The first Qatar Traffic Report (QTR), released by the Qatar Mobility Innovations Centre (QMIC) yesterday points out that March 2015 was the most congested month last year.
The report also highlighted that the highest congestion period is the morning peak hour of 7am to 8am where the average congestion index is 38%. The evening peak hour (5pm to 6pm) had about 37% of congestion while the noon peak hour from 2pm to 3pm had caused about 34% congestion.
QTR introduces comprehensive barometres for measuring the overall congestion level and its spatial and temporal evolution. These include congestion index, delay caused by congestion, top congested streets and the economic impact of the congestion.
According to Dr Adnan Abu Dayya, executive director, QMIC, the most congested areas and roads during the peak hours were Arab League Street at Al Ebb Intersection, Leabaib Roundabout, Jawaan Street at Al Saad, Olympic Roundabout, Al Bustan Street at Al Ghariya Street-Al Waab Street, Al Markhiya Street Onaiza Intersection and B Ring Road Rawdat Al Kail Street Jaidha Flyover.
When asked about March being the month with the highest congestion, Dr Abu Dayya said that it was due to the road construction activities at the Corniche resulting in a lot of traffic congestion in around the area.
QMIC report also points out that the traffic congestion levels in Qatar in 2015 seem high compared to other countries.
“This can be attributed to the fact that a large number of road projects were happening in 2015 which negatively impacted travel times and behaviour. In addition, the steady increase in population and vehicles in
Qatar during 2015 contributed to the high level of congestion and travel delays. As the road network gets stable with the completion of key road projects, we expect the level of congestion to improve.” added the official.
The key congestion indicators that are used in the 2015 report are the Masarak Congestion Index, a barometre to measure the overall congestion, the Travel Time Index which measures the ratio of travel time as compared to the free-flow travel time during peak-hours on weekdays and the Excess Travel Time which provides the average delay in minute per km driven that a driver would experience during the travel.
The total cost of road congestion would also include other factors like environmental, health, and societal impacts which will be included in the next issues of the report upon the availability of the necessary data.
The traffic data is being collected over the last three  years through Masarak which is a national platform and a suite of integrated services. Masarak collects real-time traffic data from three sources: fixed Bluetooth-based traffic sensing network deployed in Qatar, telematics (GPS) devices in fleets, and crowdsourced data though iTraffic mobile app.