A car-free year: Providing vehicles for change

Abstract

This paper describes an interventionist design research project called a Car-free Year, where three families substitute their cars for a fleet of light electric vehicles during one year. The aim is to study how this intervention changes the families’ everyday practices, as well as suggest how design can support and sustain such a change on a larger scale. If radically new paradigms are to be shaped, changes are needed both in what is considered normalities and in people’s everyday practices. We argue that design can play an important role in the transition towards more sustainable futures and new normalities.