To think car ownership is out of control in the UK

I’ll add:

Living in a hamlet, I have a 2 mile walk to the nearest bus stop. That bus runs 3 times per day, starting at 8.30 am.

My nearest station is 3 miles away up a very steep hill.

The station to get a train to London is 10 miles away and in order to get to London in time to start work I am on a 6.30 am train so I leave home at 5.50 am.

My nearest hospital is 15 miles away. I would need to take the community bus to a town centre, change onto another bus to the hospital.

It takes me 15 mins to drive it.

For anything other than small local shopping, its a delivery or drive 15 mins.

Or should I walk 3 miles up a steep hill, take a 30 min train ride and repeat in reverse with bags I cannot carry.

My parents are 10 miles away and one of them needs a wheelchair. With 3 passengers and chair, that ain’t fitting in a small car.

My MIL lives 300 miles away in a small village outside a city. I can drive it in 5 hours. Public transport? Walk 3 miles up a steep hill with luggage, train, change train, train, change train, train. Bus to her village.
Then, as she is housebound, the inly way to take her out is using the wheelchair.
Weekend travel- often no trains.

@JacquesHarlow you have no idea.

So basically tax the poorer people in society and the rich can carry on with impunity, no thanks.

I don't know what the fascination with big cars is, a status symbol maybe? I agree they often aren't needed. Of course some people do genuinely need a large car/vehicle for some reason.

But otherwise:

people worked more locally 150 years ago when the houses you speak of were built
new build estates often only have room for one car per house despite the fact we all know more space is needed so roads get clogged up
people move out later due to housing being so expensive so more cars to one house
a lot of households have two adults working compared to probably just one years ago, so two cars required
parents having to do school/nursery runs on their way to work hence school traffic
if you live in an even remotely rural area public transport isnt good enough
No one wants to spend hrs on public transport with various connections if they can drive it in 30 mins and pop into Asda on the way home. Time is valuable
Public transport isn't cheap enough so it's often cheaper to run a car

We live in a large village, the buses run every 30 mins during the day yet bizarrely they don't start this until 9am so they're useless if you have a 9-5 job as your either late or arrive an hour too early.

But if there's no bus, people can't use it. That needs to be solved first. People can't "hop on" an imaginary bus!

@JacquesHarlow YANBU and YABU as you have listed too many points!

Yes, YANBU - there should be far more parking restrictions, and those houses with no parking space should not own more than one car registered to the house. That is the rule in some cities. Makes sense and should be everywhere, or at least in built up areas.

YABU about it being cheap. Car ownership is expensive when you consider depreciation, tax, insurance, MOT, petrol etc... The problem is, once you've paid for those, then the cost of a journey is SO much cheaper than taking public transport, so you might as well drive. e.g. to drive to my local town and back is £2 in petrol. The bus is £3 each way, so £6 return, and that's just for me! I'd have to pay for the kids.

If I were able I would ban those giant cars in London and other big cities. If you are a farmer or something then fine, but the proliferation of these hideous tanks in cities is just awful. I can only assume they are some kind of status symbol which speaks volumes about the sort of people who buy them!

When my dd was still in her buggy one nearly killed her reversing out of a side street, they saw me but not the buggy in front of me because the car was so high and huge. I have seen plenty of incidents like this, a dog was nearly run over a couple of weeks ago around the corner from me.

They take up too much of the road, they are dangerous when parked as you can't see round/over them when you are trying to get out of a parking space behind the.

I hate driving. I had a car for a while because I inherited it, but sold it during Covid. It was liberating as I'd almost stopped noticing what a money drain it was!

But being a one-car household does involve some logistics and accepting restrictions. Like, choosing to live within easy distance of one of our jobs. And sending the kids to the local school a 10 min walk away. Buying a bike trailer to allow for trips to the supermarket. Finding things to do at home rather than being able to spontaneously go out if DH has the car. Living somewhere with public transport.

I'd say some of these are desirable things anyway. And I am fortunate that buses around here are also not bad.

Not everyone could do it, of course lots of people need to drive as part of their job, but I think a high proportion could. They just don't want to. Just like people don't want to reduce their water usage / turn down the thermostat / stop flying.

I’m in the NW and where I live there is a regular bus - to town
if you wanted to go to the doctors or Asda or Aldi or well anywhere else, you have to get the bus into town to the bus station (the opposite way to where you’re going) then back out again
i worked it out once and my work is about 5 miles away and it would take me something like 2hrs with 3 changes of bus plus a walk

I factored it in by knowing we have two cars! I expect most people already owned the cars before the house.

When moving don't people adsess the parking in their potential new home? Isn't it common sense.

If you commute don't you factor that in when moving house. I.e live near a station

People no longer live within their means. This doesn't just apply to cars.

What pisses me of is if i say I'm going to buy an artificial plant. Mumsnet go ape shit about the environment. But drive their cars everyday many with at least 2 cars in the family.

But I do agree public transport can be a bit shit. Lots of people think London has great transport. But it doesn't. If a few buses go in your direction and you can hop on any that's great . But if you only have a choice of one bus going to where you need to be they often skip a bus so you can wait 20+ min for that bus. Buses also stink . People smoke weed. Stink of stale cigarettes or sweed they are over crowded stuffy. Germ /bug breeding.

