The end of cool small cars | Hacker News Reader

The end of cool small cars

blackbirdspyplane.com

96 pointsdanboarder188 comments

I've noticed a large increase in what I call "idiot cars" in Denmark too, these giant monstrosities that seem impractical in every way except for driving through smaller cars and making sure the driver survives whatever incompetence lead them to buy it in the first place.

I feel it might be time to legislate this, there are perfectly legitimate reasons to drive a very large car, like, you live 100 miles from the nearest town and there are no roads, only swamp, marsh and desert between you and the grocery, or you haul around your pet cow all day.. Good, have your car, you need it.

In every other case. You don't and you're an idiot helping to accelerate the problem as this now becomes a weapons race on the road, nobody with a normal-sized car will want to drive it surrounded by idiot-cars, as they're simply too dangerous to be around in anything besides an idiot car.

Same in the UK. SUVs and large off-road vehicles are taking over. The Range Rover seems to be the car of choice for every wealthy middle-aged mother on her morning school run. Just recently, one of them managed to careen hers into kids outside their school, killing a number of them [1].

Low emission zone are becoming more ubiquitous, which combats the issue to some regards, but I question why anyone but a farmer needs to own anything that large anywhere. This isn't the US, where pavements/sidewalks are a pipedream for anyone outside of New York. Nobody should be solo operating tanks just 5m away from someone walking their dog or on their way to school.

[1] https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/wimbledon-ca...

Range Rovers are a disease in the UK.

A brand which had it's origins in the military and farming, which has now been repurposed to drop kids off at a school.

It's also the most frequent car I see which is sped around and overtakes with zero concern for other road users. The people driving them seem to not understand the size of their car and either pass over-cautiously or tunnel through everybody else whenever the road is partially obstructed (parked cars in towns and villages).

The modern Range Rovers no longer even work for their original purpose. They're not sturdy enough to last on a farm, just fashion symbols.

When I question if humanity will tame itself and step down from destroying our world in the pursuit of comfort and consumerism at all costs, the first thing I think of is a white Range Rover Discovery.

Land Rovers are a disease anywhere they go just based on their quality ratings alone. They are consistently rated as the most unreliable vehicles on the market.

A status symbol. Like BMW. Breaks all the time, but you're showing off to other people that you can afford to fix it and keep it running

BMW is a much more reliable brand than Land Rover and you can get them in non-tank size. But yeah, still an overpriced status symbol in my opinion.

The interesting thing to me is that all the 'rational' arguments given by SUV buyers (more storage, easy of entry, larger interior space) are without exception much better in any family MPV instead of SUVs that invariably are also pretty shit off-road vehicles.

Literally just more weight and waste, zero function other than satisfying the buyers reptilian brain.

Agreed. I've been a passenger in plenty of them; many of them don't seem any bigger on the inside than a hatchback, with very similar boot space. It's all pointless, superficial bodywork that makes the demand for them seem even more egregious to me.

Because the space is under the car, between the wheels. I was surprised too.

Have you been on a BMW X6? I swear there’s less interior space in it than in a 3-series, the trunk is almost at armpit level and a mazda 3 can load bigger things. Same for the mercedes GLC. They’re the contemporary version of the hummer.

Coupe style SUVs like the X6 must be one of the stupidest car design fashions ever. And I say that as a recovered X5 owner....

I recently had my car written off (a small SUV) and due to lack of availability of replacements I replaced it with a similar sized hatchback. Now I find myself thinking why on earth I had an SUV - I'm unlikely to purchase another one as the hatchback is cheaper, roomier inside and handles much better.

There are small 'subcompact' crossover SUVs that get the best of both of those worlds. I've owned a Nissan Kicks and Honda HR-V. Both are marketed as SUVs but really function as roomy hatchbacks (lightweight, tight handling, front-wheel drive), along with others in the category. Very practical compromise between cost/efficiency and size/utility. Generally the only thing that cars in this class don't do is tow.

So apart from being a bit higher up - what is the benefit of the SUV?

Edit: It's a question I keep asking myself, my wife still has a SUV...

You can tow a small camper. ??

You can look down on the plebs? :/

It's not a bit higher up, it's quite a lot and makes a lot of difference in adverse weather (like getting water in your engine or not getting water in there and driving safely through a flash flood, for example). Also the visibility is quite different, especially at night, due to low beams covering much less space in front of a low car [1][2]. The higher stance allows for large tires and smoother ride. Getting in and out of the car, especially with children in seats is much easier.

This is without getting into the actual instances of hatchbacks and SUVs on the market. There is more choice and variety in SUVs.

1. https://www.iihs.org/ratings/vehicle/toyota/prius-4-door-hat...

2. https://www.iihs.org/ratings/vehicle/toyota/rav4-4-door-suv/...

Sounds like the low beams are mis-aimed if they are generating a much larger light pool and likely dazzling other drivers on the road at night.

I am pretty sure IIHS is setting up lights according to the DOT regulations when they test. As the report says: "The low beams never exceeded glare limits".

It's simple geometry - headlights at the same angle will intersect with the ground farther when they are higher off the ground.

But does that have any noticeable impact on the driving experience - can't say I've ever noticed any difference in headlight lighting between SUVs and "normal" cars?

It depends, makes a difference for me as I like to be aware of the surroundings. Seeing that some people drive while looking into their phones, I figure, it may not matter for everyone.

