Okay but then why is the rolling brick wall of a modern pickup allowed?
Trucks used as passenger vehicles are already more expensive to register and run than farm vehicles.
The fact that modern American passenger vehicles have evolved into statistically significant deathtraps for surrounding pedestrians, cyclist, and even smaller cars is as political as anything else in that country these days.
You can find plenty of more compact pickups - I've been searching for the best one for a while because the Dodge Ram and Ford F150 are just too big.
The Honda Ridgeline, the Ford Maverick, the Chevrolet Colorado, the Hyundai Santa Cruz, the Toyota Tacoma, are all more compact, only seat 2-4 people, and have more bed than cab.
Kids and and dog have plenty of room. And the bed is plenty big for all luggage / camping gear.
Plus it’s useful when we do need to haul couches or bigger items.
Downtown park isn’t fun but is doable.
Bring back small, capable trucks.
Toyota could bring back the tiny 90s tundra, and they would sell a tiny tiny number of them. That's why the modern corolla is as large as the 2000s camry.
It can also be introduced with new vehicle registrations so as not to bring out the pitchforks. Anyone with a truck can keep going, but next purchase, they need to do a driving test.
I can't imagine parents paying for their kids to do the extra course if it costs them a fraction of that for their kid to drive a regular sedan.
You need to do a pilot study to see if accidents can be reduced. This could be done in a Western town that has tens of miles from it to anywhere else, so you are only putting a few thousand people through the course.
This could be financially incentivised, so people get paid to do the course. If the results are good then you could make it so that people buying a truck or wanting to drive one get $500 off if they have done the course, with insurers in on it so that it just becomes easier to do the course. No freedom to be American need be jeopardised.
The CAFE standards for cars are too restrictive. The fleet averages look great, but the percentage of cars as vehicles on the road is low. Cars such as station wagons don't exist any more - the only option is to go larger and get an SUV.
The current crop of technocrats thinks that regulation is like violence. If you don't get the result you want, then add more regulation. Still don't get the result you want, add more regulation. They never think about offering compelling products that people want to buy at a decent price point.
The danger posed by pickup trucks is chiefly a function of the absence of regulation: the US has decided that you can role-play as a farmer and get treated as one for safety purposes, without actually demonstrating a need for a car that's patently unsafe for US streets and highways.
https://www.energy.gov/eere/vehicles/fact-726-may-7-2012-suv...
Far be it from me to defend truck-style SUVs!
But since you asked: just about anything that can be turned into an explosive. Or, you know, prescription medicine.
I thought this comment was saying the opposite of what you meant at first. There are no small cars anymore, even the "Mini" is gigantic. And modern cars are safer than ever, due to smarter design and better engineered materials.
Each step of the way they went out of style when people went "eww that's a car for soccer moms"
Hell, my father used to have a fairly common French sedan that would sometimes need a lot of maneuvering through the public garage ramps, and would barely fit in the parking slots.
Road tax depends heavily on the vehicle. I think we pay ~€1000 a year, ~€83 a month, for our Hyundai ix35.
* Electric Cars are exempt from both IIRC.
* Diesel is mostly front loaded in the yearly road tax. With a very low tax on fuel. So if you drive a lot it is worth getting a Diesel for this reason alone.
* Petrol has a lighter yearly tax. There is a formula someplace and it has to do with engine size, weight, age and some other things assuming I understood correctly. The yearly tax is cheaper on average than the diesel. Then there is a large tax on petrol. About €0.17 a liter or €0.642 a gallon.
For example, you can't attach animal guards here to pickup trucks, and you need extra reflectors and different lighting configuration in US for all cars.
While not directly related to safety standards, intelligent active matrix LED lighting systems are illegal in US, too.
The tall grill at least doesn't ram your head through the glass. I don't know who started calling them FUVs (Fuck U Vehicles) but they are not wrong.
And much like 18 wheelers they can’t scale down the front while maintaining utility because they need large engines and high ground clearance.
Enjoy the Chicken Tax. It's why we can't have the Hilux in the States.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicken_tax
edit: I suppose it's not unintended consequences. It's LBJ's corrupt decision to trade tariffs for votes / curry favor with unions that harms US consumers.
A bigger problem is fuel efficiency standards that encourage larger footprints. You can't hit the mandated mpgs in a compact truck, so enlarge the truck to make it hit the standards.
