The Ford Mustang Mach-E and the danger of electric cars
volts.wtf
volts.wtf
Here’s his intro bio: “I should note that I’m not a car guy. I don’t know much about them, don’t much like them, and don’t much like driving them. I never learned to drive a stick shift or change the oil. I don’t drool over muscle cars or know what “hemi” means. Truth be told, I kind of hate car culture.”
Further on he has an opinion on what American drivers can handle. There’s literally thousands of Teslas on the road and he has fears of them “leaping” across intersections.
How about some facts from IIHS: https://www.iihs.org/news/detail/with-more-electric-vehicles...
I constantly see Teslas suddenly zoom in parking lots or on crowded roadways. I've also seen them seemingly lose control and weave in their lane, slightly into the next ones when there's not even any traffic around them.
I've also seen the Remote Parking/Recall function totally fail where a Tesla nearly hits me as it attempts a U-turn perpendicular to the row of parking spaces to get through a line of parked cars to its owner in the next row.
I'd say any fears of drivers not being able to handle the cars, or even fears of the cars not being able to handle themselves, are quite valid.
Once upon a time I owned a '67 mustang, I know how to change my own oil, I learned to drive on a stick, and I know what a hemi is, and I concur.
The submission clearly doesn't violate the HN guidelines, but article like this make me wonder if someone would be willing to develop a crowdsourced extension for HN that would let adoptees flag posts as "written by a fuckwit" to filter them out for each other.
As a sidenote, your "written by a fuckwit" came very close to me having to clean Mac and Cheese off my monitor.
Seems fair, given that some of them come with a "launch control mode / drag strip mode" right in the UI, expressly for the purpose of doing that.
If you look at the top 10 cars involved in accidents (per 1000 cars), it's not a particularly powerful bunch. In the USA last year the stop accident prone car was a Scion FR-S with under 200 HP (150 lb-feet). The Toyota Prius (even Toyota marketing makes fun of it's performance) is at #8.
Personally I feel safer in a capable car, even if it has crazy 0-60 times and impressive HP/Torque numbers.
https://www.iihs.org/ratings/driver-death-rates-by-make-and-...
Individual model comparisons aren't of much consequence (especially with such incomplete data), but trends are. If you scan the MV and SV columns in the midsize and large sections and compare it to the sports car and 2-door sections you'll see the trend I'm highlighting. The pdf linked on that page is helpful for this.
https://www.iihs.org/api/datastoredocument/status-report/pdf...
The data seams to be screaming "driver demographics" at you.
Generally the lower the performance of a car, the longer in the future you have to predict your power needs, which makes things like on ramps, highway passing (especially on uphills), and of course getting across intersections quickly.
I think one correction for the OP is that while instant torque is a huge change for the driver, it's not so for anyone outside the car. Much of the lag in the throttle, engine (waiting for RPMs to increase), torque converter, automatic to shift, driveline slack, etc is invisible to people outside. What pedestrian notices is the launch after all that happens, and said launch is much like an EV launch.
Sure $50-$75k Teslas are quick, but I don't expect cheaper EVs to be particularly faster than the cheaper gas cars.
Analogy: my kid has an electric dirt bike, and it has a knob to control throttle response, and a knob to control speed. He can rock top speed, but he still can't handle more than 1/3rd up the dial on throttle response. He doesn't have good enough throttle control to handle the torque, and this is a tiny little thing. I base much of my thoughts off the experience of working with him to learn throttle control (he accidentally power slides in turns all the time, which is iffy on a dirtbike for a kid), and my experience with other drivers.
I found switching to an EV dramatically easier to drive, despite having about twice the performance.
Nearly every driver on the planet handles nearly 1G braking on nearly every car on the planet from the last decade, even the outliers like the cars with drum brakes. The improved modern brake caused no rash of problems with over braking, no huge spike in crashes, no calls for strong laws to control braking speeds. Why should accelerating at nearly 1G be any different than braking at 1G? The key to safe driving is predictable performance, giving drivers what they expect.
Even fairly midrange cars like the Subaru crosstrek ($22.6k), Toyota RAV4 ($26.5k), and Honda CR-v ($26.4k) have pretty advanced traction control systems and the average cost of a new car in the USA is $47,077. In fact the traction control system is the number one complaint for those driving in the snow, except for the Subaru. Not of those 3 cars are particularly fast and reviews often mention the lack of power.