Instead of punishing the middle class by slapping ulez on them, it would be far more effective and fair for the london mayor to offer free school buses like they do in some parts of America.

I'm not sure the middle classes are likely to be hit by ULEZ anyway - it hits vehicles older than a certain age, primarily - not many of those Chelsea Tractors are likely to fall foul of it. While I agree with ULEZ, I will admit it's quite regressive - the people with old/polluting vehicles are, in many cases, those least able to afford anything better and/or the charge. Public transport should be much better, but that's way beyond the scope of something the mayor can quickly impact.

We need the need to follow Paris's lead and tax by weight - damage to roads follows a 4th power law, so very from a dumb immediate economic POV this makes sense.

Add to that the production of newer ones just negated the effeciency gain.

School children already have free bus travel in London.

Ummmm under sixteens have had free bus and tram travel in London for years. Or do you not want them to interact with members of the public and live in a sanitised bubble consisting solely of you and your nanny?

Children under 16 already get free travel on buses and trams in London, though they have to pay discounted fares on the tube and they'll need a photocard if they are 11 or over.

I'm aware of that having owned one and journeyed by bus to school every day. I also see vast amounts of traffic near schools during term times. So from personal observations and experience that's not nearly enough.

In the US nearly everyone drives their truck like it's a car. This is very dangerous. Hence the pedestrian death numbers soaring.

I have a 4x2 F-150 as my daily driver that is also my tow rig and work truck. I drive like a grandpa because I dont want people/pedestrians to be threatened by my vehicle. Nor do I want to hit anyone or anything.

You would not believe how popular it is to make the truck even bigger. People are obsessively doing 3" lift kits with aggressive stance rims and 40" tires. It costs yet another fortune to do this and causes otherwise fuel efficient trucks to suck gas like a 1977 Dodge 3/4 ton.

I'm in a truck and I have to dodge these fucks.

Edit: Part of this is due to the tax code. People can form an LLC and write off the truck and any "expenses" (cough... lift kits and superchargers) and still use the thing as their daily driver.

Same in The Netherlands. In the last year I’ve seen several micropenis-compensating huge RAM and Ford pick-ups appearing in my neighborhood. They don’t fit a standard parking spot. For small businesses they carry less than something like a Ford transit. Horrible noise. Terrible visibility from the wheel. Terrible fuel economy. I’m severely hoping that our government imposes a 1000% tax on them or something.

They already get taxed disproportionately based on weight alone. But this meme import needs some form of EuroNCAP curbing not just emissions related.

Something like an F-150 in Dutch cities is (in my view) an unacceptable risk for any child on a fietspad or a pedestrian. The visibility is shit, and the chances of survival on impact are close to nothing. A lorry is literally safer than that non-sense.

I feel like the "compensating" joke about large SUV and truck drivers has really run its course by this point.

Except for some edge cases, what else is the use of a 3,000kg 6m truck when it is transporting between 1 and 4 people except to compensate?

The point is that the compensating / micropenis jokes have been beating a dead horse for at least 10 years at this point. It's boring, it's embarrassing and it takes away from your message when you pepper them into your speech.

I disagree. At least in The Netherlands, these vehicles are a classic “mid life crisis mobile”. People compensating for something by buying an outrageous vehicle. So the “compensating joke” I’m making is in my opinion at least 50% truth.

I am not making a claim about the truthiness of the "joke". I'm saying it's old, not funny, and frankly annoying. And, to be clear, I have no stake in defending large vehicle ownership; I'm just saying you will elicit more agreement and fewer eye-rolls if you drop the "compensating" joke.

I still disagree.

A completely factual statement like “my daily observations support the theory that sales of large pick-up trucks in The Netherlands have grown, while I can not observe a matching growth in business development that could explain the increased need for such vehicles” would be read by exactly no one.

A joke based in truth catches people’s attention and draws them to read essentially the same thing I said above.

A rhetorical device, sure. But we are on a discussion forum here, not in an economics paper.

> I still disagree.

Have you measured the penis size of every large vehicle owner, published your findings, and had them peer reviewed?

What the hell are comments like this doing on HN? Please take your phallic insecurity and go away.

It’s just wrong. If I think of men likely to have a micropenis it’s going to correlate strongly with genetic or developmental issues. Not the things exactly with track with being able to afford or make great use of some imposing pickup truck.

I know a family where every man is built like a brick shithouse and ain’t compensating for shit and every man has owned at least one truck. Big vehicles fit big people and carry big things that big people lift into them.

The difference is that such men are just entitled to use such things without being mocked. Whereas a man with a small dick using such things, or a man with any sort of socially contemptible trait using such things, is mockable. Don’t they know their place?

I’m not sure I understand your point. But yes, if you have a construction company and you buy a huge pick-up I still think you might be better off with a van but at least I see your point in buying the pick-up. If you are a family of 4 whose biggest load is the weekly groceries, I absolutely think you are not entitled to drive around a tank-like behemoth, especially on the small roads in Dutch communities.

> I’m not sure I understand your point.

I’m pretty sure you do, because the poster is pretty specific. You make statements around micropenises and the required compensation for them that are incredibly toxic. The whole meme is dead, yet you persist in continuing with it. The poster is not questioning your assessment of the suitability of owning these vehicles, as you are no doubt aware, they are questioning your use of toxic language to make your point.

