Tell us: What bugs you most about living in Prague?

Prague is a special place to live. This much is clear from the many surveys and studies which put Prague close to the top of global rankings for quality of life, beauty, or student experience.

But that doesn’t mean life in the Czech capital is perfect. A recent poll by the STEM / MARK research agency for the Chamber of Commerce of the Capital City of Prague has identified the things which Praguers tend to find most annoying about life in the city.

Respondents could select which three issues they consider to be the most problematic about living in Prague.

Top of the table for getting on Praguers’ nerves is road traffic. 45 percent of survey respondents chose traffic as one of their top three gripes with Prague, with the issue of particular importance to people in Prague 7 (71.4 percent) and Prague 1 (66.7 percent).

Linked to this, the second most common issue was the availability of parking spaces, identified as a major problem by 42.6 percent of respondents. In third place was the unavailability of affordable housing, at 39 percent.

Other problems which Praguers think the city needs to focus on fixing are homelessness and drug addiction, cited as a major issue by 36.8 percent of respondents.

“The main priorities include the completion of the ring road and the consequent solution of traffic problems. This is followed by housing and security in city streets. We want to discuss all issues at the professional level with representatives of municipalities and their respective departments,” said Petr Michal, Chairman of the Board of the Prague Chamber of Commerce.

“We are also interested in the views and attitudes of private sector experts such as transport engineers and developers,” he added.

In a worrying sign for city authorities, the survey suggests a disconnect between official priorities and the concerns of people living in Prague.

City Hall is focusing on “smart city” digitization and cutting down ‘visual pollution’ around the city. But these issues were selected as major problems by only 1.8 percent and 6.2 percent of survey respondents, respectively.

Their worries will be compounded by findings that 52 percent of Praguers feel life in the capital has not improved over the past three years. Only 5.7 percent of respondents claimed to definitely feel better living conditions now than three years ago.