Traffic in Riyadh, how can we fix it?

Back in 2015, I was able to reach Manarat in around 15 minutes. Today, I spend around 40 minutes on the road, desperately trying to make it in time before class starts. Riyadh is a congested, expansive city. A city that is flourishing and developing rapidly, but an underlying issue of it is traffic. This problem is not only unique to Riyadh, many cities also face this issue. But what could we do to ease the transportation of millions of people everyday?

Public Transport is the most common answer. A single train could remove thousands of vehicles from the highway. A bus could remove thirty. A metro can remove hundreds. But these projects have already been implemented, and they have worked tremendously in other cities. Still, traffic is prominent in many parts of the world with some being ridiculous. 

In August 2010, there was a massive traffic jam in China. An 11 day gridlock on the roads, with some drivers spending 5 days traveling a stretch of highway. This example is an outlier, but the issue of traffic congestion in urban areas can pose a serious threat to society. If, for instance, an ambulance had to cross this stretch of highway, then the patient would most likely die before it could reach there. 

The solution to all of this isn’t more roads, or more of anything really. The solution starts from the beginning – urban planning. Countries have begun to realize this, and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has already started implementing new methodologies of urban planning. The Line, for instance, would be a pedestrian city, where you can access everything you need in five minutes. The idea being is that you will live next to where you work, with services and amenities near you. Neom, alongside massive projects aimed to radically change the way cities are built, will better the lives of everyone, save us time, and reduce greenhouse emissions.