There are better and more eloquent ways of making your point. There is no need to shame a bunch of people that are born a certain way. Do you also make blanket statements about people of colour? LGBTQ+ folk?

Be a better human.

This will be my final reaction in this thread. I’m only shaming people who for no reason buy an unreasonable vehicle thereby actively destroying our climate and risking our children’s life.

The fact you use penis size to shame people, and refuse to see how that is wrong says more about you as a human than is does about people buying the cars you decry.

It's not men with unreasonable vehicles who are shamed by being compared to men with Micropenis. It's men with Micropenis that are shamed through comparison to men who destroy our climate and risk our children's life.

Notice that if two people didn't denounce you, you wouldn't have denied making the implication that you seemingly made, and the stereotype being made would appear to be tacitly accepted as the truth. I'm not denouncing you to attack you, I'm denouncing you to protect men who are in pain from at least the pain of arbitrary societal stigma.

Saying that men with large cars are bad because they destroy our climate and risk our children's life is a wholesome and agreeable notion. It shames people for their actions regardless of what bodies they have. Nothing wrong with that notion.

How do you explain the women who drive these vehicles?

I’ve never seen a woman drive these (in The Netherlands). It’s always middle aged men.

Status symbol of intimidation. I can afford this because I'm something. Step aside. You get to telegraph your success everywhere. Especially at work. When you telegraph success it begets more success. Shiney door handles, wheels, and badges that say "Platinum."

I need to tow shit and haul building supplies. The base model tows more, gets better milage, and handles better...and costs a hell of a lot less.

They survive the crash.

Yes. And my 8 year old son on his bike dies. Serves him right, he should’ve gotten himself one of those RAM 1500’s as well.

Wonder why.

A lot of this is that anything electric needs to be an order of magnitude heavier and significantly large to achieve any range due to the much lower energy density of batteries.

It's possible to have small electrics but those often have short ranges and most of the big ugly things you see on the roads in DK is kinda hybrids or follows the trend set by the hybrids.

The real way to deal with the SUV nonsense and not hurt the rural areas where you might need range is to just charge double for parking for large cars and cap the speed of large almost trucks to the same as lorries.

I've got a Tesla Model 3, which a) has a perfectly decent range, up near the top of the general class, and b) isn't a huge car. It's not a small car but a sensibly mid-sized car - significantly smaller than the ridiculous SUVs I weave in between.

Electric is a non-factor here; in fact, one of the fundamental things that Tesla gets right, which other manufacturers of electric vehicles studiously ignore, is aerodynamics (not all, clearly). The very worst size and shape for an electric vehicle is "huge and brick-like" as it is for all vehicles - it's much more apparent with EVs, though, where the range is so easily comparable.

(N.B. I got it before Musk went so spectacularly off the deep end, it was a motoring choice not a political/fandom one).

The model 3 and BMW i4s are both classified as compacts in the American system (same as Honda accords). The leaf, bolt, and i3 are sub compacts (civic class).

I have an i4 now, and I really feel the extra 2 inches in width it has over my previous Acura ILX (basically a fancy Honda civic). None of the sub compact EVs have very good range yet.

Thankfully there are many European roads where those monstrosities would just get stuck, and would be full of scratches when pulling them out.

If only. Unfortunately cars are considered sacrosanct in most places, for some reason. Your own body is worth less than a car and the safety of cars is high on police priorities. If cars don't fit down a road they'll just destroy the foliage or verge and we'll pay to widen the road.

Buildings, villages,....

> you're an idiot helping to accelerate the problem as this now becomes a weapons race on the road

This is a very harsh take for something that is legal and widespread everywhere across the world (at least Western world).

You have to try really hard to pretend you don't understand why this is happening. It's a race to the top of the safety spectrum, and for good reason. Traffic accidents are among the single biggest sources of preventable deaths and grave injuries, and getting a bigger car is one of the single most important aspects you can control in this equation. It's actually super simple.

If this is truly a problem, and I guess it is, then there should be some form of legislative intervention against it. The people buying them are not the problem, the environment which encourages this is.

> This is a very harsh take for something that is legal and widespread everywhere across the world (at least Western world).

No, he is absolutely right. 99% of all people do not need a bigger car, they need better driving skills. But hey, its capitalism so of course we solve our issues with money

I highly doubt that safety is on the mind of SUV and truck buyers. Perhaps that is the reason they give after the fact, but really it is all about looks.

It's not a race to the top of the safety spectrum. That's just a disguise and also only for some people. It's a race to the top of the "social" and $ spectrum where you have to show how little you care about the others and the environment and also how much money you can dump on vanity and impractical things

I think it's actually both. Some people buy bigger cars for looks/status, and then others (esp. parents of small children) feel compelled to buy a larger, safer vehicle in response. In the case of minivans, they are choosing a less cool, but safer, vehicle than smaller alternatives.

Occupants of the largest vehicles on the road experience less than 1/10 of the fatalities than those in the smallest. We desperately need new regulations/legislation to address the vehicle size arms race.

https://www.iihs.org/api/datastoredocument/status-report/pdf...

Safety for me, but not for thee...

Some people don't even get to make a choice, they just suffer the consequences (e.g. children and others that can't drive for whatever reason). As vehicles have been getting bigger, pedestrian deaths have been going up. I don't think it's mere coincidence.

