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Comment by tmnvix | Hacker News Reader

I sometimes wonder if the best solution to these sorts of issues is to do nothing.

If vehicles keep increasing in size to the point that they become less convenient then that provides a disincentive to purchase large vehicles.

Similarly, if a thoroughfare becomes less efficient because too many vehicles start using it then that provides an incentive for people to consider other means of getting around.

No street parking where you live? Fine, you can park some distance away, sell your vehicle, move somewhere that does have it, or provide your own off street parking.

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Sadly, when towns and cities become dominated by large vehicles that barely fit in parking spaces, can't see pedestrians over their hood and around their enormous pillars, and shine their bright LED headlights directly into the eyes of folks driving more sensibly sized vehicles... everyone pays the cost of the large vehicles.

I've experienced a lot of crosswalks, sidewalks, bike lanes, and car lanes that enormous vehicles have blocked because they don't fit in a normal parking space. It creates dangerous situations very easily. And with the poor daylighting (cross-traffic visibility at intersections) in US cities, these giant vehicles make it even harder to drive, walk, or bike across town because parked or stopped vehicles completely block your view of traffic.

Growing car sizes is a failure of government safety regulation, and unfortunately I don't see much benefit for society from it.

It also sucks for drivers: we have a lot of two way roads which are no longer capable of handling two way traffic because they lost a foot on each side with wider parked vehicles and the passing trucks are wider, too. You only need one parked Canyonero on a block to force everyone to take turns.

Feature not a bug.

"Unexplained fires are a matter for the courts ... Canyonero"

https://youtu.be/PI_Jl5WFQkA

It also encourages a doom loop where people using smaller cars feel less safe because of the massive cars around them, so when it comes to buying their next car, they buy a massive car as well, making those still in smaller cars feel even more unsafe.

It's hard to consider other means, such as busses, when low-occupancy vehicles are causing traffic on every road the bus would use. This problem does not solve itself.

Fortunately, some cities have good underground or overground network to get around this.

> If vehicles keep increasing in size to the point that they become less convenient then that provides a disincentive to purchase large vehicles.

Unfortunately I have no faith in this. Builders will keep building bigger. Companies will re-paint existing lots.

Without laws (that get enforced) to limit the size of the spaces, the cars, or both things will get worse.

Ya, the problem sometimes with the free market is that the general public is far more willing than me to just keep suffering. Case in point would be coach seating on most airlines. If people would just raise their standards a little bit and be willing to pay a little more. I just want an experience that doesn't torture me without paying 10x for business class.

It’s also not a very free market: we don’t tax vehicles or charge for parking based on size, many people live in areas where they’re legally required to pay for lots of car storage, and there’s a somewhat literal arms race where people feel the need to buy bigger vehicles to avoid coming off poorly in a collision with someone else who already did.

In Southern California, I feel like parking spots have gotten smaller to cram a larger number of them into the same area.

Yeah doubt companies will allow parking spots to get bigger, you're talking about coming companies coming up with thousands of square feet of space. And turning a likely loss leader of some sort into a bigger one.

Road damage is proportional to the vehicle weight to the fourth power. We all pay for larger vehicles.

I think there's one thing that needs to happen. NYC and all cities need to pass a law where a vehicle wider than X cannot park on the street, unless they are a business vehicle at which point they are allowed under commercial parking laws.

And tow them.

It will drive demand down.

Ha! Never gonna happen. Lifted truck driving concrete cowboys who live in my area get their rocks off at the stares they receive diagonally parking and taking up 2-3 spots. It’s a hobby for them.

What “other means”? The people in the burbs are never going to support mass transit because it makes it too easy for “those people” to come into their idyllic burbs.

I’m both one of “those people” and I lived in the idyllic burbs until last year. I saw the attitude all of the time.

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