Cities face increasing transportation problems like congestion and pollution as the number of vehicles grows to an expected 2.5 billion by 2050. Traffic congestion costs countries and cities billions each year in lost time and fuel costs. It also negatively impacts the environment and public health. To support continued growth, cities need enhanced visibility across their transportation networks to make them smarter and more efficient by influencing behavior, improving communication, and driving faster, more coordinated transportation.

1. Building a smarter transportation
management network
© Copyright IBM Corporation 2014. IBM, the IBM logo and ibm.com are trademarks of International Business Machines Corp., registered
in many jurisdictions worldwide. SoftLayer is a registered trademark of SoftLayer, Inc., an IBM Company. Other product and service names
might be trademarks of IBM or other companies. A current list of IBM trademarks is available on the Web at “Copyright and trademark
information” at www.ibm.com/legal/copytrade. Statements regarding IBM’s future direction and intent are subject to change or withdrawal
without notice, and represent goals and objectives only.
1 The Global Vehicle Population, 2013, Polk Research,
http:// www.mera.org/Document-Vault/Presentations/2013/Polk-Presentation-ReMaTec2013-FINAL.pdf
2 https://www.rita.dot.gov/utc/utc/sites/rita.dot.gov.utc/files/utc_spotlights/pdf/spotlight_0313.pdf
3 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9734126/Trafiic-congestion-costs-UK-economy-4.3bn-a-year.html
4 http://cedb.asce.org/cgi/WWWdisplay.cgi?295422
5 http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/14/opinion/indias-air-pollution-emergency.html?_r=0
6 www.euro.who.int/__data/assets/pdf_file/0015/43314/E92789.pdf
7 iatss.or.jp/english/research/29-2/pdf/29-2-09.pdf
8 http://online.wsj.com/ad/article/transportation-congestion
9 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3138055/
10 http://www.globalfueleconomy.org/Documents/Publications/gfei_state_of_the_world_2014.pdf
Learn more
Cities can reduce congestion and plan proactively by integrating traffic and transit data and sharing
that information with citizens. To learn more about the IBM vision for the future of transportation,
download the Building a smarter transportation management network white paper or visit:
ibm.com/smartercities/transportation
The number of vehicles on the world’s roads is expected to reach 2.5 billion by 2050.1
But cities can’t keep up with the rate at which cars are added, so they face increasing
transportation infrastructure problems including congestion, gridlock and pollution. All
these issues have costs.
In the US, traffic congestion
results in 5.5 billion extra
hours of travel time for
drivers with $121 billion in
total delay and fuel costs (or
$818 per US commuter).2
Traffic congestion costs the
UK economy £4.3 billion
a year, or £491 per
car-commuting household.3
The cost of congestion
to Beijing is 58 billion
RMB or 4.22% of GDP.4
Congestion costs
Environmental degradation
costs India $80 billion
annually and accounts for
23 percent of the nation’s
child mortality.5
In Europe, road crashes
result in almost
120,000 fatalities and
2.4 million injuries
annually.6
In Brazil, the social costs
of traffic accidents in
urban areas are close to
$1.9 billion per year.7
By 2030, improvements
in fuel technologies are
expected to cut average
new car fuel consumption
by around 50 percent in
OECD countries, and
possibly worldwide.10
Global transportation
accounts for 20 percent
of the world’s energy use,
and 40 percent of that
consumption occurs
in cities.8
In emerging markets,
90 percent of urban
air pollution is because
of vehicle emissions.9
Safety costs
Environmental cost
The impact of traffic congestion
To improve traffic flow and enable continued growth, cities need to know where citizens are
trying to go and what may stand in their way. They need to:
Driving smarter transportation
Enhance
situational
awareness.
Establish
visibility across
transportation
networks.
Influence driver
and rider behavior.
Make transportation
networks faster.
Improve
communication
across agencies
and with citizens.
%
90 %
50
40%
20%
LBJ12346USEN-00