The implementation of that is so much more complicated in something like a Tesla S vs the others. Things like independent torque vectoring is not common in most gas vehicles. I thought Car and Driver or Road and Track did a great write-up on it, but I can't find it. This one is meh, but has some details in it. The second one talks about stuff like slip-start mode.
https://plugincarworld.com/does-a-tesla-have-traction-contro...
https://www.tesla.com/ownersmanual/modely/en_us/GUID-CC0F27E...
Sure the Tesla has an advantage over ICE cars in that it can produce positive or negative torque near instantly on either axle. But braking is a good substitute. I didn't really fully understand differentials till I built one for an RC car and played with it enough. If you turn the car upside down you can immediately tell that dragging your finger on one wheel, speeds up the other wheel, thus the dangers of an open differential (my WRX had two limited slip differentials and one open slip). Open differentials + braking give you the best of both worlds. You get a cheap, less drag, lighter differential, but you can still transfer torque from the slipping wheel to the non-slipping as needed.
Most don't realize that most cars (when it's slippery) are one wheel drive (fwd or rwd with an open differential), some are rear or front wheel drive and have limited slip so they are 2wd. AWD can be 1, 2, 3 or 4wd when slippery, depending on the configuration of open and closed differentials. My WRX was 3wd (1 open and 2 LSD). Hardcore offroad vehicles have locking hubs or full sync mode for very slipper conditions, but it's hell on tires if used on a normal road since every turn will scrub tires for the difference between inside and outside curve distances.
However if you google snow testing and the 3 cars I mention above you'll find a report basically saying the Subaru was awesome in the snow, predictable, could climb, turn, and brake as well as traction allowed. The toyota and honda however were pretty terrible in comparison despite all being a similar price, similar power, similar tires, and AWD. I was amused to find that Subaru's were really better in the snow.
I spent a year of commuting through six 7,200 foot peaks every weekend and went through many snow storms, blizzards, freezing fog, etc. My WRX did awesome, except when the snow was so high it would life the car off the tires. It didn't use anything active for traction control, but was awesomely predictable in the snow. I thought rally drivers had inhuman skills in their ability to drift sideways through corners and stay in their lane.... till the WRX and found it easy to do the same. Great fun.
Sure my old WRX couldn't do torque vectoring, or even active traction control, but was so predictable that it didn't particularly matter if there was some slipping. It also communicated exceedingly well, one treacherous night descending from 7,200 feet or so into Carson City I was at 10 mph or so, any slower and I'd slide to the inside of corners. I could tell not only that the ABS was going off, but which wheel. I tuned my speed as a result so I'd slow so one wheel would occasionally trigger, but not so slow that I'd slide to the inside of corners. Pretty eerie with the slow rumble of the boxer engine near idle, silence from the heavy falling snow, and the noise of the ABS floating between the 4 wheels. As you might imagine it had my full attention.
As you can probably tell despite my m3p being faster and more advanced in many ways, I still miss my WRX.
The subaru on the hand just shrugs, slips a bit, but does what it's asked.
The M3P for instance isn't particularly good at donuts, even in track mode, at least with the settings I tried. I've definitely been in scary situations where not being able to slip would have meant getting stuck. In my m3p I've even gotten stuck trying to get into my driveway, even with "slip start" mode enabled. Had to get a running start just to get over the curb of my almost flat driveway that my subaru (either the forester or wrx) would have just slipped a bit and gotten up.
Instant torque is alot of fun, but in terms of power, you're only ahead for the few moments until a gassers torque curve catches up.
That's what I was thinking. EVs have a totally different torque curve than ICE cars, but that doesn't imply faster acceleration. In fact, there are a few cars in the non-performance Model 3s price range that will out-accelerate it 0-60.
At least the guy was honest about not being a "car guy", though; he's got a 12 year old car, half the stuff he mentions have been standard features on cars for 5+ years.
This is the same thing, but for a polar opposite demographic. The pitch is more or less "do you hate driving? well you'll be happy to hear that even we have a car that people who hate driving think is pretty ok."
It didn't have the required safety equipment. The rules have changed recently, it's allowed now.
https://www.musclecarsandtrucks.com/dodge-demon-nhra-ban-lif...
Is that really why you think those warnings are there?