Well, we have the Tacoma, which fits pretty much the same niche. I was under the impression it was more market driven and less regulation driven.
As to why Ford etc is targeting regular people with these monstrous trucks it’s both profitable and current regulations promote their sale. You can dig into the history of these regulations but as far as I can tell it’s a mix of trying to appease businesses and a specific voter demographic. Call it corruption or giving people what they want, it’s not going away anytime soon.
I remember seeing them everywhere in Australia when I visited.
...then I realized that one of the vehicles taxi companies use are toyota siennas and read some articles about how minivans had actually barely gone up in price even though people were desperate for cars.
I got a 2006 awd sienna with nice newer tires, a 3500 pound towing package, roof racks, sunroof, power doors and hatch, disc brakes, an absolutely cavernous interior with removable seats that can fit a full size plywood sheet, window shades, a leather interior and the top trim level audio system with a newer android touchscreen radio unit for $6000. Yah it had 180,000 but on a sienna if it is maintained well that is nothing. I mean.. all the electrical shit still works on it somehow? Also this thing is fun to drive, it isnt a sports car by any means but steering is sensitive and accurate and the wheelbase is so long it eats bumps like a couch even though the suspension isnt floaty.
If I had bought a civic it would have had 250,000+ miles, cloth seats, shit tires, huge dents and probably a replacement panel that was a mismatched color along with innumerable random small problems.
Americans hate the idea of owning a minivan more than the idea of not owning a car and it is hilarious because minivans are what you get when you take a hard look at american life and design a large vehicle for it that ticks off every box. Unless you are towing very large things frequently ever other large vehicle is a joke compared to a minivan.
I mean.. sliding doors yo... I will never buy a large vehicle without them after owning one with them.
Mostly insecure rich people (or desperately wannabe rich), especially "overcompensating" macho-men and short-women, buy SUVs and shiny non-work big trucks.
Now we have no small trucks, and a continued parade of bloated, impractical junk that manufacturers are pushing as “small.” The new Ford Ranger and Chevy Colorado stand out as regressions from their former incarnations, and the Maverick is another joke. They all force giant four-door cabs and puny beds on all buyers.
Thus they lack the usefulness of a proper truck, and the safety of the “utes” you describe.
Pickup trucks are the opposite of fashion. There are to cars what Crocs are to shoes.
Fashion is about signaling not whatever you happen to agree with.
Tattoos aren’t universal, what’s acceptable for Army special forces, goths, gang members, etc are all different. So, good or bad only exists in a specific context it isn’t something that any person can judge universally. Someone really can define good as whatever pisses people like you off.
Utilization of private vehicles scales with income, not with population density. HN just all tends to live in "nice" places so they never see people using their vehicles to the max. This is true for all vehicle classes, not just pickup trucks.
If people decide to broadcast their opinions about the world using cars, they certainly can; but I don't think that kind of behavior can be called "fashion". Ideology, maybe.
I happen to think that most modern trucks look incredibly stupid, but that's because their design language isn't intended for me. It's intended for people who have different fashion tastes, tastes that approximate political positions that I don't hold. In other words: the truck itself isn't a direct political statement, ordinarily; it's an efficient means for signaling politics through fashion.
As a Canadian living in the heart of supply management (i.e. state ownership of the means of production) country, where supplies are provided by the so named and literal Co-op (i.e. community ownership of the means of production), trucks are very popular. In part because they are useful tools in carrying out the business within that socialist system, but also because outsiders emulate to try and convey similar social standing.
If there is a political statement to be found in there, which may be a stretch, to me it would be that trucks = socialism. But when I look beyond my bubble, I'm left with the impression that trucks are, if anything, especially stateside, a statement at the compete opposite end of the spectrum.
What approximate political position do you believe is inbuilt into the design of modern trucks?
Political affiliation is definitely part of social standing and the degree to which such signaling impacts how people talk, dress, and what they buy is very much fashion.
As you venture out into the world you will also find trucks that are clear political statements. You might be right that an individual cannot own a truck for both fashion and political reasons (although I'm not sure I agree), but just because some people use trucks for political statements does not mean all trucks are political statements. Some trucks can be used for fashion without crossing those who use them political statements.
99% of trucks are not that these days and that may be being generous.
