PLANNING FOR A SUSTAINABLE EUROPE? - TU Berlin

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In short, the car, which is also commonly called private motorized transport, 25
with its reliance on social and physical infrastructures, turns out to be far from being the
perfectly individual means of transport that it purports to be (Beckmann 2001:45).
As far as policy approaches related to the phenomenon of reflexive automobility
are concerned, both scholars and practitioners working within the related discursive
framework pointed to new individual user strategies and user typologies (see e.g. Jensen
1999; Canzler 2000). Car sharing schemes are probably the most prominent practical
example of this development. Interestingly, both Canzler and Beckmann find that the
frequently evoked account of increasingly individualized transport strategies in light of
the complex travel requirements in post-industrial societies in fact does not mean that the
car necessarily has to be the most successful mode. Especially in urban areas, they argue,
automobility has long reached its efficiency limits. In these urban contexts, greater
individualization is likely to foster greater multimodality in the future. City dwellers
might continue to use their cars for weekend trips, for retail shopping and for out-of
town commutes, but if congestion and parking remain as problematic as they are at
present, many of them will gladly travel to work by public transport, and if convenient
and safe, possibly even ride to the transit station by bicycle.
Examples of these developments are already visible in several EU member states,
most prominently in the form of the integrated mobility services now offered by several
railways companies. For example, the recently privatized German national railway
25 The most common German acronym for car travel, for example, is “MIV”, which stands for “motorized
individual transport (Verkehr).”