Landscapes without the car : a counterfactual historical geography of twentieth-century Britain.

Pooley, Colin (2010) Landscapes without the car : a counterfactual historical geography of twentieth-century Britain. Journal of Historical Geography, 36 (3). pp. 266-275. ISSN 0305-7488

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Abstract

Despite increased concern about environmental damage and resource depletion, the private motor car, and associated automobility, are taken-for granted aspects of 21st century life. This paper makes the counterfactual assumption that private ownership of cars was severely restricted at the start of the twentieth century, and uses a range of historical data to examine the ways in which such a scenario might have impacted on transport infrastructure, personal mobility and urban life. It is argued that, even without the wholesale adoption of the motor car as a means of personal transport, patterns of everyday mobility would not have differed significantly from today so long as other forms of transport had remained or expanded to cope with this demand. However, such a scenario would probably have required journeys to be planned in different ways, and may have disadvantaged particular groups of the population, including some women. A landscape without cars would probably also have altered the form of cities, with services provided closer to where people live, and levels of air pollution substantially lower. The counterfactual historical analysis is used to argue that, although there is little likelihood of cars being banned in Britain, greater restrictions on private motor vehicles would not necessarily lead to the fundamental changes in everyday mobility that some might predict.

Item Type:
Journal Article
Journal or Publication Title:
Journal of Historical Geography
Additional Information:
The final, definitive version of this article has been published in the Journal, Journal of Historical Geography 36 (3), 2010, © ELSEVIER.
Uncontrolled Keywords:
/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/3300/3302
Subjects:
?? counterfactualsautomobilitytransportmobilityurban formenvironmentarchaeologyhistorygeography, planning and developmentg geography (general) ??
ID Code:
34629
Deposited On:
25 Nov 2010 09:09
Refereed?:
Yes
Published?:
Published
Last Modified:
31 Dec 2023 00:18