Does anyone remember the age of traffic? It was a time when traffic jams made the headlines, when Facebook was a firmament of posts by people stuck in their cars, and when hardly a conversation took place that the dreaded word was not mentioned.

Then there were the two-minute hate sessions. Transport Minister Joe Mizzi was the standard fixture, relieved on occasion by one of his consultants who had dared say traffic was a matter of perception. The hapless Audrey Testaferrata de Noto (for it was she) was charged with blasphemy of the highest order and disservice to the Republic of Autopia.

I hate to take readers back to the days when our dreams were haunted by images of trains, flyovers, underground honeycombs, perched monorails, bicycles, and scooters. It is a largely unnecessary remembrance, too, because all of those things are also in the future.

That is because traffic, and the industry of print and spoken word it spawns, are rather like migrating skylarks. Every year, they make a punctual appearance in their numbers in the first week of October. By mid-November or so, they are mostly gone. A few linger on throughout the winter, to no great import.

Now the migration of skylarks is well understood. Ornithologists know exactly why the birds are so seasonal and predictable. No one wonders why there are no migrating skylarks in, say, January, because we know that by then the birds are safely installed in Africa.

The traffic matter is not so simple.

It is not easy to see why it hits us with such force in October, only to peter out after a few weeks. Broadly put, there are three possibilities.

The first is that the evils of traffic are, as a much-maligned someone said, mostly a matter of perception.

Also, as that someone tried to explain, that does not mean that traffic does not actually exist. It is just that the more we think (and talk, and write) about it, the longer and more terrible the waits seem. In this sense, the annual traffic crisis is a seasonal panic, nourished by stories of a million missed appointments.

Why the calendrical punctuality?

The real villain of the story is summer. Every year it gives us a glimpse of an uncongested paradise in which one can drive like there’s no tomorrow

It may be that the first week of October is the time when the commute to the daily drudgery hits people hardest. It is the time when the summer lull gives way to the grim prospect of having to work, rather than grill sausages on a beach, for a living.

By November, the years of conditioning by school bells, timetables, and ‘I love my job’ cupcakes, prevail.

The second possibility is closely related. Fatigue is a characteristic of all kinds of public debate.

The reason why the Facebook posts thin out and Mizzi can breathe again is that people simply get tired of talking about the same thing.

This logic does not explain the annual rhythmic punctuality, and can probably be discounted as a false argument.

The third possibility is the most intriguing, for two reasons. First, because it calls into play a complicated set of routines. Second, because it holds much promise as a means to better understand, manage, and live with traffic.

The premise to this possibility is that it is factually the case that traffic is at its worst in October and early November. In other words, that it could empirically be shown that the chances of being held up for longer periods of time are greater during that period.

Now I can see why there should be more people, and cars, out and about in October than there are in August. School holidays end in September, factories and businesses gear up after the shutdowns, and so on. In sum, October is the time when the timetabled stuff really kicks off.

What I cannot see is how October is different from, say, January. There are no school holidays or shutdowns in January, and most people I know spend the month working hard, partly because there is not much to do outdoors, and also to pay off their Christmas credit card debts.

And yet, if the premise to the third possibility is right, there is less traffic. That can only mean one thing: it is not that we do less, but that we do things differently. Which would be a revelation, because it presents a solution to traffic that does not involve monorails and tunnels.

It is likely to be a complicated solution. I do not think there is a single, fundamental, thing that people do differently to get to work or drive their children to school in January, as opposed to October. They just seem to learn to read the traffic better and take alternative routes, to develop carpooling networks, and generally to time their commutes more efficiently.

This means that the solution to the traffic matter is not simply a case of more or better infrastructure, or less cars. There is that, to be sure, but there is also a more achievable side that has to do with learned practice and daily routines.

The real villain of the story is summer. Every year it gives us a glimpse of an uncongested paradise in which one can drive and drive like there’s no tomorrow, only a distant October.

mafalzon@hotmail.com