Since the end of the corona pandemic, the number of traffic jams on motorways has increased again: According to ADAC, the duration of delays totaled almost 430,000 hours last year. However, the pre-Corona level has not yet been reached.
There were significantly more traffic jams and stalled traffic on German highways in 2023 than in the previous year. However, according to the ADAC traffic jam balance, the pre-Corona level of 2019 was not reached. This year, the motorists’ club expects more traffic and more traffic jams – not least because of the many construction sites.
The duration of delays on the motorways totaled 427,000 hours last year: that is a quarter more than in 2022, but still a sixth less than in 2019, as the ADAC announced. The busiest days of the week were Wednesday and Thursday. As in previous years, there were the least traffic jams on Mondays and weekends.
Lots of traffic jams around holidays
However, the busiest day of 2023 was a Friday: On September 29th, many drivers used the long weekend until German Unity Day on October 3rd for a short vacation, explained the traffic experts in Munich. There were almost as many traffic jams on the highways in May on the Friday before Pentecost weekend and on the Wednesday before Ascension Day.
Through the summer, traffic jam hours continued to increase, from 20,000 in January to 43,500 in July, August and September. From October onwards the number of hours of traffic jams fell again.
Most traffic jams in North Rhine-Westphalia
In total, the ADAC registered 691 traffic jams on the motorways that were at least 20 kilometers long last year. The longest, 56 kilometers, occurred in January after the onset of winter on the A 61 in front of the Nahetal triangle.
As in previous years, the federal state with the most traffic jams was North Rhine-Westphalia with almost 34 percent, followed by Bavaria with 15 percent and Baden-Württemberg with ten percent. Among the national motorways, the A 3 was the leader in traffic jams, followed by the A 8 and the A 10, the Berliner Ring. According to ADAC, the hope that with the introduction of the Deutschland Ticket in May 2023 commuters will increasingly switch from cars to buses and trains and that there will be fewer traffic jams in the morning and afternoon has not been fulfilled.