Traffic is one of the biggest local challenges we face. What happened and why did it get so bad?. In 1966, Montgomery had about 75 public roads and 6,000 residents. There were no subdivisions or suburban neighborhoods yet. The non-residential roads we use for commuting and errands haven’t changed much over the past six decades. Yet, we now have close to 24,000 residents and more 450 additional neighborhood roads. We have four times the residents, but the same number of primary roads. Not good.