My previous car is a Yaris.
When I got the Yaris I heard people make snide comments like “Anyone see that big guy get out of that tiny car?” then gas prices went up and they became “Hey, what kind of MPG does that thing get?”
I like hatchbacks. Bigger is fine but nothing huge.
My current car is an '07 Yaris. It’s totally bare bones, but everyone who has been in it comments on how spacious the interior is.
I’ve always driven small cars, because they’re economical and I’ve never needed anything larger. I hate that small hatchbacks are so scarce in the US and that our roads are overrun with ludicrously huge pickups and SUVs. We transitioned from land yachts to small cars in the late 1970’s and 1980’s, we could do it again with the right incentives.
My current car is an ‘07 Yaris too. It’s also totally bare bones including manual windows and locks and no cruise control (the only feature I sometimes wish it had). It’s economical and much funner to try drive than most bigger cars, trucks, and SUVs. And on multiple occasions I have been able to parallel park it in tight spots that cars in front of me had to pass on.
I can’t even remember what year mine was. It was the first year it was in the US. Was a decent car. Good milage. But it chewed through water pumps so bad. It was either loud squealing belt or too tight causing it to killed the pump. Never could get it “just right”
That’s too bad. I have 189,000 miles on mine (304,000 km) and it’s never let me down. I haven’t had to do anything but regular maintenance on it. I wanted to replace it with something a bit newer and nicer, but had to replace the car my wife and daughter share, instead. Fortuately, I don’t drive very much so it will probably hold out for a few more years.
Thats the way to be. I ignore the urge and ride whats paid off until it just doesn’t make sense any more. The “newer spiffy” car models will still be around when its time.
I drive an Auris station wagon Hybrid (aka, the US Corolla iM with bigger boot). I had a chance to drive multiple Yaris generations and honestly I am always surprised by how roomy it is inside. They made a perfect use of space - way better than VW did with Polo (smaller Golf), that’s for sure…
I have a Yaris and think it’s too big. It’s 20cm longer than my previous car (2005 Clio) but somehow has less interior space, it feels cramped.
I have a 2017 Hybrid Yaris in blue like this one:
That I affectionately call “Blue thunder” 🤣
Got the same model in red but with the 1.5L engine from 2019. Love it. Already got 75k km and it’s still running like a charm.
Mine has half that 37k. It had 31k when I bought it in 2020, and I don’t use it often. I hoper it lasts a few more years.
Yaris gang rise up!
Want to trade my 09 in for a more recent model, hatchback would be ideal
The actual model is beautiful, and it has Apple Car/Android auto and also a HUD.
The ease of driving and parking in a car that small is insane. I thought my little Outlander Sport was a big difference from my last car, then I saw my buddy’s Yaris easily make a U turn on a narrow 2 lane road.
I love that this has become the hatchback and Yaris love thread. As a GTI owner it makes me happy. I do not want nor need to go any bigger. It’s almost the perfect car.
My Yaris is actually older than me. so old in fact, that it was called “vitz” and/or “echo” in some countries. i am the 4th owner. had to replace the starter, all the fluids and the clutch (cuz old people). best car ever. it has around 100.000 km on it and runs like it rolled out of the factory just yesterday. considering we euros pay up to 7€ per gallon it’s good i still get around 40mpg out of it. love that thing.
As a taller woman my wife was against us getting a subcompact until I took her to test drive it thinking I wouldn’t fit. Between seeing how comfortable and efficient it was she was entirely on board
Honda Fit gangg
Just got a ford focus hatchback last year after a 95 suburban. Love it. Fits everywhere and fun to drive
Americans need to embrace public transit. We need trains that don’t completely suck in both speed and schedule reliability.
We’re never going to convince a lot of folks to leave their lifted F-150 or massive Suburban behind for a small car. But quality, affordable public transit that is not only efficient but saves money over owning a car would actually make a difference. We’re more likely to be able to get people to just leave the F-150 in the driveway and eventually move away from it.
Much better for the environment, too, and reduces traffic / congestion, etc. I agree smaller cars would be good, but the goalpost should be getting away from the automobile.
Americans need to embrace public transit.
Bad framing.
