6 ms·

Key missing component: CAFE needs a rewrite. US emissions laws have a cutout so that larger vehicles have less stringent emissions requirements. The problem is

• SoftTalker 2y ago
  Unless it's a total stripper meant for something like a highway maintenance department fleet vehicle, a "giant pickup" will cost 3 or 4 times that amount.
  • SkyPuncher 2y ago
    The most popular F-150 trim level runs about $50k. It’s not stripped out by any means.
• Neywiny 2y ago
  Yeah whenever I'm in an SUV I try to compare mileage. They'll get ~30% worse mpg than me in the same situation and I'm just a gas sedan, not even a hybrid
  • krisoft 2y ago
    > I'm just a gas sedan We are trully living in the future. :) I heard that cars are getting smarter but you are the first i have the pleasure to chat with. Joking asside, i don’t know if I have ever seen a more succint example of how people identify with their cars.
    • Neywiny 2y ago
      Yeah I see it now lol. I love that car. It holds all the stuff I need, 5 people comfortably, great safety (blind spot monitor, Lane keep, a backup camera [which I know is standard now but it's my first one]). When I got it I immediately drove/slept in it 1500 miles back home. So kind of instant bonding.
• rainsford 2y ago
  I think electric trucks/SUVs are a major reason changing CAFE standards won't actually solve the problem though since they are at least just as big and dangerous to other road users as gas powered vehicles and are often much faster and heavier. Changing the CAFE standards 20 years ago would have helped avoid the trend of increasing vehicle size, but here on the cusp of widespread electric vehicles I'm not sure it would have the same impact.
  • bobthepanda 2y ago
    What we really need and would never do is to put a pedestrian collision rating in NCAP, which Euro-NCAP already does. (NCAP is the system used to give safety ratings to cars.) Right now the NCAP has pedestrian avoidance but nothing on impact. It would be fairly trivial to test the impact of hitting a crash dummy at 30mph.
    • mitthrowaway2 2y ago
      Euro-NCAP would do virtually nothing to alter the design of a Ford F-150 or Dodge Ram, unfortunately. It's a very weak testing protocol. However the US regulator is already floating a proposal to include similar pedestrian testing in its requirements.
• raverbashing 2y ago
  Or change the licensing laws to be similar to other countries where a "regular" car driver's license only allows for a smaller weight vehicle.
  • Ekaros 2y ago
    In Europe regular B license for cars only allow up to 3500 kg gross weight. For car or combination. That is already lot of car.
    • sokoloff 2y ago
      I did an internship for Mercedes and I was able to drive our mid-sized R&D bus as my (routine) American driver's license allowed me to drive vehicles and vehicle combinations up to 26000 lbs GVWR/GCWR. Several of my German colleagues did not have a license permitting them to drive it.
  • oopsallmagic 2y ago
    [flagged]
  • oopsallmagic 2y ago
    [dead]
• Der_Einzige 2y ago
  [flagged]
  • ip26 2y ago
    I think this is the uncomfortable truth. I love tiny sports cars, but even I have steadily shifted my attention to larger & larger vehicles. (A family of tall bicyclists has an objectively easier time in an Outback than a Samurai) The only real downsides to larger vehicles are cost and exterior size, but with subsidy, wide lanes, and big parking spots those pains are removed. Small cars mostly are mostly popular where lanes are narrow, parking spots are tiny, costs are high, and so forth. Happily, this is mostly orthogonal to safe road design (aside from the towering height of today’s truck grilles)
    • Der_Einzige 2y ago
      Plus those giant vehicles have additional features not as often found on the small ones like 360 cameras and auto parallel park systems, so don’t expect crappy parking situations to stop these drivers from taking up every square inch of your cities parking infrastructure. The “big vehicle = more features” thing is also an independent reason for the success and popularity of big vehicles in America.
  • bluecalm 2y ago
    Good summary. No idea why it gets downvoted. People want big cars for selfish and arm-race reasons. They don't pay for the consequences so it's rational as well. When it's rational to engage in an arm race we need regulation but we are not getting any.
• doe_eyes 2y ago
  Honda Civic is $24,000. Ford F-150 is $36,000. These are representative prices for popular budget choices. And that baseline F-150 isn't a behemoth. It's 209" long and 76" tall. That's just 10" longer and taller than, say, Tesla Model X. I think the emission standards are dumb, but this narrative around customer choice is really getting distorted in weird ways. The bottom line is that people in the US want to drive pickups. Maybe for good reasons, maybe for bad reasons, but they go out of their way to do this. And the average pickup is probably shrinking right now, not growing - for example, there are fewer and fewer models with 8" beds, and 5.5" is the new standard (instead of 6"). Yes, a newspaper can always post a photo of a lifted 2024 RAM 3500 next to a 1975 Chevy C10 pickup to get some internet outrage points, but if you post an apples-to-apples comparison, the changes aren't really all that dramatic.
