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In recent years, the transition towards sustainable and inclusive urban mobility models has emerged as a crucial challenge, especially in territories where car use is deeply rooted to the point of evolving into a dependency. Urban agendas and policy have long sought to rethink the role of private vehicular mobility in daily commutes against such dependency, moving beyond an approach solely based on traffic regulation and infrastructure development. Notably, concepts such as “accessibility by proximity” (Levine et al, 2019), often linked to the X-minute city model, emphasize alternative mobility options, intermodality, and infomobility platforms as pivotal in reducing reliance on private vehicles.
Despite these efforts, a weakness lies in the limited ability of such policies to reshape consolidated habits and mobility practices, particularly in highly car-dependent social and spatial contexts. Among those, peri-urban and low-density areas emerge as territories where car dependency often stems from necessity rather than choice, driven by factors such as insufficient public transport, limited shared mobility options, and dispersed services. Effective interventions against car dependency in these areas require innovative solutions addressing both choice and necessity-driven car use, rooted in a comprehensive understanding of the underlying determinants of car dependency.
However, investigating car dependency involves recognizing it not merely as frequent car use but as a process (Goodwin, 1995) wherein car usage reshapes spatial-temporal practices while generating new ones. This dynamic nature necessitates integrated qualitative and quantitative approaches to examine its determinants, outcomes, and related behaviors. While substantial research has been conducted (e.g., Sierra Muñoz et al., 2024; Fransen & Boussauw, 2022; Baehler & Rérat, 2020), much of it relies on quantitative metrics, overlooking the contextual, multidimensional, and processual aspects of car dependency.
Assuming that car dependency is not merely ‘a combination of high car use, high provision for automobiles, and scattered low-density use’ (Newman and Kenworthy, 1989, p. 124), this paper emphasizes the need to examine this phenomenon by recognizing which practices are enabled by automobile use, in which spatial contexts and under which socio-spatial conditions (Mattioli et al., 2016), which subjective and objective perceptions are related to car use (Jeekel, 2013) and which conditions related to market distortions may reinforce car dependency (Litman, 2014).
The following key research questions emerge: how can the processual features of car dependency in peri-urban areas, shaped by socio-spatial factors, individual habits, and preferences, be effectively addressed? What integrated and scalable approaches can be employed to analyze car dependency's multidimensional characteristics in peri-urban contexts? How can this analysis inform innovative policies to promote non-car dependent mobility?
These questions are investigated in an Italian research project - RECAP (https://www.dastu.polimi.it/prin-recap/). The study, outlined in this paper, presents a transferable mixed-method approach to analyze car dependency determinants, outcomes and practices. The approach is tested in the Bassa Pianura Bergamasca (North Italy), a peri-urban area in Northern Italy marked by high car use due to settlement dispersion following large infrastructural and land use-related transformations. The results of the quantitative analysis of car dependency at the territorial scale combined with an accessibility assessment to daily services, reveal the diversity of situations within the same context, as well as correlations between settlement density, mixed-use development, service location, transportation availability. Building on these insights, the study conducts qualitative investigations at the local scale, involving stakeholders sharing their situated knowledge to discuss the feasibility of contextualized measures to promote intermodality and complementarity between private cars and other mobility options. This integrated methodology presented in the paper enhances understanding of the reasons behind car dependency in specific settlement conditions, offering a replicable framework to inform the design of targeted policy measures towards less car-dependent mobility in peri-urban areas.
References
Baehler D., Rérat P., 2020, «Beyond the car. Car-free housing as a laboratory to overcome the system of automobility». Applied Mobilities, DOI: 10.1080/23800127.2020.1860513
Fransen K., Boussauw K., 2022, «Revisiting car dependency: A worldwide analysis of car travel in global metropolitan areas». Cities, 120. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cities.2021.103467
Goodwin P., 1995, «Car Dependence». Transport Policy, 2(3), 151–152. https://doi.org/10.1016/0967-070X(95)96744-6
Jeekel H. 2013. The Car-dependent Society: A European Perspective. Ashgate. Farnham.
Levine, J., Grengs, J., & Merlin, L. A. (2019). From mobility to accessibility. Transform urban transportation and land use planning. Ithaca (NY): Cornell University press.
Mattioli G., Anable J., Vrotsou K., 2016, «Car dependent practices». Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice 89, 56–72.
Newman P., Kenworthy J.R., 1989, Cities and automobile dependence: An international sourcebook. Gower Technical.
Newman P., Kenworthy J., 2006, «Urban Design to Reduce Automobile Dependence». Opolis 2, 35–52.
Sierra Muñoz J., Duboz L., Pucci P., Ciuffo B., 2024, «Why do we rely on cars? Car dependence assessment and dimensions from a systematic literature review». European Transport Research Review. 16, 17. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12544-024-00639-z
| Keywords | Car dependency; Peri-urban areas; Mobility policy |
|---|---|
| Best Congress Paper Award | Yes |
