British writer Bill Bryson once wrote that "London is a city of endless possibility" — and perhaps, endless traffic? The UK capital is the most congested city in Europe, according to transport analytics company Inrix. The company looked at data from different cities around the world, and found that drivers in London spent an average of 101 hours sitting in traffic in 2024. That's up from 99 hours in 2023, and 97 hours in 2022. According to Inrix, these delays cost the city more than $4.8 billion a year — or about $1,200 for each of London's 4 million drivers. Inrix says London's bad traffic congestion is caused by the "concentration of population, employment and economic activity." But although it's Europe's most congested city for the fourth year in a row, London has improved in the global rankings. It was third in the world in 2023, but is now in fifth place globally. It is still, however, the only European city in the top five. Istanbul has jumped to first place, up from sixth, with drivers in the Turkish city spending an average of 105 hours in traffic per year. New York and Chicago are next on the list, followed by Mexico City in fourth place. Inrix also calculated each city's "downtown speed" — that is, the speed at which a driver can expect to travel 1.6 kilometers in the center of the city during morning rush hour. For each of the top five cities, the downtown speed was under 25 kilometers an hour.