
Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide have been named as Australia’s three most-congested cities in a new study conducted by Novated Lease Australia.
According to data sourced from navigation specialist TomTom, Melbourne drivers spend an average of 205 hours on the road per annum, 92 of which are spent sitting in heavy traffic and congestion.
Sydney motorists aren’t much better off with a yearly average of 203 hours spent on the road, including 83 hours’ worth of congestion, compared with Adelaide’s respective numbers of 182 and 72 hours.
A full breakdown of the data can be found at the bottom of this report, but Brisbane and Perth predictably rounded out the top five, followed by Hobart, Newcastle, Gold Coast, Canberra and Wollongong.
The dataset also uncovered how much money the motorists of each city spent on fuel as a direct result of congestion with Melbourne ($205) and Sydney ($173) predictably topping the tables again, however it was actually Brisbanites who spent the third-most with an average of $158 per annum – Adelaide tied with Perth at $130.
Rank | City | Hours in congestion | Yearly travel time (hrs) |
1 | Melbourne | 92 | 205 |
2 | Sydney | 83 | 203 |
3 | Adelaide | 72 | 182 |
4 | Brisbane | 68 | 171 |
5 | Perth | 60 | 150 |
6 | Hobart | 52 | 148 |
7 | Newcastle | 51 | 148 |
8 | Gold Coast | 44 | 126 |
9 | Canberra | 32 | 111 |
10 | Wollongong | 25 | 96 |
* Data provided by Novated Lease Australia

