If you were in your car in Hobart and its surrounds on Monday afternoon, chances are you weren't moving very fast.
Many are now asking how one truck rollover on the Tasman Bridge caused a city's roads to clog and stay that way for five hours or more.
Commander Tim Dooley from Tasmania Police said the situation presented "complexities that were perhaps very uncommon", and that "the reality is it was a very unusual, complex situation."
But some Hobart City councillors say it's "remarkable" the state government doesn't appear to have an emergency plan in place for major incidents.
"An incident on the Tasman Bridge is entirely foreseeable and that's why it's so surprising there is no plan to manage the road network when this occurs" councillor Ryan Posselt said.
Fellow Hobart City councillor Louise Elliot agrees and says the onus is on all levels of government to come together to start thinking seriously about how to address a future crisis.
"We need to set bigger goals when it comes to managing this traffic problem, because it's not going to go away with our growing population, it's only going to get worse."
"All three levels of government need to come together, because we've all got different responsibilities, all got different funding capabilities,"
"because one slipped truck shouldn't cause an entire capital city to come to gridlock."
Call for an additional bridge across the Derwent
Transport expert Dr Bob Cotgrove isn't surprised the incident brought the city to a standstill saying a combination of car dependency and the growing rate of Hobart's outer-regions were largely to blame.
"The government just turns a blind eye, and I should say both major parties, turn a blind eye to the use of cars by people," he says.
"All the fastest growing suburbs of greater Hobart are on the periphery, in outlying areas like Brighton and Sorell, and lower Kingborough,"
"that means that the traffic getting from one region to another – all those people from the south that are trying to get over the Tasman Bridge to get to the airport or other facilities on the eastern shore, and vice versa – are all increasing all the time" he added.
"The Tasman Bridge is becoming completely overloaded,"
"Public transport is not an answer to road congestion … it cannot meet modern travel patterns."
"There is an urgent need for another bridge across the River Derwent – urban bridge – not going out to the Bowen Bridge which is too far upstream, but a bridge that is close to where the Tasman Bridge is now"
"That is the only way that you can cater for the anticipated increase in road traffic."
What are road managers doing to ease Hobart's traffic woes?
There is some progress in the works according to General Manager of State Roads Denise McIntyre.
"Obviously we can't plan for an incident that was as disruptive as this in terms of preventing it completely," she says.
"However, we've just recently put a tender out for real time traffic information hardware and intelligent transport systems on our three arterials: the Southern Outlet, the Tasman and the Brooker Highway."
Ms McIntyre says the technology will help assist people stuck in traffic understand what's going on in real time if they're caught in a jam.
"We're also looking at options to improve transport choices. So we're looking at pathways for the Tasman Bridge that will allow people to walk and cycle across the bridge [and] additional ferry services."
"The city is growing and the outer regions are growing and we do need to manage the traffic that results from that."
But Jason Byrne, professor of human geography and planning at the University of Tasmania, says the problem isn't necessarily because of poor city planning or lack of transport infrastructure, rather it's a behavioural issue.
"We have very high levels of car dependence in Hobart where up to three quarters of trips are made either as a driver or a passenger in a vehicle, so we need to change out car culture as part of this."
"We've backed ourselves into a corner effectively through these high levels of car dependence."
He says while different modes of transport may make commuters less dependent on roads, a fundamental part of the problem is that people tend to move to the same places at the same time, such as the morning school run.
"We need to look at integrated solutions that think about where people are moving."
"Our solutions need to not just treat the symptom, which is the knee-jerk reaction where people talk about building extra highways or adding on extra lanes — and instead be thinking about solutions such as behavioural change."
Transport Minister says plans are on track to ease congestion
Describing Monday's incident as "unprecedented", Transport Minister Michael Ferguson said it was "extremely unfortunate".
"I look forward to advice from crash investigators as to the cause of the crash and want to applaud Tasmania Police and my Department of State Growth staff for the rapid response to keep the disruption as short as possible," he said.
"The ferry services did a superb job responding to the government's request for extra and extended services at no notice.
"There were double the number of crossings yesterday evening, carrying more than 1,100 passengers."
He said plans were on track for "activating" Hobart's northern suburbs transit corridor, and rapid bus transport was being looked into.
"The Greater Hobart Traffic Solution commits $200 million for short and long-term transport initiatives to manage peak commuter demand in the Hobart area," he added
"including the new Southern Outlet Transit Lane... new, wide shared pathways on the Tasman Bridge, expansion of the Derwent Ferry service, as well as the already-completed Kingborough Park and Ride facilities."
Labor spokesman Josh Willie said the government had broken a commitment on rail.
"It was ironic ... that whilst many people were stuck in gridlock for many hours that it marked the five-year anniversary of when the Liberal government said that they would pull out all stops to have the rail service in the northern suburbs operating within five years."
