Have you ever stopped to think about the impact of using your car? Unlikely. What is probably weighing on your mind is how to avoid the heavy traffic and the quickest route to get to your destination. No doubt, each time you stop at the petrol station, you realise you’re spending hard earned cash to fill in the tank with petrol or diesel. That is money you could have spent elsewhere or perhaps saved.

But let’s face it. Given the chance, we would all like to own a car and that is the first thing our younger generation thinks of buying as they approach the age of 18. Far-fetched? Not really. I recently asked my University honours students if they owned a car. They all do. True, they are fourth year students but their average age is 22, and you would not ask the same question in any university abroad and get the same answer.

The simple fact of life here on this tiny archipelago is that we are obsessed with our car. And we also tend to use cars intensively – which, of course, explains why our roads cannot cope with the ever-increasing number of cars. Unsurprisingly, our rate of car ownership is the third highest in the European Union and the effects of this are beginning to tell.

Most of these effects are, as we economists define them, indirect or hidden. We do not necessarily pay a market price for them but they are costs nevertheless – an example being pollution.

According to the study I co-authored with Maria Attard and Frank Bezzina, colleagues at the University of Malta, these costs account for 4 per cent of our Gross Domestic Product. This is no small matter. In 2012, the cost of accidents, air pollution, climate change effects, noise pollution and gridlock amounted to €274 million. These are all costs caused by our use of the car.

At this rate – and assuming the rate of car ownership reaches a peak at around 2030 – the external costs will rise to €317 million in 2020 and €322 million in 2030. Should we ignore these costs and do nothing? So far that is precisely what we have done but with more cars on the road (at least till around 2030) driving on our roads will virtually grind to a halt.

Unsurprisingly, the 2015 Country report* published by the European Commission in February identifies road traffic as major challenge for the Maltese economy .

Sooner rather than later, we need to become fully aware of the indirect and hidden effects I referred to earlier.

These effects impact our quality of life, our health, the climate, the value of our properties and increase the cost of doing business and of car use, as we spend more and more hours each year in gridlock.

The study estimated that we lose on average 52 hours a year on our roads. And that’s not factoring in delays at traffic lights and delays caused by accidents.

Of course, nobody in his or her right senses would suggest a ban on new or second-hand car sales but we cannot go on ignoring the facts. We need solutions.

The study simulates a number of recommendations which could ease the current levels of car use and as a result reduce the external costs of transport. These recommendations include a modal shift of 20 per cent to public transport, fewer parents ferrying their kids to school and relying more on school transport, and more people buying electric cars. Though it is easier said than done, we really need to give public transport a second chance.

No effort should be spared by the new operator and thegovernment to make public transport both reliable and efficient.

We simply have to get it right since without this modal shift, other measures to control traffic and congestion will not be enough to reverse the current trends.

So the next time you are about to turn on the engine of your car, stop and think about the consequences and consider whether you really need to use the car at all. You would contributing positively to reducing pollution, saving on time and fuel wasted, and last but not least reducing high stress and noise levels caused by congestion.

*The study can be downloaded from http://ec.europa.eu/malta/

Philip von Brockdorff is the head of the Department of Economics at the University of Malta.