Identifying reasons for historic car ownership and use and policy implications

Abstract

The number of historic vehicles is steadily increasing. Although, these vehicles are part of our cultural heritage with respect to road transport and mobility, they present (future) environmental concerns, which is a relevant development from policy perspective. Yet, as far as the authors are aware, there is hardly any academic literature addressing this issue. This study aims to provide a first exploration of historic cars and reasons for ownership and use and policy implications. To this end, a large explorative survey is conducted among HV owners of 15 European countries. Focusing on passenger car owners only, a latent class analysis is performed to identify possible segments among historic car owners. Seven latent classes are identified: recreational owners, reserved owners, repair men, die-hard fans, next generation fans, frequent drivers and collectors. Overall, the results indicate that there is large diversity in the ownership and use of historic cars and the reasons behind ownership. However, in general, historic cars are used much less than modern cars. Only the group of ‘frequent drivers’ (8% of the sample) represent a potential concern regarding emissions from a policy perspective. Finally, policy recommendations are provided for decision makers regarding historic cars.