Christchurch traffic congestion worse than Miami, Berlin

Christchurch motorists are facing an extra 29 minutes of travel each day.

A recent report shows the city's traffic congestion outranked that of places like Miami, Berlin and Dubai.

The results, from TomTom's Traffic Index 2017 revealed Christchurch had the third most congested roads in the country, after Auckland and Wellington, despite just a 3 per cent increase from the previous year.

The report ranks Christchurch as 106th most congested city in the world, with Auckland coming in at 47 and Wellington at 71.

Auckland motorists could expect an extra 45 minutes of travel time daily, the equivalent of 4 working weeks a year spent in the car.

Wellington drivers saw a 72 per cent increase in congestion, equating to 43 minutes longer during peak morning traffic.

TomTom's historical data showed that traffic congestion was up by 23 per cent globally since 2008 with Oceania recording the highest increase in the world by 36 per cent.

Between 2015 and 2016, Europe's traffic congestion had increased by 9 per cent, North America was up by 5 per cent, Asia and Oceania were both up by 12 per cent, while South America was up 7 per cent and Africa by 15 per cent.

Southern European countries such as Italy (-7 per cent) and Spain (-13 per cent) had seen a large drop in traffic congestion during the past eight years.

The traffic index, now in its sixth year, looked at the traffic congestion situation in 393 cities in 48 countries on six continents.