I suppose to me ArcheryAnnie there is quite a big psychological difference in being able to decide to go somewhere, go get in my car and be travelling under my own steam, choosing my own route, in solitude, in seconds.
What I hate about using buses and cabs is how you are still at the whim of somebody else. I love Uber in busy cities but when I wanted one the other week there wasn't one available for half an hour. And my own experience of buses is that they never arrive when they're supposed to, you can be waiting 45 minutes for a bus that is supposed to come every ten, it's miserable having to stand for an indefinite time in possibly miserable weather ruining your hair and makeup not knowing when or if it'll show up.
I still feel I'm relying on the whim of the bus driver, bus schedule, cabbie, when I could just use my own transport and be the boss of my own time.
Do you ever travel outside of your town or city much? I go back to my home city around 60 miles away fairly often to see friends (every week or two usually), the ones I visit live on the outskirts of the city, I live a 30 min walk plus bus ride from the town centre here.
With car it takes an hour. And costs £6 petrol each way (not including running costs of course)
On public transport (I just double checked!) it takes three hours each way, involving a 15 min walk to the bus stop, then a long train journey, a bus from the destination train stop and then a 40 min walk or a taxi. Not sure the total cost but it's clearly a very cumbersome and thrice as long journey.
As it's an hour in the car I can pop after work, stay a couple hours, then come home. To do so on public transport would be the equivalent of a full working day and impossible unless it was a weekend (a Saturday as Sunday changes the schedules!).
These friends have some severe health issues and I couldn't have been there for them like I have been over the last decade to pop over with an hour's notice, take him to hospital while his wife stays with their child or watch the child while wife takes my friend to A&E. I could only have visited once per week max, assuming I did nothing else with my weekend. And not be relied upon in emergencies.
If your lifestyle is set up so you don't go far, are never needed at a moment's notice for poorly relatives or family friends, you live super close to a train station or bus stop that runs regularly and goes far then I fully see why you don't find a car necessary. But personally I'd never want to risk clipping my wings to the extent I was unable to make a simple decision off my own back to go somewhere without someone else's aid!