I don't really understand why everyone in this post is so hung up on this.

As long as there is no regulation in a particular area, obviously each actor will look out for their own interest. I wouldn't even call it selfish, it's just the natural order of things and an example of the tragedy of the commons. Nothing more, nothing less.

The fact that people here act as if learning how to drive better and getting an SUV is an either/or choice is ridiculous.

It's a race to the top of the safety spectrum in which my 8 year old son on his bicycle can only participate as a guaranteed loser.

In fact its all a long con to bring the Penny Farthing back into style so drivers of modern land barges can see your child on his bicycle over their own 1.5m high hood/grille.

This just needs to reframed so that political actors / governments can actually legislate this away.

The reality is that large SUVs do make everyone on the road less safe, and that should be impressed upon people buying these things. Buying an SUV might make you the driver safer, but your kids, neighbours, relatives etc. less safe.

People are more communally conscious than you give them credit…

Sounds like you're one of the idiots

It only sounds like that because most people are not able to look at things objectively.

But, obviously, you're wrong. I don't own a car and haven't for many years. I never intend to own a car ever again. But just because I don't want to own a car, that doesn't mean that anyone who does is an idiot.

Hope that settles it.

So youre not even a pert of this conversation. Only car buyers determine which cars are sold.

That makes absolutely zero sense, regardless of how much I'd look at it.

Often these big cars even have a quite small trunk, e.g. compared to a station wagon.

Soon though, a few car makers will release electric station wagons (e.g. Peugeot e-308). Many danes already drives station wagons, so I hope people will start buying those kind of cars instead of SUV's.

Apparently, according to a guy trying to put in a higher offer on a car already sold, used estate cars in the UK are now selling at a premium because people who actually want such a car for its practical benefits, including farmers (a battered Volvo V70 and then XC70, which isn't a crossover like the XC60[1], is a common sight on a farm) struggle to find them because the market is full of shiny "wank tanks" with the boot space of a chunky hatchback coming off leases.

[1] and now the ridiculous XC40, for which they discontinued the "actually a car" V40, three years after also discontinuing the XC/V70 entirely.

There’s also the C40; perhaps less ridiculous?

XC70 boot has 575 liter capacity, C40 419 liter. Even the new V90 has a smaller boot than an old XC70 (and a smaller hatch which is less convenient).

Maybe calling everyone with a car you don't like an incompetent idiot isn't the best way to go about doing things.

Don't get me started on the retina singing eye level headlamps that all these vehicles are starting to wear these days.

Do the people who design and market these things not have families of their own, with kids in the back in rear facing seats whose 9 month old eyes get blasted with straight up stadium-level lighting by some dead eyed balding suburbathug in his lifted FU-150?

As for the "why": I'd love to learn about all of the historical and regulatory incentives here. From what I've managed to cobble together, this is partly due to CAFE standards[1], partly due to Section 179 of the US tax code[2], and possibly(??) due to contractor demand[3].

[1]: In 2006, the NHTSA adopted a "footprint" approach to CAFE standards, where fuel efficiency standards are set based on the vehicle's wheelbase multiplied by its average track width. I haven't dug into why this is the case, but people seem to agree that this results in less stringent fuel economy targets for larger-sized vehicles. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_average_fuel_economy

[2] A key piece of U.S. tax code, Section 179 allows businesses to deduct the full purchase price of qualifying equipment up to $1M(!) For trucks, the vehicle must have a Gross Vehicle Weight Rating (GVWR) over 6000 pounds to qualify for the Section 179 deduction. This incentivizes businesses to purchase larger, heavier trucks. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_179_depreciation_deduc...

[3] A friend told me (citation needed!) that the ability for a truck bed to carry 4x8-foot drywall sheets is often advertised as a selling point (is this true?). I suspect a lot of this is just the US market lusting after "bigger is better", but I'd love to hear anything others know about this.

Anyone have details they could add to this?

It's hard to figure the importance of #3. As just a home DIYer, I would generally think transporting 4x8 sheet goods would be critical.

But I happily move sheet goods with a trailer now, towed by a light SUV. Even not having much truck experience, I'd say it's easier to load/unload than a truck (can you fork things from the side out of a standard pickup bed?). So if I wanted a truck for more towing capacity, the sheet goods thing wouldn't really matter as I could always use the trailer.

But I also think a lot of contractors tow enclosed trailers that keep all their tools and whatnot, so perhaps they're back to wanting larger trucks for times when they need one or two sheet goods easily (for larger quantities they'll often use delivery. I love those three wheeled rough terrain forklifts)

I'd think I'm solidly in the target market for something like a kei truck, but they don't have much appeal for me. Little towing capacity. Poor crash standards means they wouldn't be good for the case of driving a medium highway distance to pick up something off craigslist. Perhaps if one with a dump bed fell into my lap.

Actually, a lot of these new trucks have smaller beds than older ones, despite being larger overall. I'm sure would be much less capable of carrying plywood or a motorcycle in the back because they have cabs with generously sized back seats instead of a three across bench seat. They're basically sedans that looks like trucks, but can't do truck stuff even as well as older compact trucks.

> partly due to CAFE standards

Posted above; CAFE plays a larger role than you might assume.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azI3nqrHEXM

The elephants in the economic incentive room are:

(1) Taxation of environmental externalities caused by fossil-fuel driven transportation are nowhere near the socially optimal level.

