The automakers clambered to build smaller, more fuel-efficient cars that, until then, a buying public did not want to drive. However, busy lives and priorities soon caused the carpool movement to struggle for support, as people became more aware of time management issues. After all, the 1980's saw the rise of two-income households, daycare for the kids, soccer moms, and households in which schedules circulated around the activities of the children. Supermoms in SUV's are harangued for putting family priorities ahead of the mass hysteria over declining natural resources. Car sharing, however, is hardly ever practicable.
Human needs are too individualized and too unpredictable.
All the hoopla over saving on car and gas expenditures via car pooling is an attempt to blast away at the prevailing automobile culture, a culture of individuals enamoured of their cars and the sovereignty that it brings to their lives. Modern government roads, as we know, are poorly maintained, crowded, and hence, dangerous. They provide incentive because drivers notice that these lanes are typically much less crowded, and therefore, move along at a much faster pace. This is because government has used coercion and legal means to keep most of the road population from legally using the designated HOV lane. Therefore, the State exacerbates the bungled traffic in all other lanes so it can effectively use misery to coerce us into accepting its mandates.