Speaking at the opening of the inaugural World Urban Transport Leaders Summit here on Tuesday morning, Mr Lim cited the case of the Area Licensing Scheme, which Singapore introduced in 1975.

The predecessor of electronic-road pricing (ERP) was actually based on 'intellectual groundwork laid by the Smeed Report to the United Kingdom Government in 1964'.

He was referring to a study headed by then deputy director of British Transport and Road Research Laboratory R J Smeed, which explored ways of charging motorists for using congested roads.

However, it took London over 30 years to implement congestion pricing.

Mr Lim said Singapore will 'continue to refine' the 10-year-old ERP scheme, 'by studying the experiences of other cities, such as London, Oslo, and Stockholm', which have since started pay-as-you-use congestion pricing schemes.

Other road systems that were inspired by cities elsewhere include bus priority lanes (introduced in the mid-1970s) and Glide (Green Link Determining System, mid-1990s), a computer software that ensures drivers on a heavily-used road get encounter as many green lights as possible.

The Glide idea came from Australia, while bus lanes came from both the UK and Australia.

Mr Lim also said 'we benchmarked the performance of our public transport system against many global cities, including Hong Kong, London and Paris'.

The Land Transport Masterplan which outlines Singapore's land transport roadmap until 2020 contains learning experiences of other countries as well.

Mr Lim reiterated the challenges transport planners face the world over.

'It is a challenge made much more acute and pressing now, because of rapid and accelerating urbanisation,' he said.

'More and more people are moving from the countryside to the city. Today, about half of the world's population already lives in cities. A United Nations report forecasts that this will rise to 70 per cent in the next 40 years.

'The same report adds that in the last two decades, the urban population in developing countries has been growing by an average of three million people a week.

'Being stuck in a traffic jam feels pretty much the same the world over,' he said. 'Whether one is in Los Angeles, Moscow, Beijing or Singapore, the frustration is the same.'

The World Urban Transport Leaders Summit, hosted by the Land Transport Authority, is an opportunity for planners and policymakers to network and exchange ideas.

'We face a common challenge,' Mr Lim added. 'Even if we cannot have a common solution that fits our diverse situations, we will at least be able to benefit by learning from one another.'

Over 100 delegates from 30 countries are here for the summit, which ends on Thursday.