Twin Cities traffic congestion is no accident.

Government agencies are not trying to reduce road congestion. Indeed, they welcome congestion, because impossible driving conditions will force Twin Cities residents out of their cars onto trains, buses and bicycles, where MnDOT and the Met Council want them.

The Twin Cities metro area has a rather modest population and is located on a prairie where there are no significant obstacles to building adequate highways. There is no reason why the should be one of the most congested urban areas in America.

Public pressure on our legislature, our governor and the responsible state agencies is needed to produce a transportation policy that meets the needs of the people of Minnesota.

Did you know?

The number of hours the average Twin Cities driver wastes sitting in traffic quadrupled between 1982 and 2014.

In 1982, the Twin Cities were rated the 35th most congested metropolitan area in the U.S. By 2017, the Twin Cities were the 22nd most congested urban area.

Congestion costs the Twin Cities metro area nearly $4 billion a year in wasted time and increased business costs.

Residents of urban areas comparable to the Twin Cities enjoy much greater mobility. For example, Kansas City has 1,320 lane miles of freeway per million residents and enjoys an average driving speed of 40.1 miles per hour, compared with 29.4 mph in the Twin Cities, because we have only 670 freeway lane miles per million people.

In 1982, Indianapolis was more congested than the Twin Cities. Since then, the Indianapolis area has grown twice as fast as the Twin Cities, but its congestion is nevertheless far lower today than in Minneapolis/St. Paul.

The American Transportation Research Institute recently identified the 100 worst bottlenecks in the U.S.. The Twin Cities had five, more than Chicago, Los Angeles, New York, or any other urban area except Atlanta and Houston.

Why do we have so much congestion, and what can we do about it? Read the report: