Roads could be jammed with an extra seven million drivers within 20 years, according to the RAC Foundation.The number of road users will leap from 36 million to 43 million if current trends persist, the foundation said.
It said its forecast was consistent with Government figures which predict that compared with 2010, traffic levels on urban roads in England and Wales will rise by around a fifth by 2025 and by a third by 2035.
The biggest increase by 2025 is predicted to be in eastern England and Yorkshire and Humberside (both up 25%), while the biggest rise by 2035 is Yorkshire and Humberside (up 40%).
The RAC Foundation's 43-million vehicle forecast came as it published essays by transport experts in a paper entitled Moving Cities: The Future Of Urban Travel.
The essays showed 49% of people in England and Wales now live in towns or cities with a population of at least 250,000 with three-quarters of households in towns and two-thirds in cities owning a car.
RAC Foundation director Professor Stephen Glaister said any new road investment due to be announced this week by the Government was very welcome.
He went on: "But our work illustrates the massive challenges we also face in unclogging our urban areas. Traffic forecasting is not an exact science but the direction of travel is clear: towards increasing jams.
"We all want to see more drivers using alternative methods of getting about but the Government's own figures suggest we face an uphill battle under present policies.
"To preserve the quality of life in towns and cities we must revise our travel expectations and ministers need to set clear and coherent strategies to facilitate this."
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