on average since 2013 (1.8 per cent in Sydney), even with more people living in the city and immediate surrounds.
The weird thing is that Sydney is not the worst for speed. That’s not to say that Sydney is good – oh, it’s not, it’s really really not, with average PM speeds dropping by 7kmph on average – but it’s not the city with the lowest average traffic speed as a result of sitting in traffic.
Neither is it Melbourne – who do have the dubious honour of having the worst congestion, taking the title away from Sydney, and adding a 20 per cent time-toll to the high-stress city-to-Tullamarine airport run.
Who’s got the lowest speed? It’s Adelaide. ADELAIDE. Speeds have dropped almost 10 kmph in the after work run. Damn you, Paris of the South, you’re meant to be better than this.
We need to burn South Road down and start again, clearly.
And sure, there are some major infrastructure things about to come online, most notably the first stage of Sydney’s controversial WestConnex toll road, and a massive injection of funds into improving and expanding public transport would do all of us a world of good, especially in the eastern capitals.
But in the meantime: if you feel the need to pop out early – or wait rush hour out with a cheeky but responsible tipple – who could blame you?