There are many useful tables in this excellent publication. Table I summarises some of this
salient information.
Ordinary life then, by which I mean those daily and repeated tasks which form a large
proportion of activity patterns, is heavily constrained by the simple presence or absence of
options (in some cases probabilities rather than simple presence or absence). Is it possible to
walk to school or to the shops? Is it possible to cycle to work? Is it possible to live in a rural
village without a car? Is it possible tc get the children to and from the swimming pool before
going on to another meeting later in the evening? Answers will vary depending on ownership and
access to vehicles. The decision to own one or more vehicles will have been taken in line with problems
of this kind which stem directly from a physical environment moulded and created by individual
decision and planning action/inaction. The decision may have been made for us in the U.K. by
the owners of the I million plus company cars, a subject dealt with in greater detail elsewhere
[Whitelegg, 1981, 19821, responding to the fiscal advantages conferred by that system. In both
cases there are other models and other possibilities but because they have not been pursued
someone will end up in their vehicle driving a child to the swimming pool when something
happens to “cause an accident”. Of what relevance is the cause of component failure in
comparison to the system design which has robbed those it is meant to serve of basic choices in the drive or not drive. walk or cycle, shop and recreate locally? The absence of choice fuels car
ownership and usage. feeds the demand for road space, concentrates facilities. increases average
mileages. affects frequencies of journeys and influences the daily activity patterns of many millions
of individuals. It also seriously deprives many individuals and groups of basic ordinary experiences
associated with mobility. Hagerstrand [ 19731 has drawn attention to the gap between the mobility
rich and mobility poor and we have yet to comprehend the significance of this basic maldistribution
of goods in contemporary industrialised societies.