A Household Level Investigation into Personal Chauffeured Automobility

Personal chauffeured automobility is a widespread yet under-researched practice, particularly in cities of the Global South. This study presents the first systematic investigation of personal chauffeured car use and the motivations that sustain it as an everyday mobility practice. Based on semi-structured, in-depth interviews with personal chauffeured car users, the study integrates qualitative thick description with quantitative analysis to explain the need to choose personal chauffeur-driven cars. In total, twenty-eight distinct reasons emerged from open ended responses. Subsequent cluster analysis of these reasons reveals four broad motivational themes shaping personal chauffeured automobility: (i) physical or functional constraints, (ii) utility maximization, (iii) habitual comfort-related motivations, and (iv) habitually assisted mobility practices. These motivations cut across diverse household types, indicating that structurally different households may share similar underlying motivation for relying on chauffeur-driven travel. The analysis reveals that personal chauffeured automobility is strongly shaped by socioeconomic characteristics, including the presence of elderly household members aged above fifty-five years, households with school-going children, very high annual incomes, salaried and self-employed occupations, multiple car ownership, long car ownership duration exceeding 20 years, ownership of high-value cars, and high work-related car trips. Household archetypes developed from these motivational clusters further reveal how life-stage challenges, mobility needs, lived circumstances, habitual practices, lifestyle preferences, and socially embedded norms—shaped by prior generational experiences and social circles—are intertwined with everyday mobility decisions.