London has the slowest-moving traffic in Europe, according to a study released yesterday which put six British cities in the Top Ten.

Traffic in London moves at an average of 12mph. By contrast, cars get through Hamburg, the fastest-moving city surveyed, at more than 50mph.

Other British cities in the Top Ten are Manchester, at 17mph; Edinburgh, at 18mph; Glasgow, at 19mph; and Bristol and Belfast, both at about 20mph. Newcastle-upon-Tyne was the fastest-moving city in the country, with an average of 26mph.

“It shows that in British cities, people would rather sit in traffic jams than brave public transport,” said Mary Vingoe, a spokeswoman for keepmoving.co.uk. “Hamburg, in comparison, has a very good public transport system. They have free park-and-ride buses, and trains are coordinated; and if you’re on a bus, and you know you have a long walk from the bus stop to your house, you can ask the bus driver to call you a taxi,” she said.

The survey also found that the Congestion Charge had reduced traffic in London by 20 per cent since it was introduced in 2003.

“Measures to encourage people to use public transport work better than congestion charging, and at the moment public transport isn’t a good enough alternative,” Ms Vingoe said.

Keepmoving.co.uk used GPS (global positioning system) data from thousands of vehicles travelling through Europe. Alex Petrie, general manager of Keepmoving.co.uk, said: “It has long been recognised that British cities have a limited ability to cope with traffic but we had assumed that cities such as London, Paris and Rome would produce very similar results.

“We were amazed to discover that London is on average 40 per cent slower than Paris.”