Cavey wrote:
But, I take your point to an extent - looks like we're heading in the same (boring) direction; kids just aren't bothered about cars these days and the average age of a biker in the UK is now over 40. We're (literally) a dying breed, people are more bothered about what telephone you're making calls on these days it would appear.
Anecdotally, from folks I know with children in their teens and twenties, learning to drive and getting a car just isn't the draw it was when we were that age. Indeed, quite often a car is simply regarded as a massive and unnecessary expense.
I think part of the reason is 25-30 years ago, a car was what gave you freedom. Chances are that at home there was one telly controlled by the parents, no internet, not much to do, maybe living in a less than salubrious neighbourhood, and so on. As such a car represented the ability to get away from all that, and live more of the life you wanted to, to see your friends and engage with the opposite sex.
Fast forward to today, and home is a much more hospitable place. Entertainments galore, computers/tablets/phones, internet and games, streaming anything and everything from all over the world, you can keep in touch with your friends and boyfriend/girlfriend via multiple devices, social media and Skype or whatever, and houses in general are just a lot cosier than they used to be.
I think there's also a similar thing going on with the decline of pubs, 25-30 years ago going out to the pub during the week was what you did to socialise, play pool and pinball, and generally 'do stuff', whereas now you've got everything you want at home, who wants to trudge around the pubs on a cold Tuesday evening?
But yes, back to cars, I'd say there are two main things go on, (1) Is the massive expense involved with learning to drive, then buying a car, insuring it, and keeping it on the road - that's a lot of money and leads onto (2) Which is the car itself doesn't represent anything like what it did when we were a teenager or in our early twenties. Why bother, is what a lot of youngsters think about it IMO.