Municipality’s solution for Tehran traffic

Drivers passing 10 highways in Tehran should pay toll, announces Tehran Municipality as part of its plan to control the traffic jam in the capital.

For many years, driving to Tehran downtown was only accessible by paying toll which could he purchased daily or annually, dubbed “Main Pattern”.

Since last spring, Tehran Municipality decided to update the payment rates and hours to the downtown.

For the next year, drivers would pay a higher rate if they enter the “Main Pattern” at rush hours, while those who commute in this zone between 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. will enjoy a discount up to a 50%.

Therefore, the highest daily rate to enter Tehran downtown, i.e. Main Pattern Price, will be nearly 390,000 rials (3.5 USD).

To control the pollution and traffic, the Municipality also applied another restriction for cars driving in a larger circle of the city. The pattern was that cars with number plate ending with an odd number could enter this zone on Sunday, Tuesday and Thursdays. And those with an odd number on their plates could drive through this zone on other days. Friday was exempted. (This is because in Farsi, week’s days are named with numbers and therefore we call them “odd days” and “even days”. Therefore, this pattern was called “Odd-Even-Pattern”.)

While all the traffic restrictions were lifted after 7 p.m., driving through Odd-Even-Zone was free of charge.

However, since the coming Iranian year, the Municipality wants to lift this scheme and replace it with toll payment. After the Odd-Even-Pattern was applied, several Iranian families bought more cars to have a chance to drive in this zone on every day of the week.

Tehran Municipality is trying to adapt already tested traffic patterns used in foreign metropolitans to find the best scheme for the Iranian capital.

From summer 2019, commuting through ten main highways in the city will be possible at a daily price equivalent to half of the Main Pattern Price.

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