For over a century, the automobile has represented freedom, power, and the thrill of mechanical mastery. The connection between driver, machine, and road defined what it meant to own and love a car. But in today’s digital era, a different trend is unfolding. Cars are no longer just machines designed to take us from point A to point B. Increasingly, they resemble something else entirely: smartphones on wheels.
In Europe, not having a car generally is perfectly fine
In cities.
For those living in the countryside, not really, as distances are huge and public transport is rare (think a single bus that stops at a bus station a km or two away and passes maybe once every 2h) or non-existent.
That said, over 70% of people in Europe live in urban areas.
This depends on the country. Switzerland has excellent transit to even remote towns. And it has an excellent car culture for this reason as well.