Moscow’s sprawling public transport system has been ranked as the world’s most efficient in a recent report on transportation in global cities — with minimal waiting times and increased transport speed during morning rush hours.
The McKinsey & Company consulting firm assessed the public and private transportation systems of 24 global cities, including Moscow and St. Petersburg, in a June 2018 report on urban mobility. The analysis broke down the criteria into five aggregated metrics, including availability, convenience and sustainability.
Moscow leads all 24 cities in public transport efficiency with an “intelligent transport system” that uses more than 2,000 cameras and 3,700 sensors to ease congestion and synchronize traffic lights, McKinsey reported.
St. Petersburg ranked the fifth-most comfortable city for public transit riders, with strong wheelchair accessibility and a relatively modern fleet of metro cars.
However, Moscow’s rail infrastructure, affordability, convenience and safety all fell outside the top five.
In terms of overall transport efficiency that combines public and private transport, McKinsey said Moscow’s network ranked second to that of Seoul. The city placed fifth behind Chicago in the overall transportation affordability metric.
Moscow’s public and private transportation system was named the sixth-most convenient.
McKinsey contrasted recent technical advances in Moscow’s public transportation with surveyed residents perception of the network.
“The system’s true affordability is extremely undervalued, which possibly can be attributed to recent income stagnation,” McKinsey said. “While residents agree that recent positive changes were tremendous, their satisfaction lags the objective measures by a wide margin.”
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