Fed up with Istanbul traffic

Istanbul has the third highest traffic congestion in the world. The number of registered vehicles in the city is 3.75 million, with 1,017 new vehicles registered every passing day. Each year, we spend 125 hours in traffic.
 
At the same time, Istanbul is the most polluted metropolis in Europe. One of the reasons for this pollution is the vehicles on the roads, as 23 to 25 percent of the carbon dioxide emissions polluting the air stem from transportation, while 75 percent of it comes from motor vehicles.  

In other words, traffic not only takes up our time and energy while turning us into nervous wrecks, it also causes climate change and poisons us with the air it pollutes. 

For instance, among those who live near highways or places where there is plenty of traffic, the risk of developing serious respiratory tract diseases and dementia increases.  

It is high time for us to pursue truly effective solutions to liberate us from the traffic issue instead of resorting to short-term solutions by building new roads. While new roads solve traffic congestion problems in the short run, they again cause traffic congestion in the long run because they encourage driving. 

The solution to this problem is charging for use of roads, something that has been tried and tested in many cities of the world.  

In a panel held at the Istanbul Policy Center, Ayşe Uyduranoğlu of Istanbul Bilgi University made a presentation, stating that the practice of charging entry and exit fees for vehicles where the city traffic is most intense could be an effective solution. This is precisely what has been suggested for Istanbul for years.  

Road pricing, which was suggested in the 1960s by Nobel laureate William Vickrey, was first introduced...