No. Drug ads in the US have to include (and I'm no authority) information about possible side effects. Most drug ads will downplay that part and have someone read off the list quickly. The Viagra ads seems to have no shame about that particular possibility though. So my guess is it's required but they're also kind of happy to include it.
For example when I'm a pedestrian/on bicycle I can hear when petrol cars get closer and I also know that a car that I just checked is not going to suddenly teleport next to me while I turn the head to check the other direction.
Having said that, I also would not trust IIHS safety ratings as evidence that new automotive technologies will ultimately make us safer. For one thing, the vehicle-to-pedestrian evaluations typically seem like an afterthought compared to the evaluation done for the vehicle occupants. For another thing, it's entirely possible that many of these new safety features make us collectively less safe by inducing people to drive more miles, faster, and pay less attention while doing so.
It took more than a decade before it became clear that the increase in pedestrian fatality rates was largely due to the increase in trucks and SUVs. I suspect it'll take a similar amount of time to find out (empirically) whether electric cars result in communities that are safer or less safe.
Everything needs reasonable limitations that balance the rights of others in society. Surely there are reasonable limitations on how much acceleration a stock car should have.
It always turns me off when someone says something like "people from some country do/don't do/can/can't" when almost every time it has nothing to do with what country the person is from.
If most people switched from driving cars to riding motorcycles I would be willing to wager that they would find it fun and that traffic fatalities would increase.
(I say this not to discourage anyone from riding motorcycles but to point out that "fun" and "dangerous" are often positively correlated.)
Given I am a poorly coordinated and easily distracted, I only own dull knives. It takes twice as long to saw through meats which equates to an extra minute. I have that kind of time.
You do not want someone like me owning a car with godlike acceleration. And we all know how this story ends -- regulations on acceleration. Knowing that, why wait ? Because the anti-regulatory alter of freedom needs human sacrifices first ?
https://www.urmc.rochester.edu/encyclopedia/content.aspx?con....
Hahaha succinctly put.
I've been a performance automotive enthusiast for decades, competed in autocross for years, visited the Houston drag strip many times, and own a 500 horsepower Tesla, and I still agree there should be some kind of power to weight ratio limit on cars used on public roads.
The report said he was driving at 113 MPH, which is easily achievable in most modern cars way below even your 500 HP Tesla.
A bit off-topic, but having seen a picture of the aftermath of the house (https://www.tampabay.com/news/crime/2021/10/08/man-who-crash...) I have to say I'm glad we build houses out of brick where I live. While there are no guarantees at that speed, it would have definitely slowed the car down more than wood framing.
http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=weight%20of%20a%20tesla...
My point is that drivers licenses seem have such a low bar and, anecdotally and quite possibly related, many people are really bad at driving, and it seems like something that can be improved.
At least having done autoX we know the limits of our vehicles, and even more importantly of our skills. Understanding how a small change in conditions can drastically change performance and create an unsafe situation is hugely valuable, as is the mindset to pay attention to it.
I've got a M3P and after keen observation of ever Tesla I see on the road they are the last car I worry about safety wise. The ones I worry about are mostly WRXs, riced out Hondas, and Minivans.
Seems like it's a very popular opinion that "my car is fast, but faster cars are insane" ... without much data to prove it.
I've participated in FT86 (BRZ/FRS) communities for years now and the constant factor in crashed ones is almost always the age/immaturity of the driver. Most times it also boils down to simply not knowing how to operate the (or a) car properly on the road.
It is _because_ this car is so "underpowered", that young people think they can get away with driving so terribly, that they inevitably crash/get into accidents.
Meanwhile when I see Teslas lose control or get crazy, they are almost always being driven by 25-50 year old people, sometimes even older.
This is a bad comparison, honestly.
The FRS is cheap, looks fast/sexy, and is fun to drive... which encourages exploring the limits. Thus new enthusiasts explore (and cross) the limit. Not sure another 25% HP/torque would really make it safer. Maybe another 2x-3x would be enough to scare people into being careful. Trick is most don't know where the limit is, after crossing the perceived limits a few times, they are in for a surprise when they find the real limits.
I even tried an E85 tune for a bit but honestly stock tune is perfect for me with the 2017+'s gearing ratio. It feels snappy, feels great to rev high, etc.
I've known people to turn off traction control thinking they can handle it and then they don't even think about situations like the road surface being too cold or damp from light drizzle/rain. Known two young guys who wrecked with those exact situations.