Instead of asking Americans to just embrace our absolutely shit public transit (which they won’t do and will become more angry and obstinate about in its current condition), we need to push representatives into office that are far more left-leaning and not fucking autocrats who will MANDATE massive increases in taxes on billionaires and legislate much more significant subsidization of public transit to the point that it is MASSIVELY expanded and improved to a degree that it starts to look like what we see in actual 1st world countries like Japan, Europe, and pretty much all the Nordic countries. See “Not Just Bikes” for countless great examples of how other countries do this to a degree that it should be embarrassing for the US.
They didn’t get the public to “embrace public transit.” They made it good enough to the point that even the rich use it. It’s the same for anything. You have to show how good it can be. Then people will “embrace it” and guard it from dismantling by the rich looking to line their pockets. It’s why even ghoulish Republicans won’t touch Medicare. It was made GOOD by FDR’s administration, and now it is political suicide to do anything to water it down.
We need some bold leftist president to yell from the bully pulpit about high-speed bullet trains and advocate for it like Kennedy did for the Moon race.
Fixing things here means not only having lots of trains that stick to schedules, but regulating it very strongly and mandating adequate staffing, paying those staff well enough to live a dignified life, and providing proper training for every employee.
But the real sad fact is, there are so many other problems stacked on top of each other that all need addressing that are not only not being addressed, but directly worsened year over year - things like mass homelessness, housing unavailability, rising cost of living, zoning making nothing everyone needs to access (like grocery stores) within a public transit-friendly distance, that this will probably not happen ever…
I mean, I think this is what they’re saying, but yeah.
Yeah. I probably should have been more detailed in my comment, but I did not mean embrace it as it is. I mean investing in it and making it competitive. I don’t think it’s embraceable in its current form.
Make it good and people will use it. It’s really that simple.
we need to push representatives into office that are far more left-leaning and not fucking autocrats who will MANDATE massive increases in taxes on billionaires and legislate much more significant subsidization of public transit
You’re framing it wrong. We don’t need to elect scary commies to massively increase taxes in order to subsidize icky collective things; we simply need to elect Fiscal Conservatives™ who will cease massively subsidizing car dependency. In particular, it’s time to repeal Big Government® intrusive regulations that try to tell Red Blooded Americans© they can’t build a multifamily building on their own damn property or that dictate minimum parking requirements.
This is America, damn it! It’s high time we put the invisible hand of the Free Market back in control!
[insert screaming eagle noises]
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Countries like Japan, Europe and Nordic countries… My man, Nordic countries are Europe and Europe isn’t a country.
It’s more complex than that.
The way the US is spread out makes public transit prohibitively expensive and difficult to achieve proper coverage. To make it effective, you would have to shift the entire way we live. Our entire society is built off the concept that everyone has a car.
Add to the fact that building transit is extra expensive in the US and you arrive at the reality that we will NEVER have a working transit system. That’s why the shift to small cars is needed. We don’t have any more room for roads, so we need more cars to fit in the roads we have
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We just lack the leadership needed to implement massive programs like high speed interstate rail.
In fairness the Interstate system was more about air defense than transit.
…and the moon landing was more about “beating the Soviets” than the pursuit of lofty science and exploration goals.
Regardless, I don’t care what we decide to “make it about.”
I just want us to get it done.
Politically you have to get several different groups of people to buy in to make it work. Unfortunately “what it’s about” is the deciding factor in accomplishment.
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My dude what do you think OP is talking about. That’s what embracing public transit means ya dingus.
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You live in a democracy lol
You make it sound like you’re in an authoritarian state
Sure doesn’t feel like it a lot of the time
You live in a democracy lol
That hasn’t been true since the 80s.
Americans have absolutely embraced public transit. It’s just that not a lot of cities have robust systems in place, but go somewhere like NYC or Chicago and you’ll see a transit system that millions rely on daily.
Public transit needs to do what it says on the tin. People won’t choose public transit if it’s the choice between an hour commute each way and a 3 hour each way bus ride.
americans will embrace small cars like they embrace gun control
We embraced the shit out of them during the oil crisis in the '70’s. Then when gasoline got cheap again we snapped right back.
“But my SUV makes me feel so ‘safe’ and gives me a commanding view of the road!!!”
I am of the opinion that everyone ought to just get a motorcycle.
Have you ever seen Americans drive? Or the ones that ride motorcycles?
