Behavior of Traffic Congestion and Public Transport in Eight Large Cities in Latin America during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

This comparative study analyzes the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on motorized mobility in eight large cities of five Latin American countries. Public institutions and private organizations have made public data available for a better understanding of the contagion process of the pandemic, its impact, and the effectiveness of the implemented health control measures. In this research, data from the IDB Invest Dashboard were used for traffic congestion as well as data from the Moovit© public transport platform. For the daily cases of COVID-19 contagion, those published by Johns Hopkins Hospital University were used. The analysis period corresponds from 9 March to 30 September 2020, approximately seven months. For each city, a descriptive statistical analysis of the loss and subsequent recovery of motorized mobility was carried out, evaluated in terms of traffic congestion and urban transport through the corresponding regression models. The recovery of traffic congestion occurs earlier and faster than that of urban transport since the latter depends on the control measures imposed in each city. Public transportation does not appear to have been a determining factor in the spread of the pandemic in Latin American cities.

The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Public Transportation System of Montevideo, Uruguay: A Urban Data Analysis Approach

“…A sustained increment on public transportation usage is observed in the few infection periods identified in Figure 9 regarding the behavior of both COVID-19 cases and trips. The analysis suggests that the behavior of older people followed the same trend observed for normal users and other categories, without significant changes in the in cities in the Netherlands [7], 95% in Fuenlabrada, Spain [25], up to 93% in Santander, Spain [26], and more than 80% in major Latin American cities [28],…”

“…Andara et al [28] conducted research examining the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mobility in eight large Latin American cities: Bogotá (Colombia), Buenos Aires (Argentina), Mexico City (Mexico), Santiago (Chile), Lima (Perú), and Brasilia, São Paulo, and Rio de Janeiro (Brazil). The study utilized mobility data from both public institutions (such as the IDB Invest Dashboard for mobility and traffic congestion) and private organizations (specifically the Moovit platform for public transportation usage), along with COVID-19 contagion data from Johns Hopkins Hospital University.…”

“…Liu et al [8] 2020 USA essential workers and vulnerable populations continued using public transportation Carteni et al [24] 2021 Italy high correlation between reductions and COVID-19 cases Rodríguez et al [25] 2021 Spain reduction up to 95% Aloi et al [26] 2020 Santander, Spain reduction of 76% Awad et al [27] 2021 Spain significant decrease but willingness to resume if adequate sanitation measures Andara [28] 2021 Latin American cities low recovering of public transportation Gramsch et al [29] 2022 Santiago, Chile 72% reduction Puello [30] 2022 Dominican Republic 50% reduction…”

An analytical model for a tandem of two traffic-light intersections under semi-actuated and fixed control

“…Travel restrictions and social-distancing measures due to the COVID-19 pandemic led to a significant reduction in daily trips such as for commuting, shopping for non-essential items, and visiting friends and relatives, see Andara et al (2021), Abdullah et al (2020). This, in turn, resulted in an improvement of the traffic situation.…”

Open Business Model of COVID-19 Transformation of an Urban Public Transport System: The Experience of a Large Russian City

“…The transportation sector went in to a crisis state—the aviation transportation sector, in particular [ 5 , 6 ]. However, the automobile passenger transport services (95% of which are urban public transport (UPT) or city passenger public transport (CPPT) in Russian) also experienced difficulties in the spring–summer 2020 [ 7 ]. A significant decrease in demand for transportation forced transporters to drastically decrease the number of vehicles they placed on routes.…”