Accessibility, Car Dependence and Rural Peripheralization: The Automobility Gap in the Spanish Countryside

ABSTRACT Disparities in access to opportunities and services often accumulate in peripheral rural areas, contributing to a sense of being left out of prosperity. To bridge this gap, regular commuting to cities where jobs and resources are concentrated has partly replaced emigration, making the private car the key to settling and living in the countryside. However, car dependency reveals important fractures within the rural population. Our work examines the relationship between mobility capabilities and life opportunities by analysing the Spanish case. The results underscore the link between automobility deficits and the risk of exclusion. In a context where rural depopulation and gentrification, hypermobility and mobility deprivation coexist, car dependency needs to be addressed beyond a transport problem as a variable of social peripheralization. The conclusions highlight the need for rural policies to address the challenges posed by this issue in the current transitions to greener mobility paradigms and ageing societies.