IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/cog/urbpla/v8y2023i3p126-134.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Drivers’ Perspectives of Car Dependence

Author

Listed:
  • David Metz

    (Centre for Transport Studies, University College London, UK)

Abstract

The concept of car dependence includes both travel to destinations for which other modes than the car are not practical and preference for car travel even when other modes are available. While the concept has been a focus for transport analysts for some time, car ownership and use have continued to grow. This reflects the utility of the car for travel on roads where drivers do not experience excessive congestion and where there is parking at both ends of the journey. Local public transport and active travel only become generally attractive alternatives to the car in dense city centres where road space for car use is limited. Reduced car dependence is facilitated by city planning that encourages increased density, opportunities for which are constrained by the stability of the built environment. As well as utility for travel to achieve access to desired destinations, car ownership is also attractive on account of positive feelings, including pride, reflecting both self-esteem and social status. The positive feelings of the population at large towards car ownership are not consistent with the critical view of many analysts, a divergence in point of view that contrasts with the general acceptance of the need to respond to climate change, for which the purchase of electric vehicles is seen as an appropriate action. Rather than advocating measures explicitly aimed at reducing car dependence, a more effective policy approach would be to increase the availability of alternative modes while mitigating the detriments of car use.

Suggested Citation

  • David Metz, 2023. "Drivers’ Perspectives of Car Dependence," Urban Planning, Cogitatio Press, vol. 8(3), pages 126-134.
    • Handle: RePEc:cog:urbpla:v:8:y:2023:i:3:p:126-134
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.cogitatiopress.com/urbanplanning/article/view/6286
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Ho, Chinh Q. & Mulley, Corinne & Hensher, David A., 2020. "Public preferences for mobility as a service: Insights from stated preference surveys," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 70-90.
    2. David Metz, 2021. "Time constraints and travel behaviour," Transportation Planning and Technology, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 44(1), pages 16-29, January.
    3. Kandt, Jens & Rode, Philipp & Hoffmann, Christian & Graff, Andreas & Smith, Duncan, 2015. "Gauging interventions for sustainable travel: A comparative study of travel attitudes in Berlin and London," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 35-48.
    4. Moody, Joanna & Zhao, Jinhua, 2019. "Car pride and its bidirectional relations with car ownership: Case studies in New York City and Houston," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 334-353.
    5. Jens Kandt & Philipp Rode & Christian Hoffmann & Andreas Graff & Duncan Smith, 2015. "Gauging interventions for sustainable travel: a comparative study of travel attitudes in Berlin and London," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 63872, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Kobe Boussauw & Enrica Papa & Koos Fransen, 2023. "Car Dependency and Urban Form," Urban Planning, Cogitatio Press, vol. 8(3), pages 1-5.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Haarstad, Håvard & Sareen, Siddharth & Kandt, Jens & Coenen, Lars & Cook, Matthew, 2022. "Beyond automobility? Lock-in of past failures in low-carbon urban mobility innovations," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 166(C).
    2. Feitelson, Eran & Cohen-Blankshtain, Galit, 2018. "Public transport planning in a spatially segmented city: The case of Jerusalem," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 65-74.
    3. Václav Plevka & Pieter Segaert & Chris M. J. Tampère & Mia Hubert, 2016. "Analysis of travel activity determinants using robust statistics," Transportation, Springer, vol. 43(6), pages 979-996, November.
    4. Li, Shengxiao (Alex), 2023. "Revisiting the relationship between information and communication technologies and travel behavior: An investigation of older Americans," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 172(C).
    5. Geng, Jichao & Long, Ruyin & Chen, Hong, 2016. "Impact of information intervention on travel mode choice of urban residents with different goal frames: A controlled trial in Xuzhou, China," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 134-147.
    6. Geng, Jichao & Long, Ruyin & Chen, Hong & Li, Wenbo, 2017. "Exploring the motivation-behavior gap in urban residents’ green travel behavior: A theoretical and empirical study," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 125(C), pages 282-292.
    7. Jichao Geng & Ruyin Long & Hong Chen & Ting Yue & Wenbo Li & Qianwen Li, 2017. "Exploring Multiple Motivations on Urban Residents’ Travel Mode Choices: An Empirical Study from Jiangsu Province in China," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(1), pages 1-16, January.
    8. Biehl, Alec & Ermagun, Alireza & Stathopoulos, Amanda, 2018. "Community mobility MAUP-ing: A socio-spatial investigation of bikeshare demand in Chicago," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 66(C), pages 80-90.
    9. Benjamin Maas, 2022. "Literature Review of Mobility as a Service," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(14), pages 1-28, July.
    10. Wan, Li & Tang, Junqing & Wang, Lihua & Schooling, Jennifer, 2021. "Understanding non-commuting travel demand of car commuters – Insights from ANPR trip chain data in Cambridge," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 76-87.
    11. Ryan, Jean & Martens, Karel, 2023. "Defining and implementing a sufficient level of accessibility: What’s stopping us?," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 175(C).
    12. Ortúzar, Juan de Dios & Bascuñán, Raúl & Rizzi, Luis Ignacio & Salata, Andrés, 2021. "Assessing the potential acceptability of road pricing in Santiago," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 144(C), pages 153-169.
    13. Khan, Muhammad Salar & Jamil, Kamil & Malik, Ammar A., 2022. "Delivering Urban Mass Transit—The Case of Lahore, Pakistan," SocArXiv 2zj8m, Center for Open Science.
    14. Hasselwander, Marc & Bigotte, Joao F. & Antunes, Antonio P. & Sigua, Ricardo G., 2022. "Towards sustainable transport in developing countries: Preliminary findings on the demand for mobility-as-a-service (MaaS) in Metro Manila," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 155(C), pages 501-518.
    15. Hörcher, Daniel & Graham, Daniel J., 2020. "MaaS economics: Should we fight car ownership with subscriptions to alternative modes?," Economics of Transportation, Elsevier, vol. 22(C).
    16. Xi, Haoning & Liu, Wei & Waller, S. Travis & Hensher, David A. & Kilby, Philip & Rey, David, 2023. "Incentive-compatible mechanisms for online resource allocation in Mobility-as-a-Service systems," Transportation Research Part B: Methodological, Elsevier, vol. 170(C), pages 119-147.
    17. Feuillet, Thierry & Bulteau, Julie & Dantan, Sophie, 2021. "Modelling context-specific relationships between neighbourhood socioeconomic disadvantage and private car use," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 93(C).
    18. Johannes Gessner & Wolfgang Habla & Ulrich J. Wagner, 2023. "Can Social Comparisons and Moral Appeals Induce a Modal Shift Towards Low-Emission Transport Modes?," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2023_451, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    19. Jaroslav Mašek & Vladimíra Štefancová & Jaroslav Mazanec & Petra Juránková, 2023. "The Classification of Application Users Supporting and Facilitating Travel Mobility Using Two-Step Cluster Analysis," Mathematics, MDPI, vol. 11(9), pages 1-16, May.
    20. Lapo Mola & Quentin Berger & Karoliina Haavisto & Isabella Soscia, 2020. "Mobility as a Service: An Exploratory Study of Consumer Mobility Behaviour," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(19), pages 1-14, October.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cog:urbpla:v:8:y:2023:i:3:p:126-134. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: António Vieira (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cogitatiopress.com/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.