The Carpool: a Staple of Modern Parenting?

With three kids who need to get to soccer, lacrosse, football, cheer and swim team — not to mention school — Allison Stevenson says her eight-seater minivan is crucial for carpooling.

"I always have extra children in my car. I couldn't function with a smaller car," says Stevenson, 37, of Greer, S.C., who bought her Honda Odyssey in 2007.

Stevenson, who has 6- and 7-year-old daughters and a 9-year-old son, shares a morning carpool to school with a neighbor and swaps rides with other parents after school.

"They have lots of children involved in lots of activities, so we depend on each other to get everybody to where they need to be," says Stevenson, adding that most of her neighbors also have vehicles with the important-for-carpooling third row of seats.

Sure, carpooling has been around for decades. Kids got carted around in the big station wagons of the '70s and early '80s, then the minivans of the '90s and, most recently, the SUV. But the carpool has become an important piece of the parenting puzzle for some parents of heavily scheduled kids.

"Unfortunately, it's imperative these days that your child is extremely well-rounded," says Stevenson, who believes after-school activities can impart lessons in dedication and teamwork that are important later in life. "There is pressure for your children to do a thousand different things."

Many parents also see carpooling as a way to save money, time, and wear and tear in a time of higher gas prices and a shaky economy.

Kara Corridan, health editor of Parents magazine, says carpooling may be more common now because more women have re-entered the work force; fewer children walk to school; and there are more extracurricular activities, and sports being offered at younger ages. Without sharing the driving, parents say they couldn't do all they want for their kids.

"For some parents, it's vital," says Corridan, whose own family began helping another with rides after the mother went back to work.

With more seven-seat (or larger) vehicles on the market today than there were 10 years ago, more families are now driving big cars, says TrueCar.com analyst Jesse Toprak. TrueCar.com found that eight of the 10 most popular cars bought by drivers ages 28 to 45 in 2009 and 2010 had at least seven seats.

"The main buyers of the vehicles are the parents with school-age children, which clearly, at that age group, carpooling becomes a factor," Toprak says.

In Folsom, Calif., Lori Barudoni has been part of eight carpools over the last 13 years, and says they gave her the flexibility to send her children to a mix of public and private schools. She began carpooling when her oldest child was in preschool and she was driving a five-seat car. She quickly realized the carpool math: With more seats, she'd be able to carpool with more families and reduce her own driving.

"After that, when I went to purchase my next car, I said, 'It's got to be a 7-seater,'" Barudoni, 48, recalls of her minivan purchase about a decade ago.