It takes 45 minutes to travel from the roundabout on Hermanas Mirabal to Nicolas de Ovando and 30 minutes to get from the Alcarrizos to Kilometer 9 of the Duarte Highway. On the San Vicente de Paul to the bridge of La 17, it will take patience and 25 minutes of your time. Crossing the Juan Bosch Bridge will add 30 minutes to your morning commute. While observers blame poor infrastructure and planning, the closure of the pontoon bridge over the Ozama River and the near-total closure of the Duarte Bridge are in large part responsible the problem. El Caribe shows the kilometric jams on each of these major thoroughfares. Besides the reduced access to bridges, the failure to synchronize more than 3,000 traffic lights combined with the rampant electric shortage are huge contributing factors. According to Angel Segura, the Transit Department head for the National District, the creation of 174 new bus routes also complicates things, since the buses do not have any fixed points to pick up passengers or special bus stops that do not tie up traffic. According to his estimates, there are 550,000 vehicles trying to move about Santo Domingo at any given time.
AMET, the Metropolitan Transit Authority, only has 400 officers for each 10-12 hour shift, both day and evening.