Give everyone a motorcycle and half the country would be dead in a week
Well, that’ll keep 'em off my damn roads, won’t it?
Yeah that’s a net win
Honestly, fuck motorcycle drivers. I know there’s plenty of them out there who operate your machines properly, but there SO MANY absolute asshats on motorcycles, always making the highway way more dangerous for everyone around them.
If I could remove one vehicle from the earth it would be motorcycles. Idgaf how fun they are for you, people can’t be trusted with them in general.
Like most drivers you probably just don’t notice the ones that aren’t loud / ridden by asshats.
Many bikes have basically the same performance as a civic, you are painting with far too broad a brush here.
In a decade running a motorcycle as my only transport, I’ve never been remotely a threat to the 5,000 pound tanks I’m forced to share the road with, but almost been taken out by left turning stop sign and red light runners more times than is reasonable.
Yep couple assholes ruin it for everyone, I recognized that already,but also, it’s a particular type of danger that isn’t posed by anything else, and I dont think your pleasure is worth my stress tbh.
To be clear when I’m talking about danger I’m talking about the motorcyclist turning into an unrecognizable pink streak on the asphalt, not “hurting my car”…
If you pull some stupid shit and die on the road next to me that affects me more than you, since youre fucking dead then, so therefore: I should get more say in it than you.
Wrap it in whatever guise you want, you’ll never convince me that riding a motorcycle is anything other than selfish.
I don’t use it for pleasure, I use it to get around. If car drivers are stressing about rider safety (I don’t get that impression) they can show it by putting their phones down and paying better attention to the world around them.
So wait. I am transporting one person, not taking up much space, obeying the rules of the road, don’t have loud pipes nor speed, and you’re telling me I’m selfish? When you literally just said you don’t care about our pleasure?
I don’t think it’s us thats the selfish one here.
You don’t like them weaving in and out of traffic and blowing past you at 40+ mph over the speed limit?
Weird right
They’d all get those goddamn ear splitting harleys too. Like there isn’t enough noise already.
I think there should be a separate license to drive SUVs and Trucks over a certain size. And that maintaining that license should be a bit of a hassle - like a required in-person written and practical test every 2 years. If people want that commanding view of the road and “safe” feeling that comes from endangering everyone else on the road, then they should have to put in some extra effort - not enough extra effort that it’s unattainable for those who actually have a need for a vehicle of that size, but enough effort that it would discourage the widespread use we have currently.
Also, during your SUV probationary period you have to drive a Suzuki Samurai for two years or so.
I’d love to have a motorcycle that would replace my current vehicle, but it would need to be capable of keeping me warm while handling well in heavy snow. Afaik, there aren’t any enclosed bikes out there
I am of the opinion that everyone ought to just get a motorcycle.
But only if it’s a dual sport, right? ;)
Well I mean preferably.
When you need a fucking step ladder to get into your jacked up pickup just so you can commute or get groceries you might have lost your mind.
I am of the opinion that everyone ought to just get a motorcycle.
I’d rather not die tyvm.
The US EPA currently penalizes smaller cars thanks to a poorly thought out rule for fuel economy that scales by wheelbase size, making larger cars easier to meet requirements for. The EPA has made many embarrassingly backwards decisions, but this might be the worst.
I was taxed an extra $150 to register a 2002 Honda Insight last year. It was for a “Hybrid Tax” because hybrid owners buy less gas and therefore are paying less tax on gasoline. Like, that’s the whole point of driving a small car!
They did for a while in the 70s-80s until giant SUVs got everyone hot and bothered
With their face?!?
Normal sized cars* you mean.
Normal cars aren’t small. They’re just small if you compare them to the giant ridiculous trucks they have over that.
Bold idea here, but maybe if we stopped fucking subsidizing SUV’s, people wouldn’t buy so goddamn many of them. Just a thought.
Whenever I’m in the States I hate the fact that everything is a 20 minute car ride away. I understand why road rage can be a thing if you spend so much time in the car.
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USA didn’t start building bullshit suburbs until 1950s. before that it was dense cities.
Unfortunately it’s zoning that caused most of this issue. Not size. Dense residential was disallowed for not entirely un-racist reasons, so it spread out enormously instead. On top of car companies lobbying in various ways to make cars essential.