  • ip26 2y ago
    there are fewer and fewer models with 8" beds That’s more a function of crew cabs and using a pickup as a family vehicle. The bed has to shorten as the cab lengthens, else the truck gets unmanageablely long.
    • doe_eyes 2y ago
      There are two models with full-size four-door crew cabs and 8' beds, and they can work in most US suburbs. I think it's less about whether it's manageable and more about the aesthetics. The front-rear proportions on 8' trucks just aren't great.
  • SkyPuncher 2y ago
    I get so tired of people mindlessly citing CAFE laws. A lot of people like bigger vehicles. For ages, big cars drove poorly, absolutely guzzled gas, and lacked features. Over the past 20 years, auto makers basically solved all of these issues. A lot of big vehicles drive much better for what most people do - straight driving on highway. Fuel economy is “good enough”. Large trucks and SUVs have great feature sets. On top of all of that, large vehicles seat more, hold more, and generally still fit in most parking spaces and garages. People just want big cars
• kevin_thibedeau 2y ago
  The solution is to stop classifying cars as trucks by invoking a more stringent definition of a truck. The PT Cruiser should never have been a truck. None of the XUVs should be trucks.
  • SkyPuncher 2y ago
    All of the SUVs I’ve owned are classified as wagons for insurance.
• edude03 2y ago
  > Most Americans do not want these big cars Based on what? Anecdotal I know, but my biggest frustration is I can't convince friends and family they should buy a small car instead of an SUV because they always say "I might need to move a couch/dresser/friends/etc one day". I'm convinced they would come out way ahead buying a small car and renting a truck the once or twice a year they need it but again, I've yet to convince anyone that's the case
  • dmix 2y ago
    Beyond personal needs people want what others have, what they see in films, and what they see marketing for. The price and general availability impacts all of those things. Car companies will push what makes most economic sense and consumers will to, which helps create trends people hop on to.
    • throwaway7ahgb 2y ago
      I disagree. At least where I'm at, small cars don't serve any better purpose. We have plenty of space and gas is relatively inexpensive. So I'd rather spend a few thousand more for a midsize or large car/suv than a mini or compact car. It has nothing to do with neighbors, or signaling. Larger cars are usually just better.
      • evolve2k 2y ago
        Parent is a propaganda account, comment history shows the account making the same duplicated pro car comments repeatedly in different threads. This article is clearly on the money.
  • Spivak 2y ago
    Because the small car is the same cost as an SUV but worse utility wise. I actually go the other way, I bet the back row of an SUV (or tall hatchback like the Honda Fit) gets more use carrying people or large items than the back row of your average sedan. During growing season I'm constantly schlepping dirt and mulch home. I can fit 5 humans and all our camping supplies no problem. Fit a whole assembled grill in the back we got from FB marketplace. You get the utility of a truck and van with the MPG of a car, I see why they took over the world. If it weren't for pickup trucks being a cultural icon they would probably have replaced the "workman" vehicle too.
• shellfishgene 2y ago
  A simple change would be to raise taxes on petrol, but usually no politician wants to touch that one with a 10 ft pole.
  • sieabahlpark 2y ago
    You must hate poor people as that's who it's going to affect the most.
    • curun1r 2y ago
      The key to this implementing this sort of policy without hurting poor people is to introduce a corresponding tax credit or stimulus payment (potentially means tested) such that driving a normal vehicle a normal amount comes out even and poor people can actually come out ahead if they make more responsible choices. You want people to feel it at the pump so it affects their decision making without having it be punitive.
      • frumper 2y ago
        Sounds like it’d hurt poor people unless they make what you call more responsible choices. A difficult part about being poor is you often don’t have as many options. There is a lot of reasons why that turns up, but it’s there all the same.
        • Dylan16807 2y ago
          The ability to buy a car with a loan is very widespread. It's easier than cash if you're poor, isn't it? And with a loan you can balance vehicle cost against gas cost easily.
          • sieabahlpark 2y ago
            [dead]
      • throwaway7ahgb 2y ago
• WheatMillington 2y ago
  >Most Americans do not want these big cars. That's patently false.
• Amezarak 2y ago
  People keep repeating this but isn’t the case. The smallest cars from budget automakers are their cheapest cars and they’ve almost all been discontinued for lack of sales. I know, I drive one. And people look at it as a joke, they’d never buy one, and they think it’s hilarious I do. I’d buy another for my commute vehicle when this one diesbecause I do like it but Honda discontinued it for miserable sales numbers. Americans by and large want SUVs at a minimum the size of CRV or RAV4, or else a pickup. At any rate with hybrid vehicles getting 40mpg is very attainable. I have a three row SUV that gets this. And I bought it because I really wanted a much more comfortable vehicle I could fit more humans and stuff in. Other comments addressed this, but it’s also absolutely bananas to claim trucks are as cheap as small cars in the US. Even the F-150 quoted in the comments which is already more than 10k more than the car is quoted as the base model that basically doesn’t exist outside of work fleets. You’d be lucky to find a truck with 100k miles for 15k.