- Cars are a lowest common denominator for transportation. They do not require much infrastructure at first, and are a very easy way to get around when not many other people are driving.
- Once enough people are driving, the downsides start to become apparent. But roads can be upgraded incrementally and drivers become a powerful interest groups since people have invested their livelihood into it by moving somewhere you need to drive to.
- So it's a ratchet mechanism where people get locked into a transportation choice, and then force it to be expanded and catered to.
Public transit does not have this dynamic. While cheaper in the long run, train lines are very expensive to build at first.
If the density is high, cars don't work.
In between there is a bit of a choice, streets that are friendly to pedestrians and bikes encourage people to walk, cycle and take public transport. Streets only designed encourage traffic jams.
Cars create traffic jams in a way that doesn't seem to happen with other modes of traffic. In a medium density environment, if you like traffic jams, go for cars.
There is a also a bit of a question how much children can move around freely. In areas designed for cars, children tend to have very limited freedom. Their parents have to move them around until they get a driving license.
As much as I would like that to be true, I don't think it is. The safety-critical nature of railways, more so even than a coach/bus which might travel almost as fast as a slower train, means there are massive costs for maintaining railways, based partly on use but not always.
I asked my MP (representative) the other day about why it was so expensive to travel on trains when there should be a massive economy of scale but she didn't understand the question. A return ticket for an approx 150km journey might be around £100 in the UK, whereas the gasoline cost would be maybe £40 + some small percentage of my yearly insurance and maintenance costs.
On a pure cost basis that's just about equivalent to a compact car assuming you have to pay for unsubsidized parking in Boston or thereabouts and with the car option you also get a car that you can use wherever and whenever you want.
That said, if I'm going in for a day, I usually take the train because rush hour driving is so painful.
Cities are only "noisy, dirty and crowded" because of cars. The noise is self-explanatory, the dirt is also (car tires cover everything in a thin layer of black dust). Cars also make cities more crowded because of the immense amount of space they take up. Trains and bikes can transport people using 1/10th to 1/100th of the road space of cars. Reducing streets to train lines and bike paths would allow cities to reclaim around 75% of the road area (2 lanes of parking and 2 lanes of traffic reduced to one lane for bikes and deliveries).
This is hyperbole. Throughout history cities have always been noisy, dirty, and crowded. Even in very dense cities with limited car traffic there is still an abundance of grime.
But agreed: cars don’t work in cities. We need to create more bike and pedestrian paths and get rid of a LOT of streets, roads, and highways to fix US cities.
And don't get me started on the pathetic state of public transit in the city itself. Muni is disgusting, unsafe-feeling, unreliable, and slow. Even LA's metro buses are better than SF's.
Chicago, OTOH, has an outstanding public transit infrastructure.
heh why would someone who hates cars with the passion of a thousand suns review one?
I enjoy driving, I don't enjoy traffic but i do like road trips. I live in Dallas and regularly do weekend trips all over Texas, SE Oklahoma, and Arkansas. It's relaxing to me.
Huh? I've lived in NY for 25 years and have never owned a car.
Whereas somewhere like Boston, a lot of your friends probably live in the suburbs and do weekend activities in the mountains or wherever. You can get off without one--I'm sure people do--but, especially as you get older, it affects your activities to at least some degree.
You misspelled N.Y. L.A. barely has a train system in comparison. L.A.'s train system is hot garbage and goes practically nowhere. L.A. is one of the most car dependent cities in the US.
I live in one. I still have a car, but pretty much only use it on the weekend.
From what I've read a VW Golf weighs between 1300 - 1600kg. A VW ID.3, practically the same car but electric, weighs between 1800 - 1900kg. That's a small car weighing as much as a bigger, older ICE SUV. An almost 40% weight increase over the equivalent ICE. Battery weight will really need to go down.
Plus we're going to have to really upgrade road infrastructure to make it safer.
That's a profile choice, it's not like you have to do this since it's all drive by wire.
For instance the folks from lightyear one were not interested in acceleration, the car is specced for 0-100 in "less than 10 seconds" and that's about it. That's for a 150k car too.
Plus the Mach-E's acceleration... is in line with regular mustangs: the normal versions are 5 to 6s, only the GT is 3.8 (or even 3.5 for the GT-PE).
