Traffic levels hit a record high last year, new Government statistics have revealed.
According to the Department for Transport’s Provisional Road Traffic Estimates for January-December 2016, 320.5 billion vehicle miles were travelled on Britain’s roads, an increase of 1.2% compared with 2015’s figure.
The DfT said this is a record high, 2% more than the pre-recession peak in the year ending September 2007.
Rolling figures have now increased in each quarter in succession for the past three years, the Government body added.
The DfT said much of the rise is down to increasing population levels, a higher demand for goods and services, and fuel prices falling. Figures from the report show that UK prices have dropped by 18.9% in the past three years, while traffic levels have increased by 5.5% during the same period.
Compared with 2015’s figures, van traffic grew the most – up by 3.4% to a new high of 48.5 billion vehicle miles – while car traffic increased by 0.7% to a record 249.5 billion miles.
Car traffic has grown by an average of 0.9% over the past four years, and by 11.6% over the past 20 years.
Additionally, cars now make up 77.8% of the UK’s share of traffic by vehicle type, an increase of 0.7% compared with 2015’s figures.
The Government estimates are based on data captured from around 200 automatic traffic counters, with these counters classifying vehicles based on their axle-spacing and vehicle lengths.
Final annual traffic level data – which is due to be published in May 2017 – however, uses a network of 8,000 manual traffic counters.
“Today’s statistics lay bare just how increasingly congested our roads are becoming. Motorists, who are paying in excess of £40bn a year in overall motoring taxation, will find it incredibly frustrating that they are having to deal with clogged-up roads with these provisional figures showing that traffic levels hit an all-time high in 2016,” said RAC public affairs spokesman Nick Lyes.
