TOMTOM International BV, a Netherlands-based specialist in smart maps and location technology, released on Jan. 21 its comprehensive 15th edition of the TomTom Traffic Index. This index measures congestion levels, average speeds and travel times per mile across the global road network in major cities worldwide.
In the 2025 rankings, Colombia ranked first with an average congestion level of 48.8 percent, followed by Malta with a national congestion level of 45.1 percent. The Philippines rounds out the top three worst traffic congested countries in the world with an index of 44.6 percent.
Meanwhile, in the continent category, the Philippines is the most congested country in Asia. It is followed by India at 37.4 percent and Singapore at 36.8 percent.
With the computed national congestion level, the average speed by which a motorist can drive in the Philippines is a slow 21.0 kilometers per hour (kph). During morning and evening rush hours, this further slows to 19.4 kph and 16.0 kph, respectively. Average time lost during rush hours driving is 126 hours.
The 2025 Traffic Index Report said that “for 15 years, the TomTom Traffic Index has provided a global view of mobility trends shaped by urban policies and driver behavior. The Traffic Index also serves as a critical benchmark for Departments of Transportation, road authorities and city planners to make cities smarter, more efficient and more sustainable.”
Factors affecting congestion in PH
Travel time in any given locality is determined by a combination of static and dynamic factors. Static factors refer to the physical characteristics of road infrastructure, including functional road classification, carriageway width, number of lanes and designed traffic capacity. Dynamic factors, on the other hand, are conditions affecting traffic flow in real time, such as congestion levels, ongoing roadworks, vehicular incidents and adverse weather conditions.
In the Philippine context, the supply of large-capacity road infrastructure — particularly expressways and high-standard highways — remains severely limited. While a significant portion of the road network is officially classified as highways, many of these roads function in practice as low-capacity urban streets. Secondary and tertiary roads, especially outside major urban centers, continue to serve dual or residual functions as agricultural access roads, diversion routes and, in some cases, unpaved dirt roads.
Road surface quality further exacerbates travel inefficiencies. Concrete pavements are generally regarded as the most durable option and are typically finished with a bituminous or asphalt wearing course. However, a substantial portion of Philippine concrete roads falls below international engineering standards, particularly in terms of slab thickness, while asphalt pavements often suffer from poor material quality and premature deterioration. Uneven, cracked and deformed road surfaces increase rolling resistance and reduce effective operating speeds. Compounding this problem, narrow carriageways and limited lane counts constrain throughput, ultimately resulting in longer travel times and chronic congestion.
Corruption slows down travel times
Corruption skews which projects get approved in the first place. Instead of prioritizing roads based on traffic demand, economic impact or safety, projects are often chosen because they offer the greatest opportunities for kickbacks. Since new projects generate larger contracts and commissions, this results in misaligned priorities, such as new roads being built where traffic is low while critical bottlenecks remain unresolved. Politically motivated “pet projects” that lack proper feasibility studies are normally prioritized.
Corrupt practices routinely inflate project costs through overpriced materials and equipment, padded quantities and ghost deliveries, and collusion between contractors and public officials. A road that should cost P100 million ends up costing P200 million to P300 million, reducing the number of kilometers that can be built or rehabilitated within a fixed budget. In effect, corruption shrinks public investment capacity without reducing spending.
To accommodate kickbacks, contractors often cut corners on technical standards, such as reduced pavement thickness (e.g., from 12 inches to 8 inches), inferior aggregates and asphalt mixes, and poor drainage design. These compromises are usually invisible to the public, but devastating in the long term. Roads deteriorate prematurely, requiring frequent repairs and rehabilitation. This creates a self-perpetuating cycle of failure, re-procurement and kickbacks.
Corruption undermines quality control by neutralizing oversight mechanisms. Public engineers/auditors are bribed to approve noncompliant work, test results are falsified or ignored, and defects are concealed during project turnover. As a result, roads fail years — or even months — earlier than their intended design life, despite having been “completed” and paid for in full.
The broader impacts of corruption are severe: longer travel times and higher vehicle operating costs, increased accident rates due to unsafe road conditions, and reduced productivity and economic competitiveness.
Corruption does not merely waste money; it redefines infrastructure outcomes. Roads are built to extract value, not to last; standards exist on paper but not on the ground; and traffic congestion becomes a permanent feature rather than a solvable problem.
allinsight.manilatimes@gmail.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/All.Insight.Manila.Times
Viber: (0915)4201085