So I understand why people drive . I would if i could.

You said less need for a car if you wfh.
and that’s not always the case.

who would pay tax on a second car if it was a work vehicle?

Tbf the price of second hand cars is through the roof the last few years. But yes traffic is unbelievable nowadays. It takes me an hour to do the nine mile drive home a lot of times. I can't use public transport though because I often have tools etc with me.

@Pistachioitaliano

so how can we get to work? There’s no efficient public transport here!

New builds with shit parking should be the first thing targeted if anything.

There is a new estate not far from here that has mostly 4 and 5 bed houses. Yet hardly any parking.

Young people are not able to move out for longer now so when building 4/5 bed houses it should be taken into considerable that many of the families living there with "kids" are likely to have kids old enough to drive

Many of us don’t live in cities. I cannot get to work without my car because it’s a six mile walk, an hour and 45 minutes by public transport, too hilly and windy, so unsafe for cycling, takes me under 15 minutes by car (national speed limit for much of it) so we all have cars in our house, we work in different directions. Everyone pretty much has a car if of working age here

I didnt say you couldn't have a car.
I suggested 1 car per household and additional cars to be taxed.

And what about people who move places and then have their options changed on them?

Both of my DDs worked in the civil service as it was the main employer in our town. During Covid the office was closed and "centralised" over an hours drive away. To get there by public transport you'd need to get an unreliable bus for 50 minutes and then a bus or train for 30 or 15 minutes. If you finish later than 5.30 there are no buses so a car is essential.

We have 4 cars in our household (we're luckily to have off road parking for them all) and they're all essential for work or school, yet weren't when we moved here.

We're in a street with a school. It used to be primary and secondary campus. The secondary is now 5 miles away on a new campus. No school bus, just bus passes for the unreliable regular bus.

WTF has it got to do with you what car a person chooses? Do you have a problem with motobility cars?

Here in Edinburgh they have a city car club scheme where cars are placed on many streets to hire, and you pay to hire them. Can do so per hour. I have friends who are more environmentally conscious than I am who use this as a means of not having a car but it isn’t cheap and makes just popping to the shops a hassle.

Born and bred Londoner - public transport viable in the Capital. However, now living elsewhere, there is no public transport, workplaces inaccessible without transport, shops inaccessible, medical inaccessible, children bused to schools miles away.... housing built in the middle of nowhere! No cars, no life! Transport and life needs to be planned, accessible, affordable and subsidised!

First thing i would do is make school choice dependent on postcode. No ifs or buts. No choice. Your child goes to the nearest school. Eventually all the parents complaining would channel that noise into improving the school rather than trying to get a step ahead and driving DD/DS to school of their choice.

Then i would make ALL schools car free zones. Teachers car parks and visitors car parks but zero stopping otherwise. All surrounding roads within 1 mile double yellows with only permitted parking home owners (Heavily policed).

Hopefully this would make a huge impact on school traffic. There is nothing more entitled than school run parent. If its on the way to work, set off 45 mins earlier, park 1 mile from school and walk the children in then walk back to your car. Get rid of this need and you will improve schools, health, the roads and reduce the need for second cars. I remember when 1 car was a luxury. I remember walking 1 mile to school each way come rain, snow, wind or shine.

Then i would tax cars per mile. But i would also raise that tax within school and inner city areas. ALL cars should have one of those insurance black boxes by LAW. These would easily be able to calculate tax owed as they are just glorified GPS units. I would make it so expensive that you really would be looking at how to walk to school rather than drive. I would give businesses the ability to reclaim that tax so it didnt hurt them.

Then i would encourage the use of normal bikes, escooters & ebikes. It makes me so sad when i go to Austria, Madrid, France, Italy, Barcelona etc and see them all using these forms of transport. Pennies to charge and run. Their societies embracing clean transport that gives them safe travel with their car drivers aware that most of their own family travel in the same way so they are both courteous and considerate to these other road users. Unbelievably its also much much quicker to travel on escooters when more people use them.

Then i would put a weight tax on the cars alongside their emmissions. Light and clean free of charge. Heavy and dirty, taxed to the hilt. This gives scope for manufacturers to provide what the market dictates.

My partner used to drive a Fiat 500 (newer Model) for over a decade. We only changed it because it came to the point where we worried that if it was in a crash with anything other than another Fiat 500 it may result in death for the occupants. That car managed with 2 adults and 2 teenage children for years and years. The public in general do not need much bigger.

I understand in theory, but I don't think it's a good idea to police peoples decisions like that. In many places there are measures such as needing to apply for parking permits.
They might go on a lot of long drives, etc or they might be only soing the school run, but I dont thinknwe can dictate to people what car they need for their life.
If we were to dictate anything it should be that people in large houses when it occupied by only two people should be forced to sell and move to a 1 bed, for the greater good. This would also probably solve your issue of the family size cars outside small terraces.
I have a family sized house with a family in it, but most of the street is full of retired people in massive 4 and 5 bed detached with only them in it.
If we forced them to downsize, the property prices might come down enough for the families stuck in small terraces to move in and have a driveway for their family size cars.