A New Generation

Like other industrialized countries, Germany and Great Britain have experienced increasing motorization over the past five decades. However, results from national travel surveys, vehicle registration statistics, and driver's licensing databases suggest that young Germans and Britons today are less automobile oriented than their parents' generation. The paper sheds light on this trend, with a focus on the group of 20- to 29-year-olds. The analysis finds decreasing car availability, a significant reduction of automobile mileage, increases in the use of other modes, and growing multimodal behavior of the young, with men reducing their automobile travel more than women. Even though the development is more pronounced in Germany, the similarity of the changes in young people's mobility patterns in the two countries is striking. This similarity suggests that the observed changes in travel behavior are not an idiosyncratic development in one country. Instead, the similarity may indicate a structural change in travel behavior that may be found in other Western countries. The paper substantiates findings of changes in trends in mobility patterns of young adults and identifies important storylines of this development on the basis of a harmonized international comparison. Finally, the paper intends to stimulate a discussion and research about reasons for these changes in mobility trends.