How Cars Turned Into Giant Killers | Hacker News Reader

How Cars Turned Into Giant Killers

slate.com

42 pointsm0gg25 comments

I am glad the article mentions CAFE standards. Government CAFE regulations are the primary reason vehicles like Trucks and SUVs have gotten so much larger in recent years, and almost no one talks about it when these conversations come up.

Simply put, CAFE standards were modified to include a vehicle "footprint" measured in square feet in addition to vehicle weight. The larger the footprint, the lower the fuel efficiency standards for the vehicle. The intent was to give a break to heavy work trucks that needed more powerful engines, while still forcing passenger cars to be more efficient. The unintended consequence was that automakers now had a loophole to sidestep stricter emissions standards: just make the vehicle larger and heavier.

This is a good article on the subject, with graphs on the CAFE fuel efficiency target curves in it (scroll down a bit to see them):

https://www.greencarreports.com/news/1111946_for-pickup-truc...

I think they did the right thing with CAFE but they forgot one critical aspect. Licenses. In order to qualify for the lower emission standards, your car must have commercial plates with appropriate commercial license requirements.

This will solve all problems immediately. Work trucks can effectively be affected independently from residential trucks.

(I also think the 0-60 of a car should require specialized licenses. Like anything under 8 seconds should require a license that a rich 16yo can't just get just because)

In any case, thats my thoughts.

It seems like regulations are constantly shifting incentives in both obvious and non-obvious ways that create unintended consequences, and I wonder if this is a promising area for AI/LLM research.

Take a few AI agents, let them each be an archetypical player impacted by regulations (automakers, car buyers, etc), and then have them simulate a market and interactions to see what behaviors arise over time.

I believe this is related

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Principal%E2%80%93agent_proble...

Does it though? It seems like the Principal Agent problem arises when they're theoretically supposed to act on behalf of each other, but in reality they have their own incentives that undermine that effort. With legislation, the two parties are inherently in opposition, almost by design.

Not to mention in the american south where many of these large trucks are lifted to become even taller. Usually accompanied by illegal window tint so dark that you have no idea if an idling truck has anybody inside.

I want to see that the driver has acknowledged me as a pedestrian before crossing in front of their jacked up truck in a parking lot.

It's sad that we've taken it so far. Cars don't inherently have to be death traps (see smaller cars in europe), and we shouldn't have to use them for basic needs like getting groceries, but to just keep making them bigger and more dangerous for those outside of the car is plain insane.

And now these death machines are going electric, which is slightly better but now they're wayy heavier. How many deaths are we going to need to see from the cybertrucks and Hummer EVs until regulation kicks in and makes us reconsider things?

The weight difference between a Camry and Model 3 isn't much heavier. You probably won't see a lot of deaths from hummer ev's because there just won't be very many.

Just a quick google search shows

- Model 3: 3,862 to 4,048 lbs

- Camry: 3,310 to 3,595 lbs

Comparing those two lower numbers we see a 15.39% increase for model 3. That's significant when it comes to collisions with pedestrians.

It becomes really drastic when comparing trucks..

- Tacoma: 3,915 lbs

- Cybertruck: 6,843 lbs

54% increase. Sure, Cybertruck can pull more and whatever, but more than 99% of trips made in these behemoths will be to the grocery store/soccer games.

Don't get me wrong, I'm pro-EV. You can make up for a 15% weight difference by adding other safety features to a car. But it's when we talk about the cybertrucks and copy-cats to come that I think we need to seriously consider heavily regulating who drives those sorts of vehicles. I have a coworker who uses Tesla self-driving heavily, I've been in a near head-on collision in her model 3 due to it. She's getting a Cybertruck soon and I fear for the lives of those people daring to cross a street in front of that thing.

I wouldn't call 15% "way heavier". If it's close enough that the people in the car can make up the difference then it's close enough.

Also, why compare the Cybertruck Cyberbeast to a Tacoma, the low end of a Tacoma at that? It's more comparable to a Tundra or F150. You are trying to be disingenuous with that comparison.

