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Comment by nox101 | Hacker News Reader

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nox101·

Some people claim it was regulation that caused SUVs

https://www.capitalone.com/cars/learn/finding-the-right-car/...

Hopefully new regulation will fix it rather than make it worse

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Certainly not in Europe, where things like pickup trucks and light trucks were exceedingly rare and there was no such regulation loophole.

In 1990, if you had 3 kids, it could easily fit in a Renault 19.

In 2020… if you have an SUV with kid sits… it barely fits TWO kids. It is totally produced by legislation, although it’s for safety, you have to be extremely rich to carry 3 kids in a car today.

Such a SUV has barely more room than a 308, though, which is lighter, smaller, and more efficient. I agree that there are not that many good family cars and even more reasonably-sized cars are somehow getting too large on the outside and too cramped on the inside at the same time. It makes them very impractical in a lot of situations.

I think some might say it started in the USA and was then brought to Europe after. Many things are introduced in one country and once successful the companies try to expand their market to other countries

They are less rare now than they used to be, sure, but they are still very uncommon. As in, I might see one every week living in a ~10 million people reasonably wealthy metropolitan area. No regulation was tweaked to favour light trucks and Ford is perfectly happy to sell sedans and hatchbacks instead of F-150s. They don’t need to sell the same thing as in the US to develop their market share here.

SUVs seem to increase in popularity following the American fashion, unfortunately.

Regulation that came to be because of the aggressive lobbying.

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