If anything this means Europe’s cities just can’t accommodate cars, because they weren’t built for them. The weird thing is that American cities were built for cars and yet still can’t accommodate cars. Traffic, lack of parking, road rage… it’s a huge mess, and it seems like the more you commit to cars, the worse it all gets. That’s the trouble with cars. They just don’t work.
I don’t really understand this comment though. It doesn’t take thousands of years to achieve urban density. And what does America’s sprawl have to do with loving large cars? You don’t need a huge car to drive medium distances.
You need density to support a train system. You need a large number of riders to make it economical and you need them living within a reasonable distance of the stations. The US is very spread out. You can blame cars for that but that is the world we live in. The US is also very big with large rural areas, the western US didn’t even really develop until trains came out in the 1869. Europe was built around compact cities based on horses and walking long before cars.
I agree that we are too car focused and it has become a sort of arms race, build more roads, more cars, more roads, etc.
The focus on cars is emotionally driven. The car symbolizes freedom and independence. Besides this it’s a huge status symbol. And the industry is working hard to keep it this way. The lack of decent public transportation is by design.
Public transportationdoesn’t have to be economical, it’s a service.
America exists because of the train, which it has since abandoned
Vancouver runs trains through SFH development. Montreal does too. Hell, so does London.
You’re an untravelled idiot and it shows.
Uncalled for antagonism. Boooo.
Don’t say stupid shit if you don’t want to be called out for it 🤷♀️
the western US didn’t even really develop until trains came out in the 1869
The western US didn’t really develop until the government started giving land that had already been ceded to indigenous peoples and couldn’t actually support dense settlement to white settlers, at the behest of railroad companies who needed an artificial reason to build railroads in the first place.
You don’t even need a huge car to travel huge distances.
I totally get that fact. I also think that it would not be bad to copy some things from other countries to make the cities in the States more liveable without car dependency. There’s enough space to do that.
At the very least we could link cities with rail systems. Don’t put a million stops on them either though. Try taking Amtrack from DC to Boston and you’ll see what I mean.
just have more than one set of tracks and you can have a regional and express service train!
Passenger trains exist in the U.S. They used to be popular. Then planes and affordable automobiles put them out of business. If you don’t live in a dense urban area, you almost certainly have a car, meaning you aren’t beholden to train schedules and destinations. If you are in an area where you get by without a car, an Uber to the airport gets you to your destination much faster.
I agree and disagree with this. I don’t think the US inherently must be car centric because it’s big. But I do agree that Europe has superior pedestrian infrastructure because it developed for most of its history without cars. Auto and oil industry lobbying has instigated the situation in the US, but their agenda was only achievable because the technology existed to make large scale changes to the terrain, mass produce vehicles, etc. It’s very likely that there were people throughout Europe’s history who tried to monopolize bridges or horse wagons or other forms of transport, but the technology wasn’t sufficient for it to materialize. Warsaw was destroyed during WWII and rebuilt, and it’s developed to be very car-centric compared to other cities in Poland and Europe.
some reasons for the raise of vehicle size on the last decades are personal taste, but others are policy driven, we could look into that, as utility vehicles are treated differently in terms of emission requirements
Yup - in the US, pick-ups and SUVs are categorized as “light trucks,” which have different fuel efficiency and emission standards and are therefore more profitable to produce.
Add to that some clever marketing to the effect of “big car = more manly/safe” and boom, now you see these big, stupid, fuel-ineffecient, dangerous vehicles everywhere.
Good job 👍
Not just that but the standards are also more lenient if the car is larger for its class which is part of why even small cars are bigger now.
I have heard also that a big car is better because a big car crashing with other bigger cars will increase the probability of surviving, but then it’s a war of having the biggest car. It’s basically the same as weapons.
Or an adequate mass transportation system.
Or walkable zoning, lack of which is the fundamental cause of the car dependency.
The lack of continuous sidewalks drives me nuts. A developer might put in a sidewalk but the one next to them doesn’t. Sometimes you are walking alongside a ditch or have to cross a busy road to continue on.
