Busy traffic, persistent wet weather, numerous accidents and disruption caused by major construction sites on major motorways meant that the number of days with more than 200 kilometres of traffic jams on Flemish motorways was remarkably high last year. It has made 2024 a record traffic jam year, according to the annual report from the Flemish Traffic Centre.
Traffic jams. Anyone who regularly hits the road has difficulty escaping them on Flemish motorways. Homeworking introduced during the pandemic hasn’t sorted the situation either.
Figures from the Flemish Traffic Centre force us to face the facts: last year on 60 days traffic jams extended for more than 200 kilometres. In only two years, this number days has just about tripled. 2024 was a record year in terms of severe congestion.
So how come there were so many traffic jams last year? 'Heavy rainfall really affected us last year. It had an immediate impact on traffic,' Peter Bruyninckx of the Flemish Traffic Centre observes.
But he notes, higher congestion figures are caused by a combination of factors. ‘It is busy on our Flemish motorways. However, Belgians are still doing slightly fewer kilometres than before the pandemic’.
In addition, there are also a lot of accidents: on average, on a working day, no fewer than 26 accidents cause disruption on our motorways.
During the pandemic, there was a sharp decline: 16 accidents per day caused a nuisance in 2020. But when public life resumed in 2021, the number started to rise steadily once again.
‘And then, finally, you have the impact of major infrastructure works,’ according to Bruyninckx another major cause of the many traffic jams.
‘A lot of construction sites have been started up in recent months, work to make our infrastructure better is being done in many places, but of course that also has its impact on traffic flows. Usually these are works that take a long time.’
Where are the worst traffic jams?
Particularly in the Brussels region, congestion severity i.e. the length of traffic jams multiplied by congestion time increased sharply last year, partly due to roadworks on the Brussels orbital ring road.
Compared to 2023, there was a 17 per cent increase in the morning rush hour and a 29 per cent rise in the evening rush hour.
Antwerp remains the region with the greatest congestion. And motorway congestion there also became more severe last year: up 7 per cent during the morning and 13 per cent during the evening.
Motorists in Antwerp and Brussels lose at least a fifth of their travel time in traffic jams, according to the Flemish Traffic Centre.
Little improvement in sight...
Based on the initial figures for 2025, there seems to be little improvement in sight. 'We see that never before at the start of a new year have we had such high congestion figures as this year,' Peter Bruyninckx says.
'So 2025 will continue on last year's momentum. Like 10 of the 12 months last year, January and February 2025 also broke records: they were the worst congestion months of January and February since our measurements started in 2011.'
Due to dry and nice weather, March 2025 recorded lower congestion figures than the same month last year, but even so, according to Bruyninckx, "March also remains a very difficult congestion month: the third heaviest March ever".