Long-term mobility decisions during the life course

Abstract

Long-term mobility of people involves on the one hand decisions about their residential locations and the corresponding moves. At the same time the places of education and employment play an important role. On the other hand the ownership of mobility tools, such as cars and different public transport season tickets are complementary elements in this process, which also bind substantial resources. These two aspects of mobility behaviour are closely connected to one another. A longitudinal perspective on these relationships is available from people’s life courses, which link different dimensions of life together. Besides the personal and familial history locations of residence, education and employment as well as the ownership of mobility tools can be taken into account. In order to study the dynamics of long-term spatial mobility a longitudinal survey covering the 20 year period from 1985 to 2004 was carried out at the beginning of 2005 in a stratified sample of municipalities in the Zurich region, Switzerland. The paper describes residential mobility and mobility tool ownership as well as the possibilities given by the life course approach to long-term spatial mobility followed by the methodology for analysing life course dynamics. Subsequently the longitudinal data collected in the retrospective survey is described. The paper then concentrates on the analysis of the long-term mobility decisions during the life course. The main focus lies on the dynamics of mobility tool ownership over the last 20 years, at the same time looking at the relationships with residential choices as well as with locations of education and employment. Finally the results are summarised in the conclusions.