Almost like it’s designed to be annoying and pedestrian hostile
As much as I’m inclined to agree with @MaggiWuerze@feddit.de, the real reason is typically that all new developments are required to include sidewalks, but existing ones aren’t required to retrofit. So you get a patchwork of sidewalks installed over time as things get torn down and rebuilt.
The “annoying and pedestrian hostile” part is municipalities’ unwillingness to infill sidewalks in front of old developments at taxpayer expense.
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Bullshit. Adequate mass transportation is competitive with a car. You don’t even have to leave North America to see an “adequate” mass transportation system: just go to Montreal, Vancouver, or New York.
Most US cities have mass transportation that’s designed to move around poor people so rich people in cars can’t see them.
Buses aren’t horrible.
- they feel safer in terms of crime, which might not be an issue you deal with but for over half the population it matters
- they can often go around problems. One bus on the same line up ahead has an issue that has no real impact on the bus you are on
- lot easier for the disabled to go on and off compared to down into a subway
- you have a small degree of privacy
- Mechanical problems? Get off the bus. No biggy.
I do understand, I was a subway guy for the longest time, my wife would take the bus every day and she converted me.
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I never drove into Boston, I always took the train. I still needed a car though if I wanted to go anywhere away from the city. Boston also has an awful spoke and no rim train system. If you want to go from the end of one line to another you can’t go in a ring around the city, you’d have to go all the way in then all the way up the other spoke.
Give me a new El Camino EV with a 400 mile range and I’m in.
All my road trips are around 150 miles and there may or may not be a charger at the destination.
The article says range isn’t important…if you’ve ever looked at a map of the US, you’ll see why that’s a misguided statement.
Forget small cars, we should be embracing non-motorized ways of transit. Make things human-sized again and allow us to walk and/or bike to destinations rather than having to have a motorized vehicle to get around.
Public transit is obviously a good thing to have, but I think it’s also important to have alternate forms of transit as well.
So much this. It’s infuriating to have to get in a car every time you want to go outside your neighborhood.
I recommend moving to a city
In the US, it’s really only NYC and Chicago that have functioning public transit. If you can’t go to one of those, you’re pretty much out of luck. It’s not like in Europe where every little small to mid-size town has light rail and train connections all over.
NYC (and presumably Chicago - I haven’t been) are the best, that’s true. I’ve also been to Philadelphia and Boston and both had good train systems. I currently live in a medium-sized city that is 90% bus transit, and that can suffice even though it’s not great. It’s an exaggeration to say NYC and Chicago are the only places you can go without a car.
You left out Boston
You’re funny.
I have managed Denver and San Francisco many times without a car.
The question isn’t about managing, but about convenience. In some cities, public transportation is more convenient than going out and getting a car and dealing with parking and all that noise. That should be the goal, not “it’s manageable.”
I was just on Block Island, RI the other day. It’s a 10mi^2 island with ferry service and an airport square in the middle of it. Very seasonal economy and the residents are wealthy NIMBY-types.
No trams or trolleys or any mass transit on the island itself. Lots of mopeds and bikes and a surprising amount of cars. We were on foot to a restaurant and approached a 4-way stop and both myself (pedestrian) and the bicyclist next to me were amazed at how hard it was to cross the street with all the taxis and rental cars around.
What a shame. The island should be a model of an ideal “minimal car” community, and could easily become it.
That’s all fun and games until weather happens…and weather is going to happen a lot going forward.
I moved to Europe, grew up in New York near the City and decided to get a moped here to commute. It’s roughly equivalent to an Ebike but was actually cheaper than one and has a 100km range. It’s not highway legal as it has a top speed of 45km/h but can go on bike paths as long as I watch the speed.
After 3 months since I got the moped I am going to get a car because FUCK going to the office in the rain with that thing. The trains and/or busses go on strike about once a month, maybe a little less, and between delays and cancelations I can’t rely on them for my commute. I’ve literally been waiting for the bus and the driver just decides not to stop to pick me up too. Also packages don’t get reliably dropped off at my front door so I need to go into town or to the supermarket next to the highway to pick up my things which becomes untenable when they are bulky. Instead I’m taking taxis at a cost of €30 each way just to pick up shit that should be left at my door.
The dissonance is strong, I still need a car, and I still need one big enough to move bulky crap at least once a month if not more.
