In recent months, traffic, bad infrastructure and the related congestion dominated the news and social media. Whether it’s bus or priority lanes, new high-rise building developments or the never-ending Coast Road project – which, incidentally, no longer lets you see the coast at all – it has been one debacle after another.
In an island of 316 square kilometres, with 430,000 locals and an increasing number of residents – who are either originating from the EU, buying their Maltese nationality or scheming their way in to obtain resident status – road management must be a top priority.
Further to this, add 1.8 million tourists and a staggering 330,000 registered vehicles and you literally have a ticking time bomb on your hands waiting to explode.
The writing has been on the wall for a while now and the current administration has inherited an issue that has grown exponentially over the years. Yet, in its now infamous Malta Tagħna Ilkoll 2013 electoral manifesto, the Labour Party did commit to addressing our traffic management issues. Hence, this administration is now politically accountable for this. It is certainly not a challenge for, as they say, any average Joe. We need a solution.
After all, it’s relatively easy to realise that time lost in traffic, finding a parking space or trying to get to your destination – even if using public transport – all have a cost. Yet, governments have either failed to quantify these costs or have simply underestimated them as mere ‘lost time’.
In calculating this ‘cost’, my estimates are based on a local workforce of 190,000 and a prudent assumption that 50 per cent of those workers waste an average 30 minutes a day in traffic, parking or commuting.
Should one value this lost time at an average rate of €10 per hour, the annual cost of lost productivity will stand at an incredible €124 million.
Yet, one should not stop there, because other costs should be included, such as the extra fuel used, the increase in pollution and road rage and traffic accidents.
There are also other costs related to the lack of accessibility, making it harder for consumers to access businesses, which, in turn, results in less revenue to the economy.
Hence, you can probably safely assume that the economic and social cost caused by congestion and the absence of a solid and efficient infrastructure is probably, and easily, costing the country between €170 and €200 million a year.
If this congestion is not drastically addressed and it gets worse, it is safe to estimate that this jammy problem might probably end up costing the country €1 billion in five years’ time.
Yet, the objective of this article is not to exactly quantify the cost but to address the urgent need for awareness about these costs. They need to be taken into consideration when evaluating and making future infrastructure decisions.
Concurrently, this kind of framework needs to be considered elsewhere to really focus on the improvements that could be achieved in other areas, such as in education and health investment decisions. This brings me to the way forward.
Having a public transport system with air-conditioned buses, an efficient schedule, Tallinja cards and smiling drivers is not enough. This is a given which should have been in place many years ago.
To address this issue we need to think big and futuristic. And while I acknowledge that governments do have limited budgets and conflicting demands, if the full social cost is included in the decision-making framework, then things are placed in the right perspective and priority.
Simply put, the government, as opposed to private investors, has an obligation to address the social cost as well as the lost or acquired benefits of such projects, primarily those that tackle congestion.
More importantly, the €1 billion that will be lost over the next five years should instead be allocated and invested in a state-of-the-art infrastructure solution.
Not only will it be paid back in five years’ time but it will serve to generate further economic benefits through the external improvements of day-to-day life and urban living in Malta.