It is difficult to imagine a world without the car, and yet that is exactly what Dennis and Urry set out to do in this provocative new book. They argue that the days of the current car system are numbered. Powerful forces around the world are undermining it and will usher in a new system sometime in the next few decades. Specifically, the book examines how several major processes are reshaping travel, including:

• Global warming and its many global consequences

• Peaking of oil supply

• Increased digitization of most aspects of economic and social life

• Massive global population increases

The authors examine changes in technology, policy, economy and society, and make a convincing argument for a future where, by necessity, the present car system will have been replaced.

The book also suggests that there are some bleak dilemmas facing the twenty-first century. The authors lay out what they consider to be possible ‘post-car’ future scenarios. These they describe as ‘local sustainability’, ‘regional warlordism’ and ‘digital networks of control’.

Some describe the twentieth-century as the century of the car. Now that century has come to a close – and things are dramatically about to change.