(2) Fossil fuel production is massively subsidized, even beyond the lack of taxation offsetting environmental externalities.

I've always driven a small car and it's what I prefer to drive. They're easy to handle, I like being able to not worry as much about navigating tight curbs, and fit into smaller or "small car only" parking spaces, etc.

But man, sometimes I pull up beside one of these absurdly huge modern trucks and I'm basically just staring at their wheels. It's terrifying to think if I collided head-on with one of these, they'd probably just run me over. Or the entire truck body would shave off the top of my car, along with my head.

It makes me want to upgrade to a stupid big vehicle too, just for my own safety.

You describe the exact reason I sold my Civic for a Rav4. My commute often had me looking at tires out my sides, headlights and grill in the rear, and a tow hitch out the front.

I ended up having replace a compact with a crossover mainly to stop getting blinded by headlights at night time. It was getting way too dangerous. I tinted the back window, but was still getting blinded in the side mirrors.

Given how horribly the biggest trucks drive around me (NYC suburbs), I’m all in favor of treating trucks like trucks.

If you’re over 3000lb then you get speed limited to 55, require additional driving licensing for the heavier, more cumbersome special purpose vehicle, etc.

Treat trucks like trucks and encourage behavior in the direction that’s societally appropriate.

The cars overtaking me the most are 5,000lb F250s and 2500s doing 80+. They’re the same ones racing on 25mph residential streets, and over taking school buses.

The size and protection is a moral hazard that causes incredibly bad behavior.

And that’s before you get to the morons with the serious lifts and 35”+ tires, deliberately rolling coal as they drive around.

A lot of the analysis on this issue relates to the supply side of the market - manufacturers maximising margins and increasing safety standards - but the demand side plays a role too. For the past fifteen years, we've lived with negligible interest rates and (for most people) stagnating wages. This encourages consumers to cut back on small-ticket items but splurge on items bought on credit (mostly houses and cars).

This environment is crumbling: many older people went into retirement (or were forced into it) during the pandemic, and many working mothers found that the cost of childcare exceeded their contribution to the household finances; this reduced labour pool coupled with increasing interest rates (in part a response to that smaller labour pool) will push car buyers to be more thrifty. I expect to see smaller cars return to dealer forecourts in the next couple of years, especially in Europe.

Ughhhhh -- yes, I constantly dream of a pickup truck on a car-size chassis, and often mentally hack off the back of cars on my jogs to imagine what they'd look like as trucks (my version of imagining girls naked ;-))

* The Auzzies had an old version of this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ute_(vehicle)

* There's an awesome Tesla pickup truck mod that I'd buy long before the Cybertruck: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R35gWBtLCYg

The closest thing we have these days is the Ford Maverick. It's a ute! They're not very available though.

Auzzies? That would be ''Aussies'', mate, and the market for the ''ute'' is alive and well to this day there and in New Zealand. Australian car buyers have also tended to prefer 4-door sedans to 2-door coupes.

As my modest contribution to the battle against SUVs/crossovers/other bloat, I am attempting to popularise the term ‘bimbo box’ - the credit of which belongs to Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash

I call them the more offensive “TwatPanzers”

This is vulgar, unhelful, and childish. Why is this even on HN?

How is calling names helpful? Can we please act like adults? Treating others badly only reflects on your character.

I don't believe that it is the end. Because small cars make more sense than big ass SUVs from a whole lot of angles: safety on the roads, energy efficiency, parking, traffic in cities, cost for the consumer.

It is a policy failure that we ended up in this situation, a hard one to fix, but I still think that it is inevitable that we will revert to smaller vehicles, eventually.

I generally agree with you, but small cars are a lot less safe on a highway with tractor trailers and big SUVs around.

Big SUVs and pickup trucks are less or equally safe to mid-size SUVs and cars. The pickup frame is durable but doesn't provide good occupant protection. Also, big vehicles are more likely to crash being less maneuverable. Plus, a good portion of crashes are single-car and doesn't matter how big truck is if crash into pillar.

This is sadly untrue; larger vehicles are safer, and the largest are the safest. Legislation is the only way I can see to stop the vehicle size/weight arms race.

https://www.iihs.org/api/datastoredocument/status-report/pdf...

Cities should start putting in bollards that prevent wide vehicles from passing but let narrow ones through. Make the bollards retractable into the ground. If you want your big-arse vehicle to go through, you have to stop and then pay 10 $/£/€

While well meaning, this sounds dystopian. Neverming backing up traffic for smaller cars.

Some say that traveling educates, meantime people coming back from a travel to US immediately turn into "I want big-ass loud intimidating pickup occupying two parking spaces!"

We never said it would be a good education ;)

Indeed traveling educated me concerning cars. 1.) When traveling through the US, I understood that giant cars ("rolling living rooms") make perfect sense for the often long distances that have to be driven to get from one place to the other. 2.) When traveling through Italy, I understood why most people have a small Fiat Panda (because villages are so tight that even my moderately sized family car almost feels too big there).

Americans might not all need big cars (or at least one car of the household could probably be a compact), but it is not obscenity that Americans/Canadians have bigger cars.

Bigger means like a Ford Focus or so, not a fucking SUV. Nobody ever needs an SUV. If you need more space to move stuff just get a van.

