In case you ever say to your self whereas sitting in your automobile ‘the visitors is getting more and more worse,’ you might be proper: new information confirms that the variety of visitors jams in Switzerland has exploded in recent times.
In 2024 alone, motorists travelled a complete of 29.8 billion kilometres on Swiss motorways: the overwhelming majority —25 billion kilometres — are attributable to passenger automobiles. That’s 0.6 p.c greater than throughout the earlier 12 months.
That is what emerges from a new report revealed by the Federal Roads Workplace (ASTRA) on June seventeenth.
And although they characterize solely about 3 p.c of Switzerland’s total street community, motorways accounted for greater than 40 p.c of visitors jams in 2024.
“Practically 87 p.c of those visitors jams had been because of visitors congestion, and solely about 4 p.c to development websites,” ASTRA identified, including that “areas with heavy commuter visitors had been significantly affected.”
These are primarily areas round main city centres and alongside main transit routes.
Sometimes, Zurich and the A1 motorway are infamous for heavy visitors, as is the Gotthard Tunnel street, particularly on lengthy weekends and nationwide holidays.
Motorists driving on the A2 motorway, which connects Basel to Chiasso, are additionally no strangers to bottlenecks.
What plans does ASTRA have to enhance the visitors stream?
To handle and state of affairs, ASTRA is planning “focused measures based mostly on community upkeep and visitors administration utilizing clever techniques.”
How precisely will this work?
“Clever techniques, which permit for velocity changes and non permanent opening of the arduous shoulder to visitors, are already being efficiently carried out in lots of areas, for instance, between Bern-Wankdorf and Muri since August 2024,” ASTRA stated.
“They contribute to higher use of accessible infrastructure, improved street security, and smoother visitors stream.”
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However there may be extra
There are additionally plans to alleviate congestion in areas the place visitors volumes are rising significantly sharply and the place bottlenecks happen repeatedly.
That is already the case because the opening of the third tube within the Gubrist Tunnel, which lies to the northwest of the town of Zürich, and types part of the A1 motorway.
The third thoroughfare “has lowered the variety of hours of visitors jams within the route of Bern from round 1,400 in 2023 to round 150 in 2024,” in keeping with ASTRA.
When it comes to future plans, the Swiss Federal Institute of Know-how (ETH) in Zurich is presently reviewing all deliberate street and rail improvement tasks on behalf of the Federal Transport Workplace.
The outcomes, anticipated within the third quarter of 2025, will function a foundation for future transport coverage selections.
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Will all these measures be adequate to scale back visitors and congestion on motorways?
Solely future will inform, however there may be at the least one improvement on the horizon that’s more likely to enhance visitors in Switzerland.
Considerably extra vans that beforehand transited via Switzerland’s ‚Rolling Motorway‘ are anticipated to be on Swiss roads.
That’s as a result of RAlpin, an organization that operated the truck-to-train service because the Nineteen Sixties and noticed as much as 80,000 lorries per 12 months change from street to rail on sure sections of the Swiss Alps — will shut in 2026.
On account of this measure, considerably extra vans are anticipated to be on Swiss roads.
This is not going to solely generate heavier visitors, however may also end in extra air pollution within the mountain communities, although the extent of this injury can’t be quantified presently.
READ ALSO: Switzerland’s ‚Rolling Motorway‘ to shut