The 2020 Mustangs range from 5.1s for the EcoBoost to 3.7 for the GT500.
Have you seen those discussions about American drivers where driving is basically a human right after 16 years since most Americans live in places with no or bad public transport?
I don't even know if they test old drivers regularly in the US.
Volkswagen Golf Dimensions 2020: Height 1452mm Width 1799mm Length 4258mm
Volkswagen ID.4 Dimensions 2022: Height 1651mm Width 1854mm Length 4597mm
And/or the cars could be much smaller and more efficient like the Aptera [1] which uses about 1/2 as much energy/mile (100Wh/mile) than a Tesla does (220 Wh/mile). Much of that is due to being more aerodynamic, but also due to being lighter. Which means you don't have to carry as much battery weight around to get the same range.
On a more serious note, that's a 2 seater with a small trunk, from what I see. Good luck getting mass adoption for it.
Plus it looks more like a prototype, and we've seen thousands of those. By the time it gets into production it will need to add extra safety and comfort features which will add weight.
Unfortunately, there's also another factor, and people are sensitive to this stuff. To me, it looks ugly.
Plus, I'm obviously thinking: if their form factor is so revolutionary, why has nobody used it? Though technically we had similar looking stuff, wheel arches were super popular during the 30s. What did they discover that literally every other major car maker didn't? That form factor went away for a (presumably solid) reason.
In the eye of the beholder. I think it looks like a space car from the future.
Shouldn't it be possible to model the EV's acceleration on a combustion engine car, and/or let the driver select the type of acceleration they want?
As with everything, you're damned if you do and damned if you don't.
That's not to say that if I need to get across that intersection before you do that I won't slip out of economy mode and enjoy the ride.
So people who got into electric cars suddenly drive harder, creating more pollution ie from tyres and brake discs (that added weight makes this also much worse). It ain't fun for lungs and overall health to breath in metallic or burned rubber nanoparticles. It looks like we will change visible pollution in the cities for less visible, but at least as deadly one.
A Dacia spring is even lighter, and extremely slow.
The Dacia Spring is comparable to the VW Up which is two tiers down from the Golf.
However, I don't think that cars being more fun than ever before is contrary to goals of reducing how much the average person drives. Better cars, fun, torquey EVs, and the like are not what is stopping construction of protected bike lanes and light rail. Having cars that have sucked for decades has not slowed the expansion of car-centric suburban sprawl around cities like Denver and Seattle.
A personal anecdote: last year I moved to another state, and I looked for housing with a lot of my core needs within walking distance. Having secured this, I proceeded to buy the most fun, least practical car my budget would allow. It's OK to want infrastructure that doesn't cater to cars, but still enjoy driving for driving's own sake.
It's not the same issue as with cars, since fast acceleration isn't new, and every driver has driven at high speed (even if not quickly accelerating). But it is an interesting trend resulting from high-powered electric motors.
Normally inexperienced riders go slow, wobble, don't hold their lane, don't understand traction (like wet = slippery), but are very easy to avoid. However put they same rider on an ebike and they are dangerous. Suddenly they have to make fast decisions, predict the movements of things around them, hold their lane, compensate for road conditions (potholes, sewer grates, painted lines, sand, slab edges, etc). They go at car speeds (in the city), but have nowhere near the skills to manage it. Seen plenty of accidents.
With that said you put those same people in a EV with crazy top speed and acceleration, and I'd expect them to honor the local speed limits (or close), drive just like the rest of traffic, and not be a hazard just because their car is fast.
Unless of course this changes, there are designs in I think Norway and/or Denmark that treat bicyclist as first class citizens.
My mileage has tripled since I got an eBike so an accident is now roughly three times as likely.
But this isn’t the first time rip-roarin’ vehicles have been sold to the public. Motorcycles, even slow ones, will stomp most cars from a light or 1/4 mile. And, yeah, folks plow into things with them on occasion. But it’s generally failure to negotiate a turn that causes moto accidents, not outrageous acceleration.
So we already have the prior art of Teslas and motorcycles, and the world hasn’t ended. In fact, this is the first such worry I’ve heard about EVs. As I’ve said about fast motorcycles: the throttle is not binary.
