UAE: How residents can enjoy low 'summer traffic' all year round

School runs undoubtedly contribute to urban traffic congestion. Now that schools are closed and many residents are abroad for their summer holidays, motorists enjoy reduced commute time.

There are lessons that can be drawn here to understand the changes in traffic flows during school days and school holidays. Khaleej Times spoke to urban planners and transportation experts who shared practical solutions and proposed measures that can be implemented so residents can enjoy less traffic not only during summer.

Dr Monica Menendez, associate dean of Engineering for Graduate Affairs at New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD), noted: “Having traffic fluctuations that follow school patterns is typical everywhere across the world. When school is on, traffic tends to be worse than when school is off and kids are on vacation. This is also true for the weekends, when the traffic patterns change, as most people don’t commute to work."

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“In the UAE, the (positive) effect of the school holidays is even more pronounced during summer, since many people leave the country. As a result, congestion goes down significantly, travel times drop, and moving around some typically congested areas of the city becomes a breeze,” she added.

The NYUAD professor of Civil and Urban Engineering told Khaleej Times: “Maintaining these low traffic levels all year round is very hard once people come back into the country and kids start normal school."

“As school opening times in the morning tend to be very similar around the city, most families with kids need to commute at the same time. This – compounded with the fact that many people have a similar working schedule – can lead to a lot of traffic,” explained Dr Menendez.

Explore flexible working hours

One solution Dr Menendez suggested is to explore the potential impact of flexible working hours and remote working arrangements.

“Encouraging this additional flexibility could alleviate congestion – as it would spread the traffic peaks in a way that the available road capacity is used more efficiently throughout the day,” she underscored.

“Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority, for instance, is conducting a survey to explore the potential impact of flexible working hours and remote working arrangements.”

Use big data to predict traffic

Another solution suggested by the NYUAD professor, who is also director at Research Centre for Interacting Urban Networks, is the use of big data for traffic management. She noted: “With all the data that is being generated across a multiplicity of devices, it is now possible to predict traffic much better than before."

A study published by Dr Menendez and her colleagues has shown that urban mobility patterns – at the aggregate level – are quite reproducible from day to day. The patterns “could help transportation authorities to be more proactive when it comes to managing traffic and reducing the likelihood of traffic congestion,” she added.

Emirati traffic safety researcher Dr Mostafa Al Dah said AI (artificial intelligence) and other predictive tools can provide solutions to mitigate traffic. He explained: “We can use AI to draw out complete data for example to profile what type of people – their jobs, nationality, age group – who usually go out of the country during summer. Then we compare the data when traffic is high and create a computer model to interpret the data.”

Out-of-the-box solutions

Al Dah said the data can be used to create a trend as to the number of people who leave or don’t use the roads during summer “then we can have better traffic mitigation or come up with out-of-the-box solutions.”

For instance, one solution can be is to give incentives to people who will stay off the road at certain times of the day to minimise the number of cars on the roads, noted Al Dah, who is also the founder of MA Traffic Consulting.

Another solution is to enhance pedestrian-friendly infrastructure and implement safety education to encourage active commuting options or the use of public transportation.

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