I'm guessing if you travel by car in major european (and most major cities of the world) rush hour will be similiarly bad. The main difference in European cities is that you often have better options, including better public transit or bike infrastructure, also more housing in the inner city and less endless suburbia. I don't have sources for this but my thoughts are that if traffic was much less more people would elect to use the roads and drive private cars and it would end up as congested as here, as it does when more road infrastructure is built.