A lot of SUVs are more or less the same thing as a minivan. The minivan, like the station wagon is a casualty of its own success. Both became synonymous with boring domestic middle class family life.

The recent Kia Carnival (name for US market IIRC) is an interesting response to this phenomenon. It's a true minivan that's just styled as if it's an SUV.

I feel most SUVs are just minivans for people who would not want to be seen driving a minivan.

My theory is that there's (in USA) a pervasive emotional connection to driver seat height that's driven/exacerbated by the arms race to build larger and taller vehicles. Everyone wants their family to be in the safest vehicle possible, and higher driver seat height is a tactile, intuitive way to feel like you're in a larger and ostensibly safer vehicle, than other cars on the road with lower driver seat height.

Around where I am, the Kia Telluride is much more popular than the Carnival, which I think is telling.

My thoughts on the demise of the North American station wagon:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37324322

So can you provide some clarity on why you feel the need should demand people to opt for a van instead of an SUV? My SUV fits my needs, is a hell of a lot more comfortable to drive, and it gets literally the same gas mileage as a ford focus (Which is a helluva lot better than a van).

There's actually a new class of cars that doesn't go by the name: L7e. L7e is the EU's name for light electric cars. 90 km/h top speed, 200 km range. Cheap.

While small "cars" might disappear, I think the L7e class will see a lot of improvements.

This still leaved the gap for small cars you can cram 4 people inside + some luggage unfilled. Also, are manufacturers taking L7e vehicles seriously, or are they styling them like toys still? Early EVs suffered form car companies deliberately making them look non-serious.

I think the Renault Twizy is a great example where it was made too much of a toy - and I pretty much stopped following the developments in the L7e space with that. But now a lot of Chinese companies seem to sell vehicles that are actually useful - mostly in the last-mile delivery space.

This one convinced me that you can build useful vehicles: https://www.ari-motors.com

Essentially, L7e could perhaps be the Kei car of Europe?

I didn't know about this, looks pretty neat.

Unfortunately, 90 km/h top speed is a hard sell here in Germany, since that means that you will get in other people's way when driving on federal roads or the Autobahn, provoking people into dangerous overtaking manoeuvres.

In addition to cars having become noticeably larger in the last years, people's driving styles has (imo) become more aggressive also.

Is there a street-legal modification we could make to small sedans that would massively increase the risk of death to an SUV/truck owner (and ideally only that) in the event of a collision? Until the lethal calculus is equalized, the arms race is going to continue. SUV drivers have to start dying.

I know it sounds extreme, but the fact that they don't die and that the other guy dies instead, is the entire reason they choose the SUV, even if they don't say it.

Until that changes, the best-response function is just going to keep returning "bigger SUV".

This is literally a matter of life and death, so fucking play to win. You need something like MAD, but specifically targeted at SUVs.

In theory that would be protected by the second amendment but I'm not sure how it would go over in practice. I can't actually think of anything though, contractors in the middle east took out the fuel pump kill switch, removed the airbags, and sometimes did something to reinforce the frame rails, but that's pretty much it. A roll cage could work, but then you need a full face helmet and a HANS device. Sticking anything to the front of the car would probably just kill pedestrians.

Maybe fill the car with lithium ion batteries?

This video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azI3nqrHEXM explains why small pickup trucks can't really be sold in the USA anymore. This explains the drive to larger pickups, but I don't know what explains the drive from cars to trucks/SUVs.

We were considering a wagon when we bought our last vehicle, an SUV. The ability to occasionally carry more than five people was the deciding point. I believe crash standards prevent the selling of wagons with a "wayback" anymore.

Holy cow that explains at least some of what's going on. I'm still not sure why trucks are getting taller too; I saw a 1990ish Toyota Pickup next to a late model F-150 and the hood of the Ford was almost as high as the roof of the Toyota.

The Mercedes E450 wagon has the rear-facing 3rd row as standard equipment in the USA.

Because of course you wanted a wagon with a starting price of $75k without any options.

We legitimately considered it; there are no cars that seat 7 for under $40k new these days, so it's less-than-double the price of the cheapest option.

Totally off-topic, but I actually saw a E450 wagon AMG on the streets the other day. Had no clue they even made one of those. Will only set you back $177k

You could possibly grab a Metris for ~$40k on closeout, though it might be a bit too basic for you.

It's amazing for us.

> I actually saw a E450 wagon AMG on the streets the other day

Awesome. When I was growing up, my parents had a big orange wagon with the Oldsmobile Rocket 455 in it. Kind of like the predecessor to the AMG wagons :)

There aren't even wagons for sale in America anymore. There are a few crossover-wagon options, with lifted suspension and plastic cladding a la Subaru Outback; there are a few overlarge hatchbacks, e.g., the Honda Civic; but, look for a normal wagon with traditional four-pillar proportions and normal car handling and styling and the only option you'll find for sale here is the Porsche Panamera Sport Turismo, which is not an affordable family vehicle. Gone are the days of the Volvo 240 or VW Golf wagons; long gone are the big old American wagons.

To me, the North American passenger car manufacturers' changeover from ladder-frame to unibody construction was the death knell for the kind of station wagon you've described, with four-pillar proportions and normal car handling and styling. With the 1970s fuel price crisis, those giant dinosaurs were terribly impractical, but a full sized mid-1970s ladder-framed station wagon could pull a large trailer without being twisted into a pretzel from the forces at play. Nowadays a full-sized pickup truck or SUV with proper towing ratings is needed for the same.

