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Young people, old cars
1 year ago
Young people still love cars if they are interesting
Popular culture proves it. In the 1960s, John Lennon drove a Rolls-Royce Phantom V; in the 2020s the likes of Frank Ocean and Tyler the Creator own fleets of E30 BMWs and Lancia Deltas. The BBC’s The Cleaner features a young ‘influencer’ who drives a Lotus Esprit for the ’80s aesthetic. Album covers now display boxy classics where once they featured brand new Lamborghinis. What is it then, that has attracted young people to these cars?
Initially I thought it was fashion. The 1980s are back and cars are an extension of the music and the mullet. But once I’d got talking to the owner of the red Golf I came to realise it was something more fundamental. Minty, said Golf’s custodian, had always driven modern hatchbacks until she saw a local 1991 VW Polo for sale and decided to take the plunge. She bought it because, though lacking sat-nav, power steering and who knows how many other creature comforts we take for granted today, it possessed an abundance of character they all lacked. While its pedestrian looks are unlikely to appear in a music video anytime soon, the older car offered a more engaging, idiosyncratic driving experience than its modern counterparts.
Minty then upgraded to a Mk2 Golf Driver of the same vintage, citing power steering and a five-speed gearbox coupled with iconic looks as the reason behind her decision. The 1.6 Golf allows Minty to enjoy driving without risk of disqualification, while also having ample power to keep up with traffic. In this way, the Golf sits in the sweet spot of possessing enough sophistication to cover long motorway journeys from Dorset to Durham with ease while retaining a simplicity that makes it both characterful and reliable. With their complicated electronics, mechanically sound modern cars will occasionally give up the digital ghost, leading to costly repairs. Minty’s experience could hardly be more different: regular maintenance combined with frequent and sympathetic use has meant that other than the addition of a manual choke and original wheels, the car’s not been touched.
"A young person, having passed their test, often doesn’t want their hand held. We don’t need help keeping lanes or remembering the speed limit. We want to experience the freedom of the road on our terms, with a car that converses not commands"
It was maintenance that brought another university student, Anton, to his 1993 Mercedes 190E. The spanner-friendly Benz with its plentiful parts supply allowed Anton, wishing to learn how to look after a car, to experience changing filters and spark plugs with relative ease. He bought the ‘semi-abandoned’ car from a farm and was able to restore it himself to the point of it passing its MOT.
For Yeshwant, it was a combination of character and mechanical simplicity that led him to buy his first car, an NB Mazda MX-5. With a similar cost to buy and insure as a modern Polo, the Mazda was the first car that he could learn to drive properly. Modern driver-flattering traction control systems may make life easier when you’ve grown up without them, but they can feel frustrating, almost patronising, when it’s all you know. A young person, having passed their test, often doesn’t want their hand held. We don’t need help keeping lanes or remembering the speed limit. We want to experience the freedom of the road on our terms, with a car that converses not commands. And we will also learn along the way how to manage the mass of the car and not always rely on electronic safety nets to save us from ourselves, so we’ll wind up better, safer drivers with some idea of what to do when the unexpected occurs.
Journalists are forever lauding driving purity; a sentiment Anton echoes with the belief that ‘the simpler the driving experience, the closer the connection to the car.’ But there is more to it. The enemy of the young person has long been uniformity. When a modern Skoda is a Seat, is an Audi, is a Volkswagen, automotive self-expression is limited. Yes these cars come with more gadgets than the older vehicles but a phone mount and Bluetooth-equipped head unit will grant all the modern comforts required. Our phones have democratised modern comforts, bridging the gap between old and new which once disguised the absence of character. A gold MX-5 will forever be ‘cooler than a grey VW Polo,’ it just so happens that Yesh’s car is also a superb roadster.
A Mk2 Vauxhall Cavalier can be enough to spark the passion
Many have cited a lack of interest from younger generations as the reason today’s cars resemble kitchen appliances. It is commonly held that modern cars are not built for drivers because modern people don’t wish to drive. All wrong; a classic case of getting cause and effect precisely back to front. What will inspire a young person to get their licence when modern cars are so uninspiring? My friends in the car park confirmed this belief. The automotive hobby is not becoming increasingly niche because of a disdain for motoring held by young people, rather there remains a universal but latent interest in cars which I’m afraid a 2016 Skoda Fabia just doesn’t appeal to.
Minty loves her car but it would be a stretch to say she shares the enthusiasm of Ti readers. Older cars offer self-expression in the same way a person might display their favourite band on a T-shirt. It is unfair, therefore, to dismiss this resurgence in older cars among the young as a passing fad. It is less like buying a retro Polaroid camera as a novelty and more like sticking a record player on the side at home to enhance the experience of listening to the music you love.
