If the ‘mobility agenda’ here in the U.S. gives you the creeps, wait until you see what’s happening in the UK

I feel the need to preface what I’m going to say here about the mobility agenda. I love technology, and I’m all for using it to make life more efficient, protect the environment, and expand access to transportation to more people—especially those unable to afford their own vehicles or who, due to factors such as disabilities, are left out of the privileges and pleasures of driving.

But I also treasure the rights I enjoy here in the United States to own my vehicle, to drive it under my complete control, and to drive it at times and on routes of my choosing. These rights, for me, are a defining element of individual freedom. In my book, if you don’t have these rights, you aren’t fully free.

That’s why, right or wrong, the mobility hype, in spite of all of the feel-good buzzwords and appeals to admirable causes, has always given me a creepy sense of an Orwellian subtext.

Take last week’s press release from the British government, announcing new policies that will allow “advanced trials for self-driving cars” to move forward as a step toward keeping the government “on track to meet its commitment to having fully self-driving vehicles on UK roads by 2021.”

In the UK government, there is actually a “Future of Mobility Minister”—a position held by one Jesse Norman. If that doesn’t underscore that the mobility push is a willful agenda and not an inevitable, organic outgrowth of technological, industrial, and social progress, I don’t know what does.

If an official position like that existed here in the United States, we would call it a “Mobility Czar”—with all the baggage and controversy that always goes with that type of “appointed, not elected” authority.

The British government, moreover, has also articulated a written strategy for the “Future of Mobility.” It’s a chapter of a policy paper called The Grand Challenges, which also addresses other issues including artificial intelligence and data, the aging society, and “clean growth” (another baggage-filled term that we won’t go into here, at least for now).

Two paragraphs of the “Future of Mobility” chapter sum up the essence of the agenda quite clearly. And you can make a case for the presence of a certain level of “doublespeak” in the language:

The UK’s road and rail network could dramatically reduce carbon emissions and other pollutants, congestion could be reduced through higher-density use of road space enabled by automated vehicles, and mobility could be available when we want it, where we want it and how we want it.

We will look for opportunities to improve customers’ experience, drive efficiency and enable people to move around more freely.

Where’s the doublespeak, you ask? It follows the “less is more” pattern. It’s true that there is an implication of expanding the access of underserved populations, such as those in rural settings as well as people with disabilities and economic disadvantages.

But it’s hard to get around the possibility that the push toward “higher-density use of road space enabled by automated vehicles” could also mean fewer choices for at least some people even though it could also mean more access for others.

And who, exactly, is the “We” referred to in “available when we want it, where we want it and how we want it?” We is a deceptively simple word that can be used in an effort to try to impose a certain collective identity with shared interests as a foregone conclusion. But having mobility available “when we want it” is not necessarily the same as “when I want it” or “when you want it.”

So… is it “we the people,” “I the individual,” or “we the government” slash “we the agenda setters?”

For some insight into this question, let’s continue to deconstruct. In last week’s UK-government press release on the advanced trials of self-driving cars, there is one particular twist of phrase that we could read as being very revealing of the intent.

“We need to ensure we take the public with us as we move towards having self-driving cars on our roads by 2021,” UK Automotive Minister Richard Harrington said in the statement.

In this quote, Mr. Harrington might be inadvertently letting the cat out of the bag just a bit. Look at the language: “We need to ensure that we take the public with us.”  There is a clear divide between the “we” of “the government’ and the implied “they” of “the public.”

So there we have it: “we” and “they.” The UK government sets the agenda, and is determined to take the public along for the ride, implicitly not as drivers but as passive passengers on this journey into the brave new future of mobility.

I can’t speak for you, but from my point of view this is enough to make the short hairs stand up on the arms of anyone who is a car enthusiast or who generally values the right to drive.

In the United States, the agenda isn’t quite so in-your-face. There is more fluidity in who is driving and shaping it. We’re witnessing a more complex interplay of business interests, the desires of the consumer market, and agenda setting by internal government entities, intergovernmental organizations like the United Nations, and nonprofit interest groups such as trade associations and think tanks.

But make no mistake: an agenda is taking shape here, and sometimes what is happening across the pond can be a “leading indicator” of what we might expect to see advanced in the U.S. in the not-too-distant future.

If you don’t believe it, just look at how much “mobility” was emphasized last year at the AAPEX show, an industry-only trade event (held every year in tandem with SEMA), organized by Auto Care Association and the Automotive Aftermarket Suppliers Association (AASA).

So what should those of us in the car enthusiast and “right to drive” camps do? Should we go all Mad Max, head for the back-country and become crazy, survivalist, conspiracy-theory-believing car guys and car gals, growing our own corn to distill into 200-proof grain alcohol to power what will one day be our internal combustion, human-driven outlaw vehicles after all the gas stations are gone?

Of course not.

But we should be proactive and watchful for any signs that the stateside mobility agenda is advancing in directions that could run counter to our right to drive. And when we see those signs, we should make sure we get off our butts, open our mouths, break out our pens, and make sure our point of view has full representation in the public dialogue.

There is still time for us to shape this emerging future. And here in the U.S., change is likely to take longer due to the more complex interplay of government, industry, and market forces. But that window of opportunity won’t be open forever.