By Brendan Carroll

Galway has been ranked as the 37th worst city in the world for traffic congestion.

Drivers in the city are spending an extra 73 hours a year in their cars as a result of the bumper-to-bumper hold-ups, an international survey has found.

Galway has fallen from 17th worst in Europe for traffic congestion to the 14th worst, according to the latest Global Traffic Scorecard for 2023 by urban traffic data analytics company Inrix.

And it’s not getting any better this year – the report shows that in the first three months of 2024, Galway traffic congestion got 12% worse than during the first quarter of last year – at a time when the majority of other European cities surveyed showed an improvement.

“Traffic is stealing days of our lives each year,” said Galway People Before Profit spokesperson Adrian Curran.

“The data shows that people who commute in Galway are losing over three days a year sitting in traffic. This is not just wasted time, but fuel and emissions – things we should be drastically reducing the use and production of.”

He pointed out that while Dublin was ranked even worse than Galway, at 16th in the world and fourth in Europe for traffic congestion, Galwegians were actually ahead of Dubliners for time lost due to traffic each year.

“Galway was ranked 37th for congestion compared to its population, putting it firmly in the worst 4% of cities worldwide analysed for this report,” Mr Curran added.

Traffic was surveyed in a total of 834 cities across the globe for the Inrix 2023 Global Traffic Scorecard.

Pictured: Standstill: traffic exiting the M6/N6 at the Coolagh Roundabout in Galway and backed up to the Galway Clinic and on to the Briarhill junction.