I can't do that even if I don't leave the house. There's a school near our house, and there are a lot of Tesla school buses that drive by. :-) But multiples in a single outing? How about multiples at the same intersection? It is not uncommon to see three at a stoplight, all pointing different directions, and all the same color even. Even in the heyday of MSFT stock options, I don't think I'd see that many cars of a single luxury brand everywhere I go. It's cool and all, yet strangely bizarre at the same time. Like Tesla ownership is a rite of passage for Microsoft employees or something. :-)
So you can imagine how strange it is to me when we travel to visit my parents in central FL, and don't see a single one the whole time.
I "leaped" across an intersection just yesterday in Portland -- an intersection which has a light rail train stop in the center divider -- exploiting the torque of my Model Y. While I only peaked at about 5 miles above the speed limit there was not a corresponding audio cue that would be present with a traditional car accelerating comparably. A commuter began an attempt to cross from the light rail stop with his bicycle after I had left the intersection. I felt he had far fewer cues to notice my car. He noticed me and abruptly stopped before completely entering the street. Even though my speed was reasonably safe, I felt the acceleration in the conditions definitely was not. I made a note to my self to take more care there in particular, not expecting I would talk about it on HN the next day.
This is just one specific example -- but the acceleration and sonic characteristics of electric cars present real hazards and drivers should adjust. While driving the Leaf and the Tesla for many years, I have noticed that pedestrians tend to notice me later than they would had I been driving a conventional car.
It will be a long time before I can buy the EV equivalent of my wife's Skoda Fabia.
EV trucks, sportscars, and SUVs really can't come soon enough because those solve different problems for different people. Not everyone uses their car to commute to an office.
How about some evidence? There is usually enhanced traction control and other safety features in EVs. It's also possible being able to pull out or maneuver quickly to avoid someone/something else could also reduce it. It seems the claim can't be made either way without looking at the net effects and their contributors.
"I do feel safer knowing that my car will keep me in my lane in normal driving conditions. But there's only so much software can do in the face of bad infrastructure."
Same rule for guns - never rely solely on physical safety devices as they can fail. If you feel safer with this feature, then it's an indication that you need to change your behavior (pay attention).
Then you simply blame infrastructure? There could be some enhancements, but I don't see mention of the proposed changes here beyond land use restrictions.
"Ultimately, my fondest wish is that I lived somewhere where I didn't want or need a car at all. I hate cars. I hate driving. I really hate other people's driving, and other people's cars."
Places like that do exist. If you wish this so badly, you could move.
"...should be reducing the need for, and number of, cars. ... The top priority should be making land use and planning choices that encourage walkable communities, with amenities mixed in, so people can get out of cars and get onto their feet or bicycles."
I sort of agree, but would depend on the process and implementation details. Some places like rural areas probably wouldn't be great candidates for this. Cities and many high density neighborhoods basically already have this to varying degrees.
Also - you don’t have to use autopilot! I don’t, I love driving but each there own.
just stay inside in front of netflix, you'll be perfectly safe that way.
We don't live in that world though do we. For a very long time the car has been absolutely dominant. Any thought at provision for pedestrians, cyclists or public transport has been squeezed out by the car lobby. All we are talking about is some rebalancing.
But, to be less cynical about fellow human beings, a lot of my peers choose to not have a car way into their 30s. Lots of people choose to be part of car clubs, where you can share a car effectively across multiple households. I did that for a while too, but the limitations of car sharing make them too cumbersome, more on this later. I expect that there will be less privately owned cars in 10-15 years in the urban areas of the UK. However, I don't believe any of the smaller (less than 100'000 people) communities will ever be able to get out of the perils of private car ownership, as the geographical sparsity will force people to use cars. To not have a disproportionate negative impact on the lives of the people who choose not to live in big cities, instead of legislating cars out of existence, cars should be downsized, electrified and made to be more efficient - there is very little reason why most regular families should transport their own 300kg of human matter by also transporting 1500kg of metal in the process. Point being, in cities where the population density allows for all the infrastructure to lead a good quality of life, lets decrease car ownership, but let's not leave the people who live in smaller communities and rely on cars in the dust.
As for car clubs, it seems the pricing model is hostile towards road-trips, yet I wouldn't ever want to rent the car for a shopping trip. I have a car mainly for the luxury to explore the country around me on my own terms. And since the car is shared, I'm disallowed from taking my dog with me.
You don't have to go along holding hands on your trip to the shop. All it needs is a smile and "good morning".
