Not sure about everywhere but here in Europe (Spain, Ireland) the bands are dead quiet. I became a ham in the 90s and every morning we had a call in on the way to work. Tens of people on the repeater. The repeaters are quiet now. The digital ones sound a bit more active but that's because they're relaying the whole country now.

Hf is still pretty busy I think but I don't do that. No space for antennas in the middle of the city.

But anyway there's definitely space on 70cm. The band plan would have to be redesigned though for wider channels. There's even more space on 13cm. Literally nobody uses that. There used to be some amateur TV but that's gone too.

And yes it's annoying that in this day and age digital radio still sounds way worse than ordinary FM at the same bandwidth.