Cities with the most cars per inhabitant; Tirana, with so much traffic, is not in the lead!

2026-03-09 07:36:00, Aktualitet CNA

Cities with the most cars per inhabitant; Tirana, with so much traffic, is not

Residents of the country's main cities, especially in Tirana and Durrës, spend a lot of time, but also fuel, in traffic.

A Monitor survey last year, where most respondents were from the capital, found that 70% of car users spent more than an hour in traffic every day. 41% of respondents who declared themselves car users said they spent 1-2 hours in traffic per day. 29% said they spent more than two hours in a vehicle without moving.

The number of vehicles circulating in the country has increased rapidly in recent years, exceeding 1 million (1,047,427) for the first time in 2025, with over 80% of them being cars.

In relation to population, Albania has a total of 443 vehicles per 1,000 inhabitants, which despite the increase remains among the lowest in Europe. For example, for cars alone, Albania had 328 vehicles per 1,000 inhabitants in 2024, compared to the European average of 578.

So which are the cities with the most traffic?

"Monitor" processed data on the number of total vehicles registered by municipality, based on figures from the General Directorate of Road Transport for 61 municipalities in the country, in relation to the respective population of these municipalities, according to the 2023 Census of INSTAT.

The municipality with the highest number of vehicles per 1,000 inhabitants is Saranda. The coastal city has 22.6 thousand inhabitants, while there are 16.2 thousand registered vehicles, or 716 vehicles per 1,000 inhabitants. This concentration of vehicles is 61% higher than the national average. In the summer, traffic in Saranda is almost paralyzed, not only due to the locals, but also the influx of tourists and the narrow streets.

The second is the coastal city of Durrës, with 584 vehicles per 1,000 inhabitants, or 32% more than the national average. In Durrës, traffic is present not only in season, but throughout the year, while parking, except at the entrance where the new project has been built by the municipality, remains extremely difficult.

Kurbini is in third place, with 557 vehicles per 1,000 inhabitants.

The list is followed by another coastal city, Vlora, with 551 vehicles per 1,000 inhabitants.

Tirana, where it is faster to get to a destination on foot than by car, ranks fifth, with one vehicle for every two residents (533). Another mission impossible, or very expensive, in the capital is parking.

In the Monitor survey, 84% of users said they always have trouble finding a place to park their vehicle. Average monthly parking costs are exceeding 10 thousand lek per month. Even buying an apartment is often “worthless” if you don’t have a parking space, and if you have to buy one, it costs up to 60 or 80 thousand euros, the same amount that used to buy a large house.

The large municipalities where residents have the fewest cars are Berat, Dibra, Përmet, Pogradec, with less than 300 vehicles per 1,000 residents./monitor