Census figures from the Central Statistics Office highlight the massive growth in car usage in recent years. Four out of every five households had at least one car last year.
Car ownership levels were higher in rural areas (88.6%) than in urban areas (75.2%). Meath had the highest level of ownership at 89.8%, while Dublin City was lowest at 59.5%.
The figures show that 57% of all workers drove to work by car last year, up from 55% four years earlier. When combined with those who drove vans or lorries, the figure rose to 65%, representing an extra 225,000 work-related car users from 2002.
55% of primary schoolchildren are now driven to school, a huge increase from 27.7% 15 years earlier. During the same period, the proportion of children walking to school slumped from 39.4% to 24.3%.
Separate CSO figures showed that the number of new cars licensed in May was 20,249, an increase of 7% on the same month last year.
For the first five months of this year, new car sales were 123,501, also up 7% on the same period last year. Licensing of second-hand cars in May grew more strongly, by 15.7% compared with May 2006.
