AUTONEWS

The saga of a european worker with a car, but no garage

A worker from the outskirts of the city leaves home at seven in the morning. He lives in an apartment without a garage. He drives a 2010 diesel: paid for, functional, reliable. He works in the city center. In the coming years, this car will no longer be able to go where it needs to be. Not because it's broken. Not because it's unsafe. But because it has ceased to be accepted.

For decades, climate policy was presented as a choice between the present and the future, between immediate comfort and collective responsibility. It was an abstract debate. It is no longer. Today, the energy transition has become a much simpler and much more concrete question: who can adapt and who cannot.

The European decision to effectively end the sale of combustion engine cars by 2035 is often presented as inevitable. But this inevitability ignores an essential point: not everyone starts from the same place. An electric car is not just a different car. It's an infrastructure.

For those who live in a house, with a garage and the possibility of installing a charger, the transition is relatively simple. The car charges overnight. The cost is predictable. Adaptation is comfortable. For those who live in apartments, especially outside urban centers, the reality is different. There is no private garage. There is no dedicated power outlet. There is no guarantee of regular charging access.

A new line of inequality begins to emerge: the garage.

It is here that the decisions that shape urban space produce effects that are rarely discussed. In many cities, including Portugal, restrictions on the circulation of older vehicles are intensifying. Low-emission zones, progressive limitations, indirect penalties. All of this makes sense from an environmental point of view, but it has unequivocal social consequences.

Those who have the financial means replace their cars. Those who don't, adapt as best they can. Or they simply stop entering. The result is not just a technological change, it is a reorganization of urban space. A worker driving an old diesel car is not making an ideological choice. You are using what you can afford. When that car is banned, it is not just the vehicle that is excluded. It is that person's mobility and autonomy.

The climate transition has become territorial. It separates those who can absorb the cost of change from those who will have to bear it. It's not just income inequality, it's inequality of access.

This model is introducing a new form of inequality: time. For the urban elite, the car charges while you sleep. For those who live outside the centers, the transition means lost time looking for a functional charging station or waiting in line. Time taken away from rest or family, a resource that is always scarcer for those who already live on the edge.

When this process ignores these differences, it ceases to be environmental and becomes selective. A policy that does not formally prohibit, but excludes in practice. The market remains, mobility too, but both cease to be universal.

It is important to clarify: the past was not intrinsically better. Nor is it a moral failing of companies or technology. The problem is one of design. When policies are conceived from contexts where adaptation is easy, those who live outside this reality are ignored. Incentive is confused with obligation, possibility with universality.

The question isn't whether or not we should make the energy transition. The question is whether we are building a model that everyone can follow, or just a model where some arrive first and others are left behind.

A transition that creates barriers to access is not just an energy change. It's a social fracture. The problem is that any fracture perceived as unjust tends to generate resistance. Ultimately, this resistance will end up delaying the very transition that was intended to be accelerated.

The future may be electric, but if there isn't parking for everyone, it will be a profoundly exclusionary future.

Many Europeans own cars but lack garages, primarily due to the age of cities, lack of urban space, and high construction costs. In many areas, infrastructure was built centuries before the invention of the automobile, resulting in narrow streets and old houses without space for private parking.

Here are the main reasons for this situation(below):

-Historical urban structure: Many European cities, such as London, Paris, and Rome, evolved organically over centuries without planning for cars. Houses and apartments, especially in historical centers, were built long before parking became a necessity.

-Scrap and expensive space: In densely populated centers, land is extremely expensive and scarce. Building underground garages is expensive and often unfeasible. As a result, street parking is the norm, not the exception.

-Modern cars versus old spaces: Garages built in the mid-20th century are often too small for modern cars, which have become larger. In some places, such as the United Kingdom, it is common to convert garages into extra rooms (bedroom or office) because a modern car won't fit. 

-Street parking culture: Street parking (or parking on sidewalks, where permitted) is socially accepted in many parts of Europe. Residents often pay annual permits to park on the street, which is cheaper than maintaining a private garage.

-Transportation alternatives: Good public transport infrastructure and urban mobility (bicycles, walking) reduce the need for a daily-use car, making the lack of a private garage a manageable inconvenience for many.

This configuration is also due to the fact that, in many European cities, car ownership is declining due to policies aimed at reducing vehicle use in central areas.

by Autonews