By Paul Nussbaum, Inquirer Staff Writer
Is America's love affair with the car over?
Or just less torrid?
Some key indicators - such as vehicle use, driver's license registration, and public-transit ridership - suggest that the 100-year-old Auto Age is waning.
Economics, urbanization, technology, and environmental concerns are changing the way Americans travel, and young people are leading the shift, transportation experts say.
Young people are getting driver's licenses later or not at all. They take the train or bus or bike to work, or telecommute. If they need a car, they can rent one by the hour.
"It's so much easier to get around the city without a car," said Jim Krider, 21, of Havertown. A junior at Temple, he didn't get his license until he was 20 and doesn't own a car. "You don't have to pay for gas or insurance or the car," he said.
"I really never had a real need for it," said Marysia Pomorski, 24, a social worker from Haddonfield, who also waited until she was 20 to get a driver's license. When she attended Oberlin College in Ohio, she said, she "biked everywhere" and didn't miss having a car or a license.
Many of her classmates from urban areas were also without licenses, while students from the Midwest "were always very surprised that I didn't have it, because they wouldn't have had a choice," she said. Although some decline in vehicle use and ownership may be a result of the recession that began in 2008, several important indicators began to decline earlier and may not be reversed by an improving economy.
The declines before 2008 "make me believe something else is going on," said Michael Sivak, a research professor at the University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute. "Some of the trends are likely to be permanent."
Read more at: http://www.philly.com/philly/business/transportation/20130728_Is_love_affair_with_the_car_dimming_among_the_young_.html