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Yeah, so I'm currently reading The Founding, the first Gaunt's Ghosts omnibus, and it's freaking awesome. There was this particular scene when some of the Tanith were stealing contraband goods from the locals in a back alley deal. They get chased through the city and the book mentions them driving into oncoming traffic. That got me thinking, are there civilian vehicles in the 40k universe?

I always imagined that kind of privilege was abandoned millennia ago seeing how they would need every available scrap of material to be used for the war effort with the exception of the Arbites needing a chimera or two.

I feel that even the privileged high elite would have a hard time securing so much as two vehicles.

I laugh at the idea of a Civic in space.

Any technologically advanced society will need cargo haulers, delivery vehicles, public transport (busses/trains), construction and mining equipment. Several fluff sources talk about massive industrial crawlers and the like as well.

At the extreme end you could think of it like China during the Cultural Revolution. Pedal (or human/animal drawn) transport could be quite common for the public in cities and agricultural communities, while motor transport might be more common in mining/industrial communities. Walking might be common in urban settings, or there could be some kind of mass transit.

As to whether private passenger/cargo transport is common... that depends on the world in question and your own ideas.

My two cents.

Theres a piece in shield of baal I think where a bunch of mecs drive up to the sisters in some trucks, the natives have huge land crawlers and in some of the HH books theres mention of transit railways (maglev trains) and hubs (on Mars).
The info isnt huge though on civilians in 40k lore. War, war war and all that.

That would depend entirely on the planet. Not all planets in 40k are focussed completely on war, only a few of them do.
It is quite likely any advanced world will have some way for its citizens to get around, even if it is just public transport to get from the cathedral to the manufactorum and back to the hab block.
Worlds that are not given over completely to production likely could also have some forms of private transport as well.
The Imperium is so huge and varied, you could likely find any kind of vehicle in it.

Just about every planet with the classification "Imperial World" is going to have ground-based vehicles that are more-or-less analogous to the vehicles we have today.

People gotta work, goods gotta be delivered, people gotta get from Point A to B. Most of these worlds are in places that will never see an attack by Xenos or Traitors, where the concept of being part of a galactic civilization is some vague concept lacking solid representation for the vast bulk of the population.

So, sure. Of course there's ground cars in the Imperium. In the Ravenor series. Thronius and some merc get into a fistfight atop the vehicles in a veritable river of traffic, and the Arbiter that later joins Ravenor's retinue has both a personal car and a "classic" car owned by her uncle, iirc.

Indeed. Heck, in the last Eisenhorn book there are hoverbikes in use by the general population of Gudrun.

And even if cost a fortune, some are rich as it gets, the navigators in one book have range of transport. From cars and escort protection to starships and shuttles. In Hersey books a navigator house has skimmers, in Ragnar books a they had ground/skimmers, in iron snakes a royal land yacht. Elisihorn had a range of veichals.

Also notable mentions to rich families, trade groups, and inquisitors etc. The rich still have the good stuff,its only planets like Cadia which may have very little to no civilian stuff as basicaly it is one huge fortress,barracks and Bastian

Standard Issue Cadian bumper sticker;

"My other APC is a Centaur."

may i draw your attention to this article here... i bet it is able to answer one question or another...

http://www.dakkadakka.com/wiki/en/Civilian_vehicles_in_40k

Something very much like this :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trabant

Not elegant, not gee-whiz. But that would be precisely the point. Frills and bells and whistles to spoil civilians / only encourage discontent , would not, I think, be high on an Imperial agenda.
Throwing the proles the occasional bone or consolation prize and getting the most out of the least, would be.

i didn´t knew that auto mobile is even known in the U.S... respect!^^

This has inspired me to look at different 1:48 kits to make some scenery/vehicles for my techno-barbarians!