Cars are so last year man...

[Gob]

I couldn't wait to get my driver's licence. Growing up in suburban Sydney during the 1980s, it was a gateway to freedom. I was cruising the streets in the family Commodore within days of my 17th birthday.

But teens aren't in such a hurry now. State government figures show that at the end of the 2000s, just 3 per cent of teenagers in the greater Sydney region were fully licensed to drive, down from nearly a quarter in the early 1990s. Among 20- to 24-year-olds, the proportion of licensed drivers in the city slumped from 79 per cent in 1991-92 to 51 per cent in 2008-09.

More onerous licensing rules introduced in NSW during the 2000s have contributed to this remarkable shift. But there's much more to the story than regulatory changes.

Generation Y - those born in the 1980s and '90s - just don't seem to care as much about driving as the generations that came before them. Facebook, Twitter and text messages have given teens and twenty-somethings new ways to connect. Freedom and identity can now be found in mobiles, not motor cars.

The trend of fewer young licensed drivers is even at work in the US, the world's most influential car market. Teenage licence-holding peaked there in 1978.

The New York Times reported recently that the proportion of Americans under the age of 25 with a licence has fallen markedly since the late 1990s.

There has been a lot of attention on how technological change has swept through traditional businesses such as retailing, entertainment, media and finance. But the disruptive force of the internet is gradually changing the business of transport as well.

The economic implications of Gen Y's attitude to driving are far-reaching. A survey released last month by American car-sharing company Zipcar asked people from different age groups what piece of technology would have the most negative impact on them if it was taken away: TV, mobile phone, computer or car. Respondents between 18 and 34 said that being without their phone and computer would be worse than not having a car. The contrast with those over 45 was stark - for them cars would be missed much more than computers and phones.

The survey also showed nearly three-quarters of 18- to 34-year-olds were more likely to buy something online than drive to pick it up at a store. Nearly half in that age cohort said they sometimes chose to spend time with their friends online rather than driving to see them. It is possible mobile technology has also made public transport more attractive than driving for those who want to socialise or work online.

It is much easier to stay connected sitting on a train than behind the wheel.

The growing popularity of car-sharing services such as Zipcar, and its Australian counterpart GoGet, is a market response to changing attitudes towards cars. Of GoGet's customers, 44 per cent are less than 34 years of age.

Mobile technology has made it much easier to be without a car. You can now stand on a street corner with your mobile phone and find out the exact distance to the nearest car-sharing service and book it. You can check where the next bus or train is and when it will arrive. You can send a text message to a friend to arrange a ride and there are more options for booking a taxi.

"Five years ago you used to have to be at a computer to organise a share-car but now it's in the palm of your hand," GoGet co-founder Bruce Jeffreys says.

Peter Newman, an authority on urban sustainability at Perth's Curtin University, says many Western countries, including Australia, passed their "peak car" moment about the middle of the last decade.

"It's a megatrend," he says. "People are simply choosing to live their lives in a different way."

Technology is changing the economics of transport. But will the politicians and other decision-makers who grew up with cars rather than smartphones respond wisely?

[Guinevere]

I'm all for car sharing, and less vehicle miles traveled, but I think at the essence of this piece is the continuing laziness and lack of independence of much of the younger generation.

<taking off my grey wig and cane now>

[oldr_n_wsr]

<taking off my grey wig and cane now>

Puts on grey wig and grabs cane.
While commuting by train has it's advantages, I feel the lack of social "personal" contact being a detriment. And I think many in Gen Y and later are all about electronic contact and not eye to eye (or F2F as they put it) contact. While it's really great I have met people here on line from Australia to Boston to California and pretty much everywhere in between, I am still able to meet people at my nightly meetings and have the social skills to at least engage with them. I think a lot of the new gens, lack social skills in the real life arena.