DAVAO City Councilor Conrado C. Baluran has criticized the TomTom Traffic Index (TTI) for ranking Davao City as the eighth most congested city globally, calling the results “unfair” and “out of context.”
Baluran, chair of the committee on transportation and communications, argued that the report, based on a survey of 500 cities worldwide, does not reflect Davao’s traffic realities.
The index suggests that residents take about 45 minutes to travel 10 kilometers, leading to an annual economic loss of 136 hours.
“Inevitably, the city is experiencing light to moderate traffic during rush hours, and sometimes heavy traffic during roadworks and accidents but to be tagged as one among the worst worldwide is unacceptable,” ” he stated during his privilege speech at the council session on Tuesday morning, January 21, 2025, at the Sangguniang Panlungsod.
Baluran pointed out that Davao’s rapid economic growth, which the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) highlighted as the fastest in the country for 2023-2024, contradicts the TTI’s claims.
“Common sense will tell us that if you’re a multinational company or even a local businessman, why would you invest in Davao City if the actual business feasibility study on traffic situations is in the worst condition when they know that a lost time is a lost profit,” he said.
Baluran also questioned TTI’s methodology, noting that Metro Manila, with 3.7 million vehicles, including trucks and buses, has far more congestion than Davao, which only has 155,481 registered vehicles and a population of 2 million.
He invited representatives from the City Transport and Traffic Management Office (CTTMO), the Department of Public Works and Highways – Davao Region (DPWH-Davao), and the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board – Davao Region (LTFRB-Davao) to provide updates on the city’s traffic situation and ongoing infrastructure projects.
The latest TomTom Traffic Index ranked Davao City as the eighth most congested city in the world, with commuters taking about 33 minutes to travel 10 kilometers, compared to 32 minutes in Manila.
The index evaluates congestion and travel times across 62 countries, analyzing how many hours commuters lose to traffic. It uses floating car data (FCD) and various sources to generate traffic insights for its clients.
Travel time in Davao City is influenced by two main factors: static elements like road infrastructure and dynamic factors such as traffic congestion and ongoing roadworks, both contributing to overall travel times.
The TTI has also updated its methodology for defining cities and metropolitan areas to better reflect traffic conditions. Cities are defined by identifying the densest areas that account for 20 percent of all trips within the city’s connected regions. Metropolitan areas are determined by including the most trip-dense regions until they make up 80 percent of all trips in the city-connected area. (RGP)
