Belgium’s traffic jams have returned to some highways as car and freight traffic has started to increase again, according to the Flemish Traffic Centre (Vlaams Verkeerscentrum).
Car traffic on Flemish roads increased with 5,1% in the first week of June, and truck traffic increased with 3,4%, according to the centre.
While the average level of congestion is still 51% lower than in the first half of March, the increase in traffic has gradually caused more traffic jams since the beginning of June.
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The level of saturation is slowly being reached again at certain critical points in the network of highways, according to the Vlaams Verkeerscentrum.
The amount of car traffic during week days is currently 21.7% lower than in the last two weeks before Belgium introduced a ban on non-essential travel, and freight traffic is 1,3% lower than before the crisis.
In Belgium as a whole, there were 3,8% more trucks in the weeks before the lockdown than now, according to Viapass (the supervising and coordinating public organisation for the Kilometre Charge, a sort of road tax for heavy vehicles).
“With the number of trucks on the road being an indicator of economic activity in our country, things are moving in the right direction,” the organisation commented.
The Brussels Times