And before someone says rent a car, it’s €70+ a day to do so here and I have a preferred account through my employer. I need to book it in advance so it’s not a “same day” thing. Oh and the places they drop the packages off have weird fucking opening times and are often closed when they should be open so I’ve literally spent €60 on taxis to come home with nothing. That time the seller did me a solid and refunded me the €60 as an apology (it was a €350 item).
My dream car is a Nash Metropolitan converted to an EV.
That would be fucking dope. I’d love for retrofuturist cars like this to appear
That’s a pretty sweet ride.
I wish we got the Honda E. Would buy that up in a heartbeat.
Definitely would love a Honda E, got a Chevy Bolt EV as it seemed like the next best option here.
I’m usually not a hatch fan but that little car looked awesome. I got my last new gas powered manual transmission car before EVs are the main thing. Since I work from home and don’t drive a bunch my plan is to keep it as long as I can and get an EV in 4-5 years when hopefully infrastructure catches up a bit and more manufacturers have an option and work out small kinks.
Bro if you could get a used leaf gen one (they run around 4k), you could take that thing to a drag strip and absolutely turn some heads.
I have a friend who wants to take my gen one leaf and do a conversion. He just went to an EV mechanics course on it.
Same with a 1959 Panhard PL 17. Some of those little old cars are just beautiful.
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I’ve only seen one in person once, but I’ve loved it for years.
Lovely car! Btw: how do you put a picture in a comment? What sorcery is this?
I’m on desktop, so how I do it is right-click, copy image, then just paste into the post. Not sure how to do it on mobile.
Got it! it just needs the
markdown formatting. Thanks a lot. Cheers!Oh! Ok. I don’t know if that possible in Mlem (iOS app). Thanks!
You’d chop up a nash, and put an ev motor in it? I do not have kind words for you.
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When I was in high school back in the late 70s you’d still see a few of those around. My friend had one, but not for long. Someone had put in a more powerful motor and if she wasn’t careful accelerating she would snap the drive shaft.
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Americans will embrace small cars when we don’t need to drive 1+hours every single day.
You dont need a large car for that…
You just need a comfortable car for that.
For some people, bigger is more comfortable. Different strokes for different folks. Others don’t want to deal with playing Tetris with baggage and family every time they need to go on a trip. For others, it’s a safety issue or at least they feel safer in a bigger car.
But yes. I generally agree with you.
Especially for an obese country.
It isn’t even that. America, Germany, and the UK are all very similar. And those numbers are only becoming more similar over time.
Europeans need to remember that American states are often larger than European countries.
And that generations of neglect or intentional sabotage has rendered public transport completely useless outside of outlier scenarios.
People want to handwave it away, but there are legitimate safety concerns with driving smaller vehicles in the US. Not only are they less comfortable (in a country where you have to drive everywhere, for long periods of time, even for incidental items). They will get destroyed by our obnoxiously huge SUVs and trucks. Happens all the time.
Same thing needs to be remembered when people who don’t live here insist everyone should just be biking everywhere. I agree in spirit, but the reality is that biking in the US is a gamble every time someone does it. And you can’t convince a populace to do it when a normal American is 10+ miles away from a grocery store, and when most of our states experience both extreme heat and extreme cold.
The problem is truly systemic. We have a majority of civil planning intentionally implementing hostile engineering to incentivize vehicles.
So actually there are many cars that are nearly or just as safe as SUVs and have similar storage capacity. These arguments are often used by industry but don’t really hold any weight
https://youtu.be/jN7mSXMruEo https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/rollover/unsafe/theme.html
As someone who goes to Italy yearly with a family of 4 and a dog often the smaller car storage notes are bullshit.
We rent to drive to our home here and then use bikes when or borrow the inlaws car but they often say 5 or 6 seater with room for 3 luggages but it often means at the expense of seats. I often travel with my daughter’s stroller beneath the kids feet and a luggage or several backpacks on the floor or in the middle seat and for a several hours drive it’s not comfy. Meanwhile my traverse in the states I can fit all of them plus the luggages etc on way to anywhere and we’re all comfy for hours.
Not that that’s a justification for larger cars but it’s definitely not on par and you totally need to play Tetris or sacrifice comfort to make it work.
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exactly. I would love to take public transport everywhere, but apparently investing in our public infrastructure is “too woke” now.
