Map of the week: Two car households
A slightly historical flavour to our map of the week. It looks at what happened during the 1990s (between the censuses of 1991 and 2001) in terms of second-car ownership.
The map on the left shows where the two-car families lived: you can see the commuter belts around London and the West Midlands clearly I think.
The map on the right reveals who was buying a second vehicle or giving one up.
Given the arguments posted on this blog earlier this week over whether a car is a "luxury", it is not surprising that with the economic growth of the 1990s and cuts to public transport, rural areas saw the greatest increase in second car ownership.
But no-one could miss the extraordinary story in London.
Used-car dealerships up and down the land were obviously busy selling the cars Londoners had decided to forego. The congestion charge didn't come in until 2003, so was it simply congestion that led Londoners to hop on the bus or bike?
I will try to get an update on this for a future map of the week to see whether global warming is having any impact. For now, I would like to get some thoughts on whether you aspire to a second car or want to reduce your carbon footprint!
I'm 
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