Station wagons in North America were hit with a stigma about carbon monoxide poisoning in the rear seats. The term ''Station Wagon Effect'' is still used in relation to industrial and residential ventilation systems as well as in boating and of course the automobile industry. When mini-vans surged in popularity starting in the 1980s they had better ventilation at the rear, and today any wagon would need to stringently protect against CO inhalation. Still, the stigma remains.

My family had at least one station wagon--Jeep Wagoneer, Ford Falcon, Ford Ranch Wagon--for most of the 1960s and 1970s. I don't remember ever hearing a concern about carbon monoxide. When did this start being talked about?

> Station Wagon Effect

Described in several links I just found here: https://search.brave.com/search?q=Station+Wagon+Effect

but I'm remembering that concerns about it started coming up in the 1960s when vehicle safety regulations were becoming a thing. Sorry, I don't have a historical reference at hand.

Volvo still sells the V60 PHEV if you want one.

Audi sells the A4 and A6 wagons (and the RS6), Mercedes has it's E class wagon last I looked.

This is true. I'm in the UK and cars are getting bigger and uglier for no reason, just like taller versions of existing cars. People don't realise that big cars look stupid.

they're less stable, less safe, perform worse, have less space for storage, have worse fuel economy, worse visibility, more difficult to maneuver/fit into parking and cost more

and yet they seem to be completely taking over

in the UK we don't even have the "light truck" excuse

Oh the unintended consequences of government regulations. CAFE and Section 179 incentivize larger vehicles, so the market reacts rationally and fills that demand.

P.S. I love small trucks with big wheels.

While the author rightfully decries the bloating of the Rav4, it's pretty close to a perfect size for a couple who consistently travels outdoors. Our '14 Subie crosstrek just shit its transmission out and we migrated to a used pre-facelift Rav out of necessity, being in a small city with little pub transport and poor infrastructure.

I just really, really wish a carmaker would make something that size, and put it on a real 4x4 platform. AWD is okay, but if you're really gettin' out there, sometimes you just need that extra capability. As of right now, there's basically no true 4x4 out there that has decent cargo space and isn't absolutely gigantic. New Jeeps are as big as old Hummers (which used to be considered massive), the Bronco has piss-poor cargo space for just how bloated the thing is. The 4Runner is getting bigger almost every year.

There simply are no worthwhile new, small, capable vehicles for sale. A Rav4 or Outback sized body-on-frame 4x4, with an 8 speed auto or 6-spd manual, good suspension, cupholders that fit a Hydroflask, and some sturdy roof rails and a hitch to hold a bike rack is the ideal outdoor vehicle, imo. Toss in the new niceties like wireless phone charger, CarPlay/Android Auto, and blind spot detection, adaptive CC, etc. to make paved driving a bit nicer, and you're golden.

Just as a note: The 4Runner (and related GX) haven't changed in size since 2004 (GX this year got larger).

They aren't "getting bigger every year"; they've stayed basically the same size for a very long time. The incoming Tacoma/4R is almost the same size as that 2004 model, and is a hybrid to boot with a true 4WD system. It's larger than the RAV4, but the gap has gotten smaller every time the RAV4 gets larger.

Source: Currently have a 2004 GX470, used to have a 2018 GX460, most of my friends have 4R's or Tacoma's. Note that my daily is a Mercedes Metris because my child is special needs; the GX has been in the family for a very long time at this point.

I wonder how much of this perception is based on the observer’s age. To me “trucks have gotten so much bigger than I remember” but what I think of as my formative car years were late 90s, so of course that is how it feels… it’s for sure true that rigs have ballooned since ‘95. It’s not necessarily true they have since 2015?

No, they absolutely have continued to. The new Tundra is an absolute monster.

The Toyota 120/150 platform trucks (FJ Cruiser, Tacoma, 4Runner, GX) are an exception to that trend, lasting from about 2003 to 2024. I think the new Tacoma/4R are pretty close to the same size, but the GX did increase a bit.

My formative years were the same as yours. Got my license in 1998, and I drove a 1979 Toyota truck that was absolutely TINY even compared to my 2004, but was the same size as the other mini trucks that were everywhere at that time (Mitsubishi Mighty Max, Toyota whatever they called it, Nissan Hardbody, etc.).

I think until 1996 it was just called the Toyota pickup. 1996 introduced the name Tacoma.

It sounds like you want a station wagon.

In the US, small trucks disappeared because of the EPA mandates for fuel mileage. The idea that there is no market for them is plain wrong. Even small trucks like the ranger got much larger because the engines are not efficient enough to meet the EPA mileage and emissions requirements for small wheel base vehicles.

The idea that the move to larger vehicles is due to an arms race or due to insecurities is simply wrong. It may appear this way but the truth is that mileage requirements drive design including wheelbase. The EPA requirements are frequently revised and are too aggressive to allow any of our beloved small cars and trucks to exist on the road today in any form.

Yes, but also there's nothing wrong with the Yaris.

Except even the Yaris has got bigger over the years. (Nothing like the Mini which is now a kind of SUV).