Well, when a County drops nearly a million dollars on a bus stop, it’s not hard to understand why.
You kind of hit on the biggest problem with lack of public transit investments, and I don’t think you even realize it.
On I-66, they added an additional travel lane for 4 miles and it cost $85million. That’s more than $20million PER MILE. And it is only ONE travel lane, not an entire highway. And yet, we accept this as the norm, but god forbid we spend money on public transit. Everyone is up in arms on how our taxes are wasted only when it is public transit. I’m not saying that $1 million bus stop was money well spent, I honestly don’t know. But it still sounds like a better deal than $1 million for 264 feet of travel lane.
http://inside.transform66.org/about_the_project/i-66_eastbound_widening.asp
The US should really just directly employ regional workers to handle these projects. Corruption and nepotism are rampant in public construction projects, and the profit motive requires an inefficient use of tax dollars since we must pay a completely useless margin just so somebody can become richer for doing zero work.
We also need to stop expanding highways since additional lanes have been proven to not help congestion, and actually worsens it because it encourages more driving.
I remember when they expanded rt 3 in MA. I said to myself “It’ll be packed in a few years.” Sure enough people immediately packed into the towns along it or changed their routes and now it is a jammed as every other highway, just wider.
For them to establish a true high speed rail system down the east coast they’d have to buy up billions in property via eminent domain before they even put down a single track. I don’t see that getting much support.
That doesn’t make any sense. What does duration of transit have to do woth how large your vehicle is? The article didn’t say clown cars.
I’m 6’2" (188cm) and I drive a tiny little '05 Mazda 3s, for 1.5 hours each way to work/home. It’s not an issue at all. If anything, I’m honestly LESS comfortable in larger vehicles.
Would I like to drive less? Definitely. Working from home during Corona was fantastic and I was so much more productive.
You have kids? Pets? Long work commute? A small car makes having to balance any of these (especially together) difficult. Sprawling suburbia makes commutes and driving anywhere suck, you want Americans to get smaller cars? Build better city infrastructure so that I don’t need to use the car 98% of the time I need to leave the house. If I don’t need to use it as much I can deal with less comfort and a smaller car.
Make sense now?
Motherfucker, 15% of American males don’t even have friends, 95% of you don’t need an SUV. You think people in other countries don’t have jobs and families and cities? Christ, pull your head out of your ass and look out a window once in a while.
Aww. Someone got angry lol.
Don’t be so disingenuous as to assume that just because I enjoy cursing that I’m angry, you just make yourself sound like a fucking idiot. Especially when you don’t respond to the message with anything of substance, like a belligerent child.
I’m not responding to an insufferable little bitch. Either learn to talk like an adult and, you know, be somewhat respectable, or get use to being treated like a child. Byeeeeee
The stick is so far up your ass it’s pushing shit out of your mouth, careful there.
If self awareness was a disease you’d be the healthiest person alive. How much of a coward do you have to be to run away from mean words? It’s a bullshit excuse, you can’t attack my message so you try to disingenuously dismiss it without consideration. Pathetic.
I agree that most people don’t need SUVs. And even more don’t need a truck. But few others are forced to drive as much nor as far as Americans on a daily basis, so we don’t give a shit if people in other countries with robust public transport sometimes have to drive places in their (comparatively) small countries with their families.
TIL that a dubious 15% is also === 95%.
Edit: that is to say, this isn’t as simple as “LOL Americans fat, Americans dumb.” The same old Euro arguments don’t work on this one. Civil planning is completely fucked here. It isn’t just bad, it is actively hostile to non-drivers.
And SUVs in particular can get these massive tax advantages that cars don’t get. Same with some models of truck. Plus, marketing is highly effective and nearly totally unregulated like so much else over here.
You have morons giving themselves brain damage for the right to own gas stoves, and we have similar morons suffocating themselves and everyone else by insisting they need huge vehicles. And the government actively encourages it.
Getting in and out of a higher-riding vehicle with an upright seating position is more natural and comfortable, particularly for the elderly and/or infirm. Furthermore, we have engineered away most of the drawbacks of crossovers and SUVs.
Based on the numbers of SUV’s and large trucks on US roads I’m going to assume 90% of your population is elderly or infirm.
Vast majority are obese, close enough to infirm.
