Car-Free Viability & Walkability Calculator (UK, 2026)

The first dropdown sets a realistic monthly public-transport cost for where you live, using Department for Transport bus pass data: London £86 a month, big city £68, market town £68, rural £85. A train uplift is added if you live within 2km of a station with regular services.

Add up fuel + insurance + road tax + MOT + servicing + repairs + tyres + depreciation. For depreciation, subtract what your car is worth now from what you paid, then divide by years owned. Not sure? Click the "Use the UK average" link — it picks £3,800 for petrol, £4,100 for diesel, £3,400 for EV or £3,600 for hybrid, straight from the RAC Cost of Motoring Index 2025.

Open Google Maps, drop a pin on your home, search each category and count the ones where walking time is 10 minutes or less. Most urban homes have 2–4 supermarkets, 1–3 GPs and 5+ restaurants. Rural homes often have zero.

Count bus stops within a 5-minute walk and the typical wait time on Google Maps or Citymapper at your normal travel time. For trains, check the distance to your nearest station and the trains-per-hour at peak time on National Rail Enquiries. Six or more an hour is excellent, two or fewer is rural.

Only tick the cycle lane box if there is a proper kerb-protected lane within 400m. A painted line on a busy road does not count.

Children at home, days you work from home, how often you would hire a car for a weekend, taxi trips per month. Then press Calculate.

"Viable" with positive savings: go for it. "Borderline": try a 90-day trial before selling the car. "Not viable": keep the car, or look at our Salary Sacrifice EV Calculator to lower the cost of owning instead.

Enterprise Car Club (£60 to join + £8.50 an hour) wins when you would use a car 20–150 hours a year — think one weekend a month plus the odd errand. Above 150 hours a year, a cheap used car owned for 7 years usually beats it. Below 20 hours, taxis are easier and cheaper.

Car-free works well in London (all zones), central Manchester, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Bristol, Birmingham, Cardiff and within a 10-minute walk of most large train stations. It fails in rural Wales, the Scottish Highlands, Cornwall, rural Northern Ireland and many outer suburbs. The 2021 Census Travel to Work data shows car-dependency above 70% for any community more than 5km from a station with a peak-hour service.

A 5-year-old used EV (£10,000) charged on a cheap overnight tariff costs around £1,800 a year all-in — sometimes cheaper than car-free in rural areas. This is often the best answer where buses and trains do not reach. See our Salary Sacrifice EV Calculator.

15 UK cities now charge non-compliant petrol and diesel cars to enter (£8–£60 a day). If you commute into one of these cities, going car-free avoids the charge entirely. See our CAZ / ULEZ Calculator for your exact daily exposure.

If you decide to keep a car, our Rail Season Ticket Break-Even tool tells you whether an annual rail pass is worth it. If you commute, the Salary Sacrifice EV Calculator shows how cheap an EV gets on a workplace scheme. And the CAZ / ULEZ Calculator covers daily clean-air charges.