5 Pop Culture Moments that Made Sharing the Ride Cool
Posted on by Isabelle Brown
In a world where transportation is often depicted as “cool” when it’s a guy driving too fast, all alone, down a country road, we appreciate the moments in media that flip the script. The projects that showcase people we admire sharing the ride in a memorable way are what stick out to us as a company that educates and promotes all forms of ridesharing.
If memories of carpooling with your best friends, scenic train rides, and riding your bike until your parents call you home are what you think of when ridesharing comes to mind, then this list is for you. Here are our five favorite pop culture moments that remind us how cool sharing the ride is.
The Late Late Show with James Corden: Carpool Karaoke
Perhaps one of the most humanizing looks into celebrities we love is James Corden’s recurring segment on The Late Late Show, “Carpool Karaoke.” Corden invites a different musical guest on each episode to sing along to their most popular songs under the guise of sharing the ride to work.
Corden explained that The Late Late Show executive producer, Ben Winston, and he found something “very joyful about someone very, very famous singing their songs in an ordinary situation. We just had this idea: Los Angeles, traffic, the carpool lane—maybe this is something we could pull off.”
Since the segment’s debut in 2015, worldwide stars have made appearances such as Paul McCartney, Adele, Mariah Carey, Celine Dion, Madonna, Billie Eilish, Lady Gaga, Elton John, and so, so many more. Even Michelle Obama has carpooled with Corden.
While yes, the car is in most instances being towed by a crew and is not really being used to truly share the ride, it captures the electric energy of how fun it is to be in the car, blasting your favorite music with people you love. The show certainly inspires a sense of fun that you can only get from carpooling and pretending you are guests on your own episode of “Carpool Karaoke.”
Jerry Seinfeld’s Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee
An “experiment” from comedian Jerry Seinfeld became a sensation in the 2010s. Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee is a talk-show with the formula that goes as follows: Jerry Seinfeld, a classic car, a guest comedian, and a drive to grab coffee and food. The loose format and natural conversation that occurs in a car was a recipe for comedic gold with guests like Larry David, Martin Short, Sarah Silverman, and many more spanning from 2012 to 2019.
The show speaks so effortlessly to how a carpool fosters incredible conversations, grows friendships, and can bring you to new local places. While the average carpool group isn’t full of beloved comedians, sharing the ride can open up new doors to learning one another’s humor, personalities, and interests. It can make the ride to work into a social event that you look forward to each day, just as we would look forward to seeing who Seinfeld would get coffee with next.
Tik Tok’s Sabrina Bahsoon: “Tube Girl”
A trending wave of “romanticizing life” has created beauty, fun, and joy surrounding mundane parts of life. The daily commute often fits into this category: necessary, and nothing special. A creator on Tik Tok named Sabrina Bahsoon has the internet obsessed with her confidence and joy with videos of her riding London’s tube, or public transit system.
Since her first viral video in August 2023, Bahsoon has created the “tube girl effect,” inspiring people in cities all over the world to recreate her dancing videos on their transit systems. “Tube girl” videos have sparked a movement of unapologetic self-love and taking up space as a woman or anyone who feels they have to be small or quiet. On top of that beautiful message, Bahsoon has also transformed the boring daily commute on public transit into a magic moment. In Bahsoon’s world, we are all our own main character and we do not let the mundane moments of life stop us from having fun.
We can’t get enough of the unique perspective that Bahsoon is bringing to people around the world. Don’t take yourself—or your commute—so seriously. Life can be fun, even on your way into work!
Bullet Train (2022)
Nothing captures this era of transportation innovation like a Brad Pitt movie about high-speed rail! Set in Tokyo on Japan’s high-speed railway network, Bullet Train is a (rather ridiculous) action comedy movie that is absolutely star-studded and two hours of pure fun.
In reality, Japan’s Shinkansen trains travel at top speeds of 80-200 mph and are, without a doubt, the fastest way to discover Japan. Placing an ensemble cast along the railcars on a high-speed rail train creates a fast-paced, energized story that makes you want to experience the journey for yourself. The bullet train in the movie was based on the Tokaido Shinkansen, the world’s first high-speed rail line, opening in 1964.
The train itself manages to be just as cool as the martial arts fights throughout the movie, which is really saying something. Films and stories centered around public transit have the unique challenge of a limited setting but have the interesting opportunity to capture how much life there is inside of a train car.
Stranger Things
When a show or piece of media completely transforms pop culture, it’s incredible to experience firsthand. If you watched Stranger Things as it released in the summer of 2016, you know that its cultural impact went beyond the supernatural forces at work in Hawkins, Indiana. By October of that year, Millie Bobby Brown’s character of Eleven was probably the most common Halloween costume at any party you’d attend. Eggos were flying off grocery store shelves. Our collective love for Winona Ryder was revived.
For us at The Rideshare Company, we were big fans of a different factor of the show: The active transportation!
The iconic Stranger Things crew riding around Hawkins on their bicycles became a symbol of unwavering loyalty, bravery, and friendship as they stuck together to rescue Will. It reminded us of how cycling to work or school is an act of freedom. It’s a portal, not to the Upside Down, but back to childhood fun and wonder. To detach yourself from our car-centric communities and create your own perfect commute is a powerful thing—almost as powerful as defeating a Demogorgon.
Commuting and Popular Culture
Movies, books, and TV shows all quietly pay homage to the experience of the daily commute in their own ways. It typically goes under the radar for how meaningful the subtext of a car, bus, bike, or train ride can be.
Sharing the ride in media is often a chance to explain some exposition, to catch up with two or more characters, or take a break from an intense story. Think of the famous train scene in Studio Ghibli’s Spirited Away, or every time the students ride on the Hogwarts Express in Harry Potter. Transportation in media speaks to people because we all know the feelings evoked by being in an incredible car ride with friends or on a quiet, scenic train ride to go somewhere familiar.
Media and pop culture can remind us of the good, little moments in life. Sometimes it reminds us how special sharing the ride is.
Looking for a way to bring the magic of sharing the ride into your daily routine? Our easy commute program comes with a ridematch tool to help you find your perfect carpool companions. Check it out and ask your employer to call The Rideshare Company!