How to beat the UAE traffic surge expected as 1.27 million students go back to school

Dubai: A record 1.277 million students head back to classrooms across the UAE from Monday, and the return could not come at a busier time for the country's roads.

Over the past week, families who travelled abroad during the summer break have been streaming back into the country, offices have been filling up again, and commuters are already noticing longer journeys.

With schools reopening and normal work routines resuming at the same time, traffic experts are warning that peak congestion is about to make a forceful comeback even as authorities, schools and transport agencies are gearing up for a demanding first week.

Months of disruption

The past six months have been anything but ordinary for UAE traffic. Regional developments, including the conflict involving Iran, saw schools switch between distance learning and on-site classes at different points, while several companies expanded work-from-home arrangements.

That period was followed by the long summer break, when many families left the country and school-related traffic all but disappeared.

Now, all of that is reversing at once. Schools are reopening, businesses are back to normal operations, employees have returned to their desks, and holidaymakers are back home.

The result, according to road safety expert Thomas Edelmann, founder of RoadSafetyUAE, will be familiar chaos.

"We will, of course, see a lot of traffic chaos, as we always do when a new term begins," he told Gulf News.

Edelmann urged parents to treat the school run as a chance to set an example, leaving home earlier so children see them behaving calmly rather than rushing under stress.

School buses matter

He pointed to the simplest statistic: a single school bus can carry up to 50 children, meaning it can take as many as 50 cars off the road.

He suggested relevant entities consider subsidising school transport to make buses more affordable, which could ease congestion considerably around campuses.

Commuters are already feeling the shift. Stalin Meledath Mohanan, who lives in Muweilah, Sharjah, and works in Jumeirah 1, said his journey has changed noticeably since last Monday.

He used to leave home at 5.50am and reach work by 6.30am, but now faces arriving 15 to 20 minutes late.

From next week, he plans to revert to leaving at 5.15am or 5.20am, and expects his evening commute, currently around an hour and five minutes, to stretch to as much as one hour 40 minutes.

"If there are four school buses waiting at one traffic signal, you can imagine how much extra time it takes," he said.

Office return adds pressure

Edelmann also flagged the return-to-office trend as a major factor. While some companies embrace remote work, he said many employers are now asking staff back full-time, with offices being refurbished to fit more people.

His core message for commuters is to leave earlier, stay calm and plan around peak times. "For people who have to be on the road during peak hours, my advice is simple: chill. Don't get angry. Relax," he said.

Calling for greater flexibility, Edelmann pointed out that hybrid patterns where staff start early from home, come in mid-morning, and leave earlier to finish the day remotely, will ease pressure on peak-hour roads.

Entrepreneur Shahina Shabeer, who runs a hospitality trading company in Dubai with meetings across Dubai and Sharjah, has already adjusted her schedule.

She now books Sharjah meetings for the morning, when she travels against the heavy traffic, and keeps Dubai meetings for after noon, once school-hour congestion eases.

"During the summer vacation, I didn't have to plan like this," she said, adding that checking live traffic data on Google Maps helps her dodge jams and accidents.

Juggling family and commute

For Rouba Al Alam, an engineer, a content creator and a mother of three who lives in The Greens in Dubai and works in Abu Dhabi’s Hamdan Street, the school season means waking earlier to prepare lunch boxes.

“During the summer break, I only had to get up at around 5.30am. Now, I will have to start waking up at 4am," she said.

She leaves by 5.45am to beat the school-bus rush and avoids the evening peak around 5.30pm to 6pm.

Though she points out that while the Dubai-Abu Dhabi route is generally less congested than Sharjah's, she highlighted that accidents or breakdowns can still cause long delays.

New bridges and wide roads, she added, offer useful alternative routes.

Al Alam said the shift in traffic volume is already visible well beyond the roads.

"I've been noticing a lot more people around: not only on the roads, but also in the malls, with families returning and shopping for the back-to-school season. We just have to brace for the heavy traffic on the roads now onwards."