Except that the Toyota Yaris has been cancelled entirely in the US market, along with the Prius C, the Honda Fit, the Nissan Versa hatch, the Ford Fiesta (and all Ford cars except the Mustang), the Fiat 500, the Smart Car, the Mitsubishi Mirage, and every small hatchback except the (overpriced and controversially styled) Mini and a couple of electric models.

Sure, the US has a weird problem that the article talks about.

I'm disagreeing with the "(ew)" aimed at the Yaris in the article. It's no worse than the Honda Jazz, Ford Fiesta, VW Polo, etc.

It's hard to know what to mourn more here: the subsumption of NSU into Volkswagenwerke AG, or the demise of Citroën in the USA. Both manufacturers had genuinely fresh ideas; both provided truly mold-breaking machinery.

I love my VW GTI. I just drive it like my motorcycle: assume either no one sees me or is actively trying to kill me. So far, so good.

Cars should be taxed based on weight.

In the US they are.

Large cars can suck my many pickled cocks, they are absolutely worthless.

They are disappearing for the same reason as stick-shift cars or small phones. Consumer demonstrate with their preferences they think bigger is better.

You saw a resurgence of small cars in the US around 2010 after the US housing bubble burst. High unemployment + suppressed wages + high gas prices had Americans, particularly young Americans, looking for small compact cars.

Yeah, the Honda Fit was one of the best-selling cars in the US for a few years of the late 00s. Peaked around 2008, when it outsold the Ford Explorer and Chevy TrailBlazer.

Even then Honda sold about 450k fewer Fits that year than F-series trucks, and 120k fewer Fits than CR-V crossovers. Writing was on the wall by 2014, when Honda tried to sell an awful 20kWh/sub-100 mi. range EV Fit, and it never recovered. Gone completely from the US by 2020.

My Fit has been rock solid, and because the back seats fold totally flat - the usable cargo space is substantial. Two large car seats in the back is no issue (though three would require buying specifically narrow seats). 35-40 mpg.

It’s not fancy, but it’s a fantastic city vehicle.

Don't worry, they are disappearing in Europe as well, mostly (imho) thanks to ever stricter security standards. I read that it's very hard to design a small car that adheres to modern standards.

Source?

Quick googling:

https://europe.autonews.com/sales-segment/automakers-fight-r...

> "New CO2 rules will require automakers to fit thousands of euros of tech to each car," Max Warburton, an analyst at research and brokerage firm Sanford C. Bernstein wrote in an April report. "Big cars have the price points and margins to cover these costs. Small cars simply do not. These segments may soon be abandoned by many manufacturers."

Oh, so it's about inexpensive/expensive cars, and size is just something that correlates with that. I see.

I think the real reason is it's very hard to make money on a small car.

I think the VW beetle would disagree. The Avtovaz Lada, too.

Opel Corsa, Mazda Familia, Fiat Uno, Trabant 601, Toyota Corolla, VW Golf, Renault Clio, Seat Ibiza...

All of those the best or second best selling models of their manufacturers.

Most of those are B and C-segment cars, which are holding up ok in Europe. The real collapse has been choice and availability in the A-segment. The Fiat New 500 might be the last new offering for a while.

The fact they are best selling in the range doesn’t mean they are profitable.

To make money on a small car you have to sell volume and small cars don’t sell volume in the US compared to bigger vehicles. The top three selling vehicles every year, by a large margin, are Ford F150, Chevy Silverado, and Dodge Ram.

If the big high margin vehicles sell in volume there is little incentive to create small low margin, low volume cars.

I love my 2010 Honda Jazz (called Fit in the US). Small, can carry loads of weirdly shaped stuff, roomy enough for two adults and two kids, unbreakable. And on summer holidays I rent a roof box for about €100/week so I can fit all our luggage.

I have a 2016 Fit and had a first generation Fit before that. They are the most reliable cars I've ever had.

I'm a fan of the Toyota Yaris too. It's such a shame they were discontinued.

My first car was a 1999 Yaris, bought in 2014 for €1,250 with 320K on the odometer. Shifting gears sometimes took some force but otherwise drove like a dream...and the "holographic" gauge-screen-thingy was brilliant. Oh, and the back bench which you could slide backwards and forwards to choose between trunk space or leg room!

The best thing is, I sold it in 2016 with 400K on the odometer for €1,000...likely it's still chugging along nicely as we speak :-)

The Honda fit 2016 is my first car, and only car. I can't imagine getting another car. It's just too good!

I'm in the market for my next car (new or used), and I'd prefer something small like the fit/jazz. But I have 3 kids instead of 2, which seems like my only options from the last decade are MPVs or SUVs. I'd love to be wrong, though.

The back bench of my Jazz easily fits three kids (and had three seatbelts) comfortably for normal trips.

Good to know, thanks! I'll check it out

Had a similar problem car shopping to replace a 10-year-old Fit recently. Kia Rio can do it with tighter leg room, but lacks the Fit's fold-down seats if you want to swap kids for cargo, and has also been discontinued going forward. Chevy Sonic and Bolt/Volt hatches could squeeze theee in the back too, and the Sonic had the fold-down rear seats, but it's been discontinued since 2020 and the Volt and Bolt are in limbo.

Wound up unhappy with a larger, harder to park Subaru Impreza that in practice gets 15-20mpg less than the Fit, which also still sold used for $11k(!).

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