Updated December 2025 with data to 2024-25 (excluding city per-capita metrics).
Data sources:
- BITRE Australian Infrastructure and Transport Statistics Yearbook 2025.
- ABS National, State and Territory population
- ABS Regional population (latest data released March 2025 for June 2024)
Total vehicle kilometres for 2024-25 were a record high:
The biggest pandemic-related declines in vehicle kilometres were in cars, motorcycles, and buses:
Technical note: Financial year population calculated as average of mid-quarter population estimates.
Vehicle kilometres per capita peaked around 2004-05 and were starting to flatline in some states before the pandemic hit with obvious impacts. In 2024-25 vehicle kilometres per capita was pretty stable in all states and territories, at lower than pre-pandemic levels.
Technical note: Financial year population calculated as average of population at start and end of FY.
Vehicle kilometres per capita were flat in most cities in 2023-24, except for a small rise in Canberra. This follows a post-COVID rebound to 2022-23 in the heavily locked-down cities of Sydney, Melbourne, and Canberra.
All large cities are still well below 2018-19 levels, consistent with a pre-COVID long-term downwards trend.
Canberra has dramatically reduced vehicle kilometres per capita since around 2014 leaving Brisbane as the top city (it’s not clear to me why this is the case).
Charting Transport 