Do most millennials want to live without a car and will they stay that way? (unemployment rate, generations)
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Having been on these boards a while it seems that among most posters in the General U.S./City vs City forum the common denominator is most people want to live in cities where they can walk or take public transit everywhere they need to go and not even own an automobile. Does this represent Millennials as whole? Are cities that are less walkable in trouble in terms of attracting young talent?
Going without a car seems today to be a cultural or political statement closely tied with the hipster craze. Will that mindset go away as this generation gets older and being 'hip' becomes less important or is it here to stay?
First of all, this is really only the case for lower-income millenials who dropped out of college or lack a practical college degree. And as more and more of these type of millenials head to the cities with good public transportation, basic life necessities (such as housing and employment) will become extremely difficult to obtain due to the exponential increase in demand without any real increase in supply.
I'm the parent of a Millennial who does not currently own a car. She lives in Boston and doesn't need one. But, she works mostly with people who are in their 30s, 40s and 50s. Not one of them lives in Boston. As they've married and had kids, they've all moved to towns outside of the city for bigger, more affordable homes and yes, everyone of them owns a car and most drive it to work. While most of them started out in their 20s living in the city and were car free, the realities of living in the city with a family pushed all of them to make other choices. My daughter has already said that as much as she loves living right in Boston, that it won't be where she chooses to live when she has a family.
Having been on these boards a while it seems that among most posters in the General U.S./City vs City forum the common denominator is most people want to live in cities where they can walk or take public transit everywhere they need to go and not even own an automobile. Does this represent Millennials as whole? Are cities that are less walkable in trouble in terms of attracting young talent?
Going without a car seems today to be a cultural or political statement closely tied with the hipster craze. Will that mindset go away as this generation gets older and being 'hip' becomes less important or is it here to stay?
I hope it's here to stay. Cars and the car culture does a lot of damage to both the environment and human relations. The less cars the better. I'd much rather live in a place where I can walk where I need to go.
Although the trend may grow I doubt that it will take over the whole country. Too much of the country is built around cars and most people like it that way. They can't actually be expected to walk.
Even with the recent trends, most Millennials don't live in cities with good public transit, and most Millennials don't have any particular desire to move to such cities. Despite the drop in driving rates, the vast majority of Millennials are still driving, and since there are so many barriers to driving including graduated licenses, documentation requirements, lower incomes, much higher youth unemployment rates, it shouldn't be any surprise that Millennials are both living with their parents longer and not driving as much. These are all factors that previous generations either didn't have to deal with at all or didn't deal with nearly as much. Based on my experience most of the Millennials who aren't driving now do want to drive, but life circumstances and legal barriers are getting in the way to such an extent that it's just not worth it for them.
If the economy was as good for young people as it was in the late 1970's*, and if the legal requirements were the same as they were in the late 1970's, you'd only see perhaps a 2-5 point difference in the percentage of youngsters driving now versus then.
*Believe it or not according to many metrics it's worse now than it was then.
There have always been people who choose to live car-free, since the beginning of the environmental movement. I don't see it as a generational thing. Maybe what will happen is something along the lines of what San Francisco has already been experiencing; child-free couples live in the city, use public transportation to go to work, and walk to amenities. Couples who are starting a family move outside the city, and drive, unless they're in towns like Berkeley and Oakland that have good transportation. Maybe the cities of the future, or the downtown areas, at least, will be child-free zones whose residents are also car-free. And the suburbs will be full of kids and cars.
I'm the parent of a Millennial who does not currently own a car. She lives in Boston and doesn't need one. But, she works mostly with people who are in their 30s, 40s and 50s. Not one of them lives in Boston. As they've married and had kids, they've all moved to towns outside of the city for bigger, more affordable homes and yes, everyone of them owns a car and most drive it to work. While most of them started out in their 20s living in the city and were car free, the realities of living in the city with a family pushed all of them to make other choices. My daughter has already said that as much as she loves living right in Boston, that it won't be where she chooses to live when she has a family.
This thread topic has also been discussed in the Urban Planning Forum, and somebody there made the same basic point that you did in your post above. Once couples have children of school age, finding the best possible schools for their children becomes a high priority, and that often means moving out of the inner cities.
I think the OP has a point; someone posted statistics in the Urban Planning Forum to indicate that rates of driver's license possession and also of car ownership is slightly down among Millennials. But that is a long way from "most millennials" wanting to live without a car.
When I was growing up in the 1950's all of us males wanted to drive and wanted our own car as soon as possible. It was the rite of passage to trump all other rites of passage. We wanted to drive in an absolute sense, that is, it was important for its own sake, in addition to the convenience afforded. However, the general culture changes with time, and I think that's no longer true to the same extent.
The hard-core, fanatical anti-car movement was not yet in evidence in the 1950's, at least not to me. That is another thing which has changed. (I am not referring to folks who have chosen not to own a car, have made the necessary adjustments, and are happy with their choice. I am referring to people just dripping with hatred of the automobile and assigning to it all the ills of society.)
I agree with Ruth, it's not generational. Many seniors wish to live in retirement communities being as car-free as possible.
There's other factors to propel people into become car-free regardless of age.
6 months ago, I (age 63) decided to wind down my car dependency, have been taking the bus to work 2 nights a week, and the biggest surprise of this venture, I've grown to love it, all the reading I get done, the camaraderie in the buses and bus stops.
My car konked out last weekend, and I took the bus all 4 nites, used my bike for grocery shopping, and I'm now I'm hooked! So exhilarating to know you can actually kick that unhealthy addiction to owning a car! If more people tried this, more people would get hooked as well!
I've talked to many on the bus, why they take the bus, and I've gotten a whole array of responses from all age groups: cities having become increasingly reliant on traffic fines, some getting clobbered with a repair bill or an unaffordable traffic fine, and then there's the avid reader types, like myself, who well know you can't drive and read a book/magazine at the same time.
There's still a stigma attached to those who choose to ride public transit, like the puzzling looks of my neighbors seeing me leave home/return home with a backpack, and co-workers who refuse to believe I'm doing it all voluntarily. "We know, he just doesn't want to tell us, he got a DUI, lost his license!"
A car is a real status/success figure for many of our immigrants today. Many will starve their families just to keep that car on the road. If they could ever overcome that, there's another group who could also join this smarter millennial generation, kicking the habit!
So exhilarating to know you can actually kick that unhealthy addiction to owning a car!
I'm glad being without your car is working well for you, and I have absolutely no quarrel with your choice, but I am greatly puzzled that you would call owning a car an "unhealthy addiction". What is unhealthy about it? Why is it an addiction? We are required by law to wear clothes in public, but I don't hear anyone talking about an addiction to owning clothes. One's personal health is totally independent of car ownership. One can choose to exercise at the gym even if one drives to work. I am 69 and have always owned a car; I am not unhealthy at all - quite the contrary.
First of all, this is really only the case for lower-income millenials who dropped out of college or lack a practical college degree. And as more and more of these type of millenials head to the cities with good public transportation, basic life necessities (such as housing and employment) will become extremely difficult to obtain due to the exponential increase in demand without any real increase in supply.
There's always ways to increase supply. Assuming there's no more vacant lots to build on, you can always knock down some of the existing suburban housing stock and replace it with higher-density housing.
Not to mention that in some cases, you can divide up some larger houses to accomodate more people without necessarily overcrowding it.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