>Point being, in cities where the population density allows for all the infrastructure to lead a good quality of life, lets decrease car ownership, but let's not leave the people who live in smaller communities and rely on cars in the dust.
I have a feeling the people who are going to be left in the dust are the poor, as always.
It doesn't cost you anything you know.
>I don't have any requirements or expectations of any other person I don't have a direct relationship with.
They are your neighbours. One day you might need them.
I just sold my 1992 Range Rover, after owning it for a decade. I'm hoping not to buy another car for a while, but if I had to, 2009 is at the newer end of anything I'd be looking at.
I don't know that your example makes the point. That vehicle if so old, most states will issue special historical/classic/antique plates is you ask. I'll agree that 2009 isn't all that old, but cars can get pretty ratty after 13 years, especially if one is "not a car guy".
Besides, as Indiana Jones said, it's not the years, it's the mileage.
That old Rover made it past 200k miles; its interior got pretty worn, but it still ran as reliably as any other vehicle I've had. I'd be driving it still, if some jackass hadn't hacked the catalytic converters out of it one night.
The very basic of physics shows a direct dependency between how quickly car can accelerate to how fast it can stop. So faster car also stops better.
In the very end, if the vehicle is balanced it's not a big issue. My Tesla Model Y performance that is doing 0 to 60 in 3.5 seconds stops immediately in any city environment. It has very small reaction distance. My old toyota wasn't able to do so. Thanks to wide tires and breaks that doesnt degrade as fast due to one pedal driving.
One the highway the story is similar, yes the car can speed up faster, but it's up to a driver what is the final speed. My performance model is much more stable has far better and smarter control compares to almost any gasoline car. In the very end it quite often prevents many potential incidents.
I've turned all of these off in my car, so that I know 100% the time I need to be aware of my surroundings and do decisions myself. Happily will accept full driving mode in 10-20 years, but anything in between has a lot of hidden pitfalls.
Generally stopping distances (for modern vehicles) are related more to tire choice than anything else. Sure a stiff suspension helps minimize weight transfer and you lose less when a single tire hits a bump, but it's a small factor.
Acceleration numbers can easily be a 3x difference, The slowest car in the USA is the Nissan Kicks has a 60-0 distance of less than 120 feet, even with crude drum brakes. A corvette with the special z51 performance package has a stopping distance of 108.4 feet.
Sure if you stop 10 times from 60-0 without cool down, brake design and cooling make a big difference, but for normal road use (not racing on a track) it's not particularly relevant.
Granted, maybe they've since changed the brakes as they frequently modify models.
Ford Mustang Mach-E (2020) - $44k - 4.2 seconds
Chevrolet Camaro 2SS (2019) - $45k - 4.0 seconds
Dodge Charger R/T Scat Pack (2020) - $46k - 3.9 seconds
Toyota GR Supra 3.0 (2021) - $51k - 3.8 seconds
Volkswagen Golf R (2022) - $44k - 3.9 seconds Corvette Stingray 1LT (2022) - $62k - 2.9 seconds
> For someone like me, who drives fairly carefully and pays attention, it can feel more precise and controlled, and thus safer.
Sounds like the author doesn't really pay that much attention. And that's why we should be investing more in teaching people how to really drive a car. And stop putting huge distracting screens in cars.
> Driver-assist features might offset this somewhat.
Driver-assist features aren't unique to EVs.
That's why it's called "Mustang."
Prescriptivism is worrisome.
I love cars and I love driving. How about you live your life and I’ll live mine, okay?
(/s, hopefully obvious)
I too love cars and driving. I hate commuting via car, so I set up my life to not do that. I also dislike people pushing the blame of bad driving on _cars_ and _car manufacturers_. People are _chosing_ to interact with infotainment, use their phone, and generally not pay attention. I don't think we need more regulation, but to treat distracted driving the same way we treat drunk driving (which isn't really good enough, but a start).
He theorizes that more fun driving means more driving...I don't know...there's a lot of fun gas cars that get driven rarely. Also, almost any car might be more fun that a 2000s honda odyssey. Not a high bar.
I think the point this misses is that EVs are, in the long run, a MUCH better option than gas cars, despite any drawbacks.
Luxury cars have all the features he’s talking about. Luxury cars have good acceleration. Yes, EVs have better acceleration, but not dramatically better than a typical sports car.