Car dependence in a public transport dominated city: evidence from Hong Kong

Reducing car traffic to improve transport sustainability has become a major goal of transport policy. This is also the case in Hong Kong where car ownership and use is, by international standards, very low. The objectives here are first to determine why people own cars in Hong Kong, second to explore how dependent car owners are on their cars and third to identify the policy implications. Based on a survey of 401 car owners, the finding is that despite the existence of excellent public transport, once a car has been acquired, people become dependent on it for virtually all journey purposes. To achieve greater sustainability, therefore, car ownership and use must be controlled. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.