Commuter traffic cause of strong growth in traffic volume on the Øresund Bridge in 2006
12.01.2007
The lack of workforces in Denmark and the increasing immigration of Danes to South Sweden are the most important causes that made 2006 a good year for the Øresund Bridge as well. Traffic increased by 16 per cent and is currently averaging 15,800 vehicles per day.
The trend of the past years was confirmed in 2006: Regional traffic is the engine of traffic development and is increasing the most. Compared with 2005, commuter traffic increased by 43 per cent. If we include the rail traffic, a total of 14,000 people commute over the bridge every day. A noticeable change as compared with 2001: the first complete operating year of the bridge, at the time when the total number of commuters was 4,000 per day.
- Today the Øresund Bridge is primarily the bridge of the companies and citizens in the region, while personal and lorry transit traffic are losing significance. If the strong economic growth is retained in Denmark and Sweden, we estimate that this trend will continue and even increase in 2007, says Jacob Vestergaard, Commercial Director.
Essential for the growth is the continuously growing number of Danes who move to South Sweden as well as increasingly more Swedes who – attracted by higher wages and salaries and an almost overheated job market in Copenhagen – are looking for and finding work in Denmark. Last year, approx. 4,400 people moved from Sjælland to South Sweden. Approx. 1,400 were drawn in the other direction. In total, the Danish net influx doubled as compared with 2005, whereby most kept jobs in Denmark.
Commercial and personal traffic in cars with subscription contracts for bridge passage increased by 12 per cent and 18 per cent respectively. At the turn of the year, the Øresund Bridge had approx. 140,000 private and 20,000 commercial customers who crossed the bridge using the BroBizz transponder. These customers represent in total more than 70per cent of traffic on the bridge.
Holiday traffic on the other hand only increased by a few percentage points. This also includes customers who only rarely cross the bridge and therefore did not receive toll discounts. Still, the day's record in July was beat no less than five times – and which turned out to be the best traffic month in the history of the bridge with a total of 642,523 passages, or 20,727 per day. With 23,837 passages, the Friday of the 28th of July was registered as the best single day in the history of the bridge.
Even rail traffic over the bridge is steadily increasing. The number of rail travellers across the Øresund increased last year by 17 per cent to approx. 7.8 million.
Tables on the traffic development can be downloaded at:
http://osb.oeresundsbron.dk/news/news.php?obj=4756
Source: www.oeresundsbron.com