Also... spend half the money on a beater truck and the other half on a civic so you dont take up the whole damn road on your commute to your office job and kill me when your comically oversized vehicles rides over mine in a car crash. I am tired of seeing $70,000 trucks without a scratch on them being used like they are a commuter sedan, its selfish and stupid.
Yes. One in 10 or maybe 20
Individuals buy push snow blowers or snow blower attachments to their lawn tractors.
Occasionally a business will contract someone with a plow on a truck but that's not common because the contractors who actually deal with this regularly have dedicated equipment that's better than a plow on a truck and using a shitty plow on a standard truck is actually not easy.
Even the parking lot in my private apartment complex is cleaned after a snow storm by a company with multiple front end loaders and skidsteers.
This is what you build for that purpose:
https://img.archiexpo.de/images_ae/photo-mg/67143-15337174.w...
https://d3v9db8ug40up8.cloudfront.net/styles/large/s3/2020-0... This is colloquially called Unimog (successor, kind of), a general purpose utility vehicle with awesome drivetrain, huge tires, great weight distribution, not too heavy, serves winter and summer in several roles.
or
https://www.ecotech.at/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Ecotech-Sc...
The farmers in my family do have pickup trucks. 40 year old ones with standard cabs and no frills.
There is virtually no good function for a modern leather appointed king cab other than signaling your group. Which is fine! Half of car ownership is that but do t pretend that even half of trucks are used for some truck like usage. Heck the half that are is for hauling boats or rvs once or twice a summer.
Doesn't justify the urbanites buying SUVs though
US is 68% Urbanized, 21% Rural, and only 10% Urban Cluster.
https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/geography/guidance/g...
And of course those horse farms only demand a big truck if you are doing big work on the horse farm. If all you need is AWD you don't need a big truck.
If you want a vehicle that will handle moderately deep snow the best a subaru station wagon is probably the ideal shape, or at low speeds a shorter jeep wrangler if you are actually going off road.
That’s the thing even in urban areas you will see pickup trucks cleaning parking lots etc.
For personal driveways, people had cheap push snow blowers. For the roads, we had big plow trucks and literal construction equipment was used for large roads and parking lots.
Very few people plow, because plowing is harder than snow blowing, more damaging to your lawn and driveway than snowblowing, and just all around less effective. And the few people who do actively plow their own driveway will either start a business to do other people's driveways (a common way for 16 year olds to make money in the winter) or just straight up plow neighbors driveway for free or payment.
Even in this literal heaven for trucks, full of farmers, outdoor activities, mud, and construction, 8 out of 10 trucks were driveway queens.
Back then I would say around 1/3 to 1/4th of households in the area with large trucks had a snow plow, but I only knew one guy with a snowblower. Of course that also related to how long it took the state to deal with back roads after even a minor snow event.
If somebody is using a nice truck to snow plow they are pissing away money. Ice, constant torquing stress on the frame, hitting shit hidden in the snow, salt on main roads everywhere (depending on place) etc... it is fastest way to reduce the value of a vehicle next to driving it into a brickwall or driving it off a bridge into the ocean.
However when my wife walks past one and the hood is over her head, knowing that this is possible because it’s exempt from regulation as a ”farm vehicle” seems like a corruption of government regulation.
I don’t think we need to make people prove how they will be using a vehicle, so maybe we should just require different license classes based on vehicle’s current weight and/or height? Driving a 7,000 lb truck that is 6.5’ tall is not the same as driving a passenger car.
Among the community of people that use their trucks for "real work" (whatever their definition of that may be) an immaculately kept truck like the one you're describing would be referred to as a "pavement princess".
The talk about "farm vehicle" is a red herring in this whole thread. Actual farm plates are rare. The significant distinction is cosplayer vs contractor, which happens to be independent of commercial plates.
The right answer is probably charging yearly registration (/road use) fees based on GVWR. This is already common for trailers. There should be a part that scales as the road wear from weight does. I think it's something like the third or fourth power?
[0] - https://www.campanda.com/magazine/rv-special-drivers-license...
As you say, you don't need very many pickups for that. The fraction of American pickups that are used for snow plowing is pretty much irrelevant to this conversation.
Yes, farmers use pickup trucks, and they're great for that purpose. Nobody is arguing or disagreeing with you on that point.
Nobody is arguing against the purchasing of pickup trucks in the general sense. We're arguing against the purchase of a pickup truck as a daily driver. Something that will be used to commute and buy groceries.