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Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

economist.com

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Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#151

Post by kleiba »

Young people are quite often drawn to city life, and many big cities have a well functioning PT system. Driving in big cities, on the other hand, and especially parking is a nuisance and expensive.

At the same time, I recently saw a documentary about how young families are driven out of the cities and into the suburbs because apartments in bigger cities have become unaffordable for many of them. Also, life styles sometimes change as you get older - when you start a family, many of the amenities of city life become increasingly irrelevant, and raising kids outside of the city can also be more attractive for many. In such a situation, the perspective of having a car becomes a completely different one.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#152

Post by ajoseps »

galangalalgol wrote: post #19
TillE wrote: post #4

If you live in anything like a real city and don't absolutely need a car to commute, the misery of street parking alone vastly outweighs any kind of occasional benefit. But it's nice to have a license so you can rent a car if you really want to.

What is a real city? I live in one of 20 biggest in the US, but even #2 LA is pretty hard to get around without a car. My experience in traveling has been that places where carless transportation is easy, are places I can only afford to visit, not live.

LA is probably the least public transport friendly major city in the US. It's been improving but it's not great

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#153

Post by mantas »

Xylakant wrote: post #142
mantas wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CARGO BIKE /s

You’re being sarcastic, but I’ve been there and done that. For $reasons. Under other circumstances, the answer would be “take a cab.”

„Take a cab“ is always an option. But at some point, if using it frequently enough, it becomes cheaper and more convenient to just own the damn thing.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#154

Post by rexpress »

fleddr wrote: post #109
wffurr wrote: post #10

There's 138 trains per day between Amsterdam and The Hague. It's faster to take the train than to drive on that trip. Driving in either city in an exercise in frustration. Why would anyone in a rich country with a high functioning rail system like The Netherlands want to drive? I don't know how many rich countries that describes, but I lived happily for years in Boston in the USA without a car. I have one now but onl…

The US anti-car narrative often refers to the Netherlands as some kind of beacon of proper public infrastructure, whilst not knowing a damn thing about it. First, let's establish that the Netherlands is a car country. We have 11 million cars on a population of 17 million. On a typical day, 1 million people use public transport. Cars are the norm, not trains or bicycles. Public transport is rarely faster, not even in…

>First, let's establish that the Netherlands is a car country...On a typical day, 1 million people use public transport. Cars are the norm, not trains or bicycles.

Anyone visiting a Dutch city can see what a distortion this comment is. The sheer volume of bike traffic on largely safe infrastructure is phenomenal. Imagine if even half of these people took to cars instead, it would be gridlock. Life may be good for Dutch drivers, but only because so many others leave their cars at home.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#155

Post by mcv »

My parents wanted to pay for my driver's license when I turned 18, but I didn't want one. (I wanted a good electric guitar instead, though it's been stolen since.) Lived most of my life without a car, and so did my brother. Worked fine.

I only got a driver's license when I got married and my wife insisted, because she didn't want to the only one driving the kids around. (She mostly insists that she drives, though.) I still commute by bike.

In a well-designed city, most people don't really need a car. Some do; some jobs really do require a car. My wife still travels to all corners of the country regularly, so we do have a car for that, but for me personally, a car would be a pointless expense.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#156

Post by imiric »

BrandonS113 wrote: post #99
wffurr wrote: post #10

There's 138 trains per day between Amsterdam and The Hague. It's faster to take the train than to drive on that trip. Driving in either city in an exercise in frustration. Why would anyone in a rich country with a high functioning rail system like The Netherlands want to drive? I don't know how many rich countries that describes, but I lived happily for years in Boston in the USA without a car. I have one now but onl…

I had to spend a few months in Holland for work. We we left with the problem of what do do on the weekends. You can't rent bikes if you are not Dutch, and visiting the lovely villages and other places Holland is full of is a time consuming exercise in futility unless one has a car. A train is great for Rotterdam-Hague-Amsterdam, not so good for visiting the Bosch museum in 's-Hertogenbosch. Holland has a great road s…

> You can't rent bikes if you are not Dutch

Huh? There's a bike rental place on practically every other corner in most Dutch cities, and most of their profit is from tourists. You only need to show some ID and leave a deposit. Dutch people usually have a cheap old bike, or use the public OV bikes, for which you do need to register and get a card, but even that is possible as a foreigner, it just takes some days to process.

> visiting the lovely villages and other places Holland is full of is a time consuming exercise in futility unless one has a car.

I'm not sure where you're getting this from either. Intercity transport by train works great, and there are many organized bus tours that take you to smaller villages. You can easily see most of the country without owning a car, though it's a personal preference whether you enjoy using public transport or not.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#157

Post by TrackerFF »

I'm from a rural place, so car is more or less the only viable method of transportation. Next town over is 45 miles away, the buss goes 3 times every day (06:00, 12:00, 18:00) - and like most small rural towns, the shops are dying one after another. If you want to purchase furniture, appliances, or whatever, that means driving to the next town - or you could spend $100-$200 on delivery.

Luckily I moved away, but every time I'm back home I do feel the pain - especially during winters.

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#158

Post by wara23arish »

fundad wrote: post #117
BizarreByte wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> maintenance is expensive This is largely just nonsense for a lot of modern cars. I’m at 80k in 4 years and have only done oil changes and tyres. My mother only had her first “big” repair on her car at 140k after 10 years. Cars are more reliable than they’ve ever been.

Oil and tires is expensive

Oil changes are cheap unless you drive a really fancy car. And also everybody can do their own oil changes if they watch a video or two.

Tires last at least 3 years..

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#159

Post by jononomo »

speeder wrote: post #130
fleddr wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US anti-car narrative often refers to the Netherlands as some kind of beacon of proper public infrastructure, whilst not knowing a damn thing about it. First, let's establish that the Netherlands is a car country. We have 11 million cars on a population of 17 million. On a typical day, 1 million people use public transport. Cars are the norm, not trains or bicycles. Public transport is rarely faster, not even in…

That is not a car country. São Paulo has more car than population, and has so many cars that their area summed is bigger than the area of all streets in the city. It is so many cars that sometimes walking 1 hour to your workplace is faster than a car route where you can spend 2, 3 hours to go to a neighborhood next to yours during rush hour. So many cars that the city became also the city with most helicopters, becau…

Does São Paulo have more cars than people even if you include children? Surely there must also be an underclass of very poor or homeless people who do not own cars. What accounts for the fact that there are more cars than people? Is it common for a household of four (mother, father, son, daughter) to own five or six cars?

Re: Throughout the rich world, the young are falling out of love with cars

#160

Post by Tade0 »

hgomersall wrote: post #127
fleddr wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US anti-car narrative often refers to the Netherlands as some kind of beacon of proper public infrastructure, whilst not knowing a damn thing about it. First, let's establish that the Netherlands is a car country. We have 11 million cars on a population of 17 million. On a typical day, 1 million people use public transport. Cars are the norm, not trains or bicycles. Public transport is rarely faster, not even in…

I think the question that anyone that rejects cars would ask is "why do you choose to live 60km from your work?".

Perhaps because real estate/rent is simply too expensive anywhere closer.
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