Ethan's BF parents and grandparents have taken him to every car show around since JK, so he's grown up around the culture. I'm less rabid, a few big shows a year that's about it.

Most shows here it's classic cars 25 yrs and older, no booming stereos, family events. The do-wop crowd shows tend to be newer car shows and mostly in the big city. Same with the exotics, city only, their own shows.
Summer around here there's a lot of classics and exotics on the roads.

Here the majority of shows and car culture is classic cars and every gearhead has a summer car and a winter beater or DD.

Car culture was never big.
Car culture is as big as it ever was.
The kids just don't drive $100k Porsches.
You were the weird kid in the Chevelle?
Now that weird kid is in a modded stanced WRX

^^^ Yup, stanced cars are where it's at today. If a kid has a car that isn't bagged and is riding on non-stretched tires, it's only because he hasn't saved enough money yet. As for gatherings, Instagram allows them to put together impromptu "meets" in just a few minutes. They'll get together in parking garages, Walmart parking lots, wherever they can hang for a while, then each will go his own way until the next time.

_

Is car culture really going away? I think the amount of "casual" interest in cars among the general population is lower in the younger millennial/teen set than in previous generations, for all kinds of reasons. But that doesn't mean the number of people seriously aka "hardcore" interested in cars is necessarily lower in the younger set. Hardcore car people have always been a subgroup. The younger hardcore car guys might not hang out where the old farts notice them, or do their car thing in a way that the old farts would recognize.

It has gotten stupidly expensive and ridiculously regulated. Tinkering / modding is definitely discouraged if not outright illegal. When I was younger there was a lot of tinkering and modding... now it’s all about who has the most money to throw at the most expensive bolt-on kit... nothing about ingenuity or interesting approaches or real “hot-rodding” anymore. It’s sad really.

Wait until “pay by the mile” comes along. That’ll really be a huge nail in the coffin of it. It’s no wonder kids today have little interest in driving - it’s a total rip-off. Very expensive and lots and lots of traffic, stupid laws, money-hungry local municipalities with armies of cops with nothing better to do than straddle radar guns, etc. I actually don’t enjoy it much myself anymore truthfully.

Also true. A subset of a subset of society. For the average American the car is a necessary evil that they would happily replace with an automated capsule. We are a huge minority.:)

My 16 year old son is a car nut so I'm not sure the culture is dying but rather changing. He really likes my 911 but he likes the newer 911's. He has been begging me to take him over to a dealer to see a new GT2 RS

Autoline Detroit on PBS has covered this topic from many angles before, things are changing, and quickly.

Say goodbye.

My 25 y/o has been a E30 fanatic thanks to RickV selling him his first car.

He has purchased fixed up and sold to upgrade two E30's to get to the 318is he has now with a S50 swapped in, it is off the road getting lots of TLC including new paint.

He DD's a R53 Mini with tons of go fast goodies added to it.

Behind the local Sonics, every Saturday night there is a un-official car meet, I have stopped by it a couple of times, average age there is probably 23 years old.

Far from dead.

It’s dead? So I can pick up a cool old car for peanuts when exactly. Been waiting patiently for a long time....

Another thing they are are doing around here is buying a one thousand dollar car and getting a twelve thousand dollar paint job done on it.

I can't quite see the logic myself, but if it makes them happy, great.

Hobbies in general come and go.

The biggest thing to affect hobbies in general was the VCR and movie rentals.

Now the extra monies are going for upgrading video and streaming services as opposed to movie rentals.

Car culture is alive and well and living in the midwest. Went to a couple events this year that that had unusually large turnouts. I will say that a lot of the 20 something crowd inheirited the car addiction from parents. Not so many came into it on their own. My dad hated cars. Not sure how I got addicted.

My kid works at Timmy's PT, this summer worked 40 hr/week and picked up extra shifts to buy the car. He also pays for his own phone, car insurance, gas etc.

You guys just don’t hang in the right circles. Checkout groups like Radwood on Facebook. Tons of younger folks getting excited about cars. Not always the same stuff we are into, but hey to each their own. I was amazed at Rennsport at how large a crosse section of society was there, young and old getting out of all sorts of cars.

I think the rising prices of some of the older stuff has driven more interest in some of the cars that had been previously overlooked as well.

Still booming up in Canada, until the winter, then we just go inside and eat poutine and pro-create until spring.

What is often missed is that young people will generally go for owning the cars they can afford.

If you set the bar at a recently inflated $75K 911, then yes, car culture is dead.

If the on the other hand you set the bar at a Mazda 6 where they took the time to change out the springs, then car culture is very much alive.

Ckelly is a decade out of date referring to Korean cars as throways. They consistently top the reliability tables in the UK, the models are as sophisticated as or exceeding Japanese specifications, and they are bringing out
Hybrid and electric cars that are the best available in the World.( And at affordable prices rather than the overpriced BMWs VWs Jaguars and Tesla's)

So, are young adults playing around with cars up in Leeds? They show up at meets like we have here much? Large turn outs? Just curious.

Mark, sorry if I offended, didn't mean to. My own 16 year old grandson bought himself a really nice 58k mile Miata (he has a job too). My only point was, times seem a little different than when I was a kid. (And I'm a little jealous of your son's Audi coupe)!