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Millennials Are Driving Cars as Much as Older Generations (citylab.com)
17 points by pseudolus on March 27, 2019 | hide | past | favorite | 7 comments


Another way to phrase this might be, "Grade-separated public transit has seen only marginal improvements in most places in the last 30 years."

I know there are exceptions (Denver, parts of L.A., parts of Seattle) and I approve of them. At the same time, Nashville: https://www.wired.com/story/nashville-transit-referendum-vot..., Austin: https://www.kut.org/post/austins-rail-and-roads-bond-defeate..., Atlanta, and other cities have voted against rail and, implicitly, for traffic. We're also not working hard enough to make it cheaper to construct: https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/5/24/15681560/g...


Cultural choices of a generation on such matters make zero statistical difference if the infrastructure doesn't change to enable these choices.

I love biking, but biking in Boston was extremely scary to me. I was in dangerous situations a couple of times and then stopped doing it.

I then moved to public transport, but the green line B is slow as molasses.

This left me with only one option, and that was cars. I carpooled instead of solo driving. But, as you can see, my strong will to avoid cars was superceded by a lack of infrastructure.


Strange - they filter out Millennial-typical life choices, and find that those that make the same choices as other generations, make the same car choices too.

But Millennials are less likely to marry, and more likely to live in urban areas. Those people are truly buying fewer cars, and they are the majority.

SO what does this 'study' mean, actually? On the face of it, the title is an outright falsehood.


> Americans born between 1980 and 1984 are just as likely to own cars compared to, say, their parents’ cohort.

This demographic is age 35-39. What about younger millennials?


They're also living in them. :/


In college I rode a bike everywhere I needed to because I was able to. After moving back home I can't get anywhere without a car. It isn't that I want to take a car, it's that I don't have any choice but to take a car.


Did they filter out rideshare drivers?




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