All in all, car bloat has increased vehicle prices while making autos more destructive to human life, natural ecosystems, and pavement alike. Because the full societal costs of crashes, pollution, and road repairs are not borne by owners of SUVs and trucks, every American is effectively subsidizing car bloat. Even if they drive a sedan. Even if they don’t own a car at all.
People driving massive, gas-guzzling tanks are safer on the road at the expense of every reasonably sized vehicle. Unless you need a larger SUV or truck for a specific purpose, i.e. for work or hauling, get off the fucking road with these damn things. My brother-in-law died last week in an accident involving a Ford 550 that stalled in the fast lane. BIL driving SUV for work; couldn’t stop in time, rammed into back of 550, killed. The driver of Ford 550? Uninjured.
This, of course, doesn’t even begin to touch on unnecessary over consumption of fuel, which is an equally significant concern.
I’ve been saying this for years but the death of my brother in law really drove home the point for me—if you’re not using your behemoth tank for work or specific use case hauling—you have no business driving it, and should not be allowed to use as everyday commuter vehicle.
I have a truck that I use to move large, dirty, or awkward things for a small farm… but to commute to work I ride a motorcycle. The bike gets better gas mileage, looks cooler, is easier to park, and is considerably cheaper than a new truck.
I work with a lot of contractors, and they all still love their big trucks, having at least some utility argument that they are useful for work. But several of them have switched to smaller vans like the Ford Transit, Dodge Ram ProMaster, Nissan NV200, etc., and say they aren’t as cool but they’re so much easier to drive and park at job sites. And they lock up all your stuff, so you don’t have the same theft from work sites, a serious problem where I live. They have racks on the roof to carry ladders, which you had to put on top of the trucks anyway because most trucks can’t even fit a step ladder in the bed. These guys will still keep a few trucks in their fleet for pulling large equipment, but most of the time I meet them on a site, they’re driving the vans.
Vans are superior to trucks for working in nearly every way. More storeage space for tools and materials. Room to build custom shelving/storage. Everything stays dry in the back of a van. Larger vans can even fit a workbench. Vans are more fuel effecient, which should be a no brainer from a business perspective.
The major downside to most vans is if you need to transport more than 2 workers per van.
Van configurations can accommodate 4+ people, just like trucks, if you need it. Maybe not in the smaller vans as easily, if you have a lot of equipment, but the larger vans (Transit, ProMaster, etc.) can fit plenty. Heck, people convert them to live out of as campers. They just don’t feed the same masculinity crisis that trucks do.
I have an F150, but believe me, I tried to go another way. A van wasn’t ideal, because I need something that has an open cargo area, unless the idea of carrying a van full of manure, dirt, or compost seems like a good idea.
What I wanted to get was one of the little kei trucks, espeically a Suzuki Carry, but at the time I couldn’t find one in running condition for less than $25k, and I wasn’t going to pay that, especially when I found a base model F150 with 81,000 miles for $12k. The market may have changed in the past two years, but I have the truck now and it would be silly to waste the time and energy to sell it and find a kei truck.
Yeah, stuff like landscaping is a use case that really does favor open-bed trucks. My neighbor runs a landscaping business and uses a couple Isuzu N series trucks for that purpose. I think one is crew-cab. They’re obviously a bit bigger than the Suzuki Carry, but used ones are close to that price range.
The Isuzu N-trucks are much larger than my F150.
Right, that just makes sense to me anyway. Like, wouldn’t you want better gas mileage for your day-to-day vehicle I get not everyone can afford multiple vehicles but I’d think if you can afford a tank you could probably?
Neither the truck or the bike were very expensive… both of them together were about half the price of a base model new truck.
I wouldn’t mind if they killed giants, but unfortunately they’re killing humans.