15% of American males don’t even have friends
I can see why…
Yeah, poor stupid Americans.
Uhh nope. None of those are good reasons to have a massive vehicle. Especially long work commute…thats completely irrelevant.
How many Americans do you think are going to be able to afford two or three vehicles?
If you have a family and any pets , it’s very difficult to travel around anywhere. At most, people are going to get a car that can fulfill as many needs as possible. Just because YOU can get around comfortably in a smaller car, doesn’t mean someone else will be. Different families have different needs.
No it doesn’t make sense but thanks for patronizing me.
All I see here is you barking back the truck industry’s talking points to me. I know plenty of people with kids and pets and small cars and guess what? They are used to it and don’t hate it.
Your entitlement is the difference, let’s not make any mistake about this.
Entitlement over what? I drive a crosstrek mate. I can’t get into a smaller car otherwise I’m leaving the kids behind. Your arguing with a single person. The reality of PEOPLE is that they won’t change unless they don’t need cars as much… it’s only logical mate.
Right because all these small vehicles only have two seats, I keep forgetting the only small car options are old mr2, fiero, and rx-7’s. SILLY ME
Also a Mazda 3 is not that small, neither is a Corolla.
Neither of which will be big enough to travel with. A family with kids and a dog is a crammed vehicle. If I can’t afford a larger car, I’m going to get something that’s less cramped and uncomfortable when theres a full load like that.
If you have 20 kids and a great Dane I guess you’re right. If you have 2 kids and a dog that’s on you.
Not anymore they’re not. Not in the U.S., at least.
Just buy a station car? It’s hot more space than I’ll ever need and I have all of the things you mention. Small does not equal clown car you know.
How are you less comfortable in a large vehicle? I’m the same height and driving a Corolla my head would hit the roof sometimes. Getting in and out of a Civic felt like I was human origami. I got a Forester and it is so much more comfortable. My partially disabled dad loved being able to just slide into the seat and swing his legs in without having to drop down and struggle to get his legs folded in or out.
I drive a, for American standards, small Peugeot 308. It’s the 2018 model. Does about 45-50 MPG (the diesel does even better) and has all the luxuries I can imagine. I drive the station which means I have plenty of space for everything I could need. I drive it for 2,5-3 hours a day. It drives like a dream. You don’t need a massive SUV for that.
I drive a Crosstrek and have a small truck. I’m about as small as it gets before going to clown cars. I don’t why everyone here thinks they are going to persuade me how wrong I am…I was making a statement that’s isn’t wrong. You want people to move to smaller vehicles, build better infrastructure.
A cross trek isn’t a small vehicle. It’s larger than almost all sedans. I drive a WRX which is significantly smaller and far from a ‘clown car’. I wouldn’t say that yours are large vehicles, but your statement about going smaller absolutely is wrong. I don’t have to persuade you, you’re just categorically wrong.
I commuted 2 1/2 hours a day, mostly highway driving. In a Yaris, with a passenger. For 8 years. I was driving, not stretching out to take a nap.
TBH, I would have preferred a car that was quieter and had a bit more comfortable ride. But a Corolla, Civic, Mazda 3 or Elantra would have been just fine.
So I live in the cousin-fuckingly-deep south where 90% of what’s on the road is trying its best to be a monster truck… I drive what looks like a pregnant rollerskate by comparison cuz I don’t want to send half my paycheck into the gas tank.
It’s funny-sad how the folks in the giant trucks get offended just by seeing my tiny car. Every day there’s always at least one asshole in an F-350 or some shit that likes to ride up on my ass cuz I guess it makes them feel powerful? I just drop a mph every couple seconds until either they fuck off or get annoyed enough to pass.
Anyway, moral of the story is that stupid-big vehicles are here to stay in the US, at least in the regions occupied by Y’all Quaeda. Their trucks are one of their few sources of self esteem.
…I’m really tempted to find one of those rubber testicle things that the cowboys like to put between the rear wheels of their trucks, but like a comically tiny one, color it like the trans flag, and hang it on the back of my tiny car just to annoy the rednecks on the road. …although here, that’d probably get my car or myself shot.
It’s time for Americans to stop spending so much time in their cars. Emissions from burning hydrocarbons are destroying the planet.
