ABSTRACT
There is an apparent trend throughout geography and the social sciences involving cross-sectional studies being increasingly complemented by longitudinal and lifecourse perspectives. This includes work undertaken within various subdisciplines such as migration studies, population geography, economic geography and travel behaviour research. This strand of research is motivated by the fact that recent social constellations and behaviour patterns predominantly originate from decisions and developments which have taken place in earlier periods of life (Beige and Axhausen 2012). This is especially true for highly habitualized activities such as everyday travel behaviour, as conceptionalized by the mobility biographies approach (Lanzendorf 2003; Scheiner 2007). In particular, decisions which attract considerable physical and/or cognitive resources are likely to have a long-lasting impact on day-today behaviour patterns. The material dimension of these long-term processes becomes apparent, for instance, in the purchase or disposal of a car or in changes in accessibilities after a residential relocation. However, less tangible aspects such as values and beliefs, formed by socialization and peer group influence, are also important for future behaviour. Thus, both objective and subjective conditions of everyday life are inscribed in a person’s biography. Consequently, the lifecourse perspective aims to combine the personal characteristics of the individual with more structural and external conditions such as the household-related, socio-economic and cultural framework with which an individual is confronted throughout the lifecourse. This approach is in line with work calling for a more integrative analysis of individual mobility practices and their structural and socio-cultural foundation (Manderscheid 2014). Therefore, the work presented here shows how the lifecourse intersects with
external framings (Hopkins and Pain 2007) by focusing on the concepts of generation (Pain 2001), urban mobility cultures (Götz and Deffner 2009; Klinger et al. 2013) and, more specifically, on family and intergenerational aspects as well as on peer group and social norm influences. Empirically, this involves analysing the everyday mobility of people who recently relocated
between cities representing different mobility cultures. These mobility cultures include both urban form and infrastructural conditions as well as the attitudes and mobility preferences of a city’s population. Following this line of reasoning, residential relocations are understood as key biographical events (Müggenburg et al. 2015) which in reaction to the modified external circumstances increase the likelihood of a change of everyday behaviour, including travel patterns. Residential moves are often triggered by other life events such as the establishment of a partnership, the birth of a child or a job change. Taking the biographical embeddedness of daily travel as a starting point,
this chapter asks how and to what extent residential relocations influence the mode choice for daily trips. Furthermore, we want to consider how related life events, motives for moving and, furthermore, household attributes and intergenerational relations contribute to changes in daily travel behaviour after relocation. Last, we want to shed light on the question of how the experience of a new material and symbolic framework of everyday travel, conceptualized as urban mobility cultures, influences mode choice at the new place of residence. In this respect, we follow the suggestion of Doughty and Murray (2014: 17) that we need to understand better the ‘ways in which local cultures of mobility intersect with lifecourse issues’. By combining concrete aspects of urban mobility such as mode choice with social norms influencing everyday travel, this work is located at the intersection between transport geography and mobilities research, an approach which representatives of both disciplines consider beneficial (Bissell et al. 2011; Shaw and Hesse 2010). The remainder of the chapter is structured as follows. In the following section
the mobility biographies approach is presented with a particular focus on individual and structural factors influencing travel behaviour throughout the lifecourse. In the third section we describe the sample we surveyed to answer the questions mentioned above. Consequently, we present selected results from the survey, focusing on the individual, intergenerational and cultural factors of mode choice change after moving house; these are then discussed in the subsequent section. The chapter closes with a conclusion and an outlook on future research.