Now that makes me look at your math for the cars. High end to high end is less. So, just a quick check of your numbers show you're trying to twist stuff on both conclusions.

I looked up the Camry, it’s quite big and heavy already. The Model 3 too. The real comparison would be something like a Hyundai i10 or a VW Up, or at most a Fiesta or Golf.

I fail to see how that is the comparison to make. That's what you'd make if you want to be as extreme as possible. If you'd like to compare the best selling ICE sedan with the best selling EV sedan, then you'd compare a Camry and Model 3. They're also at least closer in price and someone considering a sedan might actually look at both. The person buying a Model 3 isn't going to buy a Hyundai i10, or a Fiesta.

Game theory predicts the “race to biggest” vehicles. The only way to stop it is through regulation and disincentives.

However, it’s important to consider future trends in automotive technology. Eventually, every new car sold will be an EV - so the pollution issue becomes much less of a concern, with a few pedantic caveats. Cars will also become self-driving.

Solve for the equilibrium. People will want rooms on the road - a self-driving, self-charging boat of a car that you can sleep in while it takes you from LA to Lake Tahoe overnight. It’ll even reach into the drive-thru window at McDonald’s and put your breakfast on a table for you to eat while facing your family members on a comfy sofa. Cars will become like miniature, smart, electric RVs minus the bathroom and ugly clunkiness. And since people won’t be driving them, and theoretically they can achieve super-human reaction time and sensing, maybe pedestrian safety will become less of an issue.

So regulation is tricky. I do think there should be an extra tax to price in the negative externality of large vehicles, but the government shouldn’t go too far with that and it shouldn’t preempt innovation in vehicle format.

It's the regulations and abusive media tactics that led to the near extinction of traditional (V8, rear wheel drive, American made) cars, which forced consumers to flee to the closest substitute: light trucks.

What does "abusive media tactics" mean?

The media mocked cars that made sense as environmental disasters (e.g., large, American-made, rear-wheel drive, V8-powered cars) when they were not. Those cars got 300,000+ miles before being scrapped. I am most familiar with the 1993 Chevy Caprice, which got 24 MPG on the highway.

The media ripped those cars and the companies who made them until the business-class* executives gave up and took them out of production.

* business-class refers to accountants, attorneys, and MBAs who are more than 2 levels above the lowest workers in the company and who genuinely do not understand the words they are using. They often say a word thinking of a common usage of it, not understanding that in their work it is industry-specific or company-specific jargon.

That seems disingenuous. No doubt there are some car owners who do care about these things, but the vast majority of drivers would likely be hard-pressed to know what type of engine their car has, or what the differences between rear and front drive are. Most people select cars based on some mix of cost, perceived safety, utility, and by what other people they know are getting.

(edit) Went to add sourcing and was surprised to find that while most of the things I listed were accurate, fuel efficiency turns out to be one I significantly underestimated: https://www.statista.com/chart/13075/most-important-factors-...

> there are some car owners who do care about these things, but the vast majority of drivers would likely be hard-pressed to know what type of engine their car has, or what the differences between rear and front drive are

I'm very surprised by this answer.

May I ask: Where do you live? What are your degrees in?

I live in Texas, and my degrees are in STEM fields like Computers and Engineering.

People saying that fuel efficiency is the most important factor often means a mid-sized SUV 3 row SUV rather than a Suburban.

Light trucks sell well because of the chicken tax loophole.

I did not realize that. Thank you.

More info on the chicken tax: https://www.gearpatrol.com/cars/a44373090/chicken-tax-trucks...

> You Don’t Need a Full-Size Pickup Truck, You Need a Cowboy Costume

That’s hilarious

They are just getting started of importing these cars to Germany. Every day I see more Ford pickup trucks in my City, thanks, I hate it. In the streets, there are more cars than people. They do not even fit on the property, so everybody just parks on the street, and this makes it real dangerous for scooter and cyclists.

At what size will these vehicles require a CDL? Hopefully it is a matter of size and not purpose.

Heavier is safer because your primary threat model is other heavy vehicles

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