It’s time for Americans to embrace small cars

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.

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” 🤣

Yaris gang rise up!

Want to trade my 09 in for a more recent model, hatchback would be ideal

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

Just got a ford focus hatchback last year after a 95 suburban. Love it. Fits everywhere and fun to drive

Honda Fit gangg

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.

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.

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.

They did for a while in the 70s-80s until giant SUVs got everyone hot and bothered

With their face?!?

Take a breath it’s ok

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 👍

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 walkable zoning, lack of which is the fundamental cause of the car dependency.

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.

Same with a 1959 Panhard PL 17. Some of those little old cars are just beautiful.

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.

Lovely car! Btw: how do you put a picture in a comment? What sorcery is this?

You'd chop up a nash, and put an ev motor in it? I do not have kind words for you.

To be fair, most people aren't driving across the US on an even yearly basis, if ever in their lives.

95% of trips are 30 miles or less. Of course everyone is the exception, we’re all above average drivers here.

Something like the Maverick hybrid might be best for you.

I got the chevy spark right before it got discontinued and the amount of people who comment on my small car in the south is obsurd. It's great being able to fit into a parking spot between 2 monster trucks and it only costs like 25 dollars for a tank of gas. People who see vehicles as more than just a means of transportation baffles me. I like the tiny truck nuts idea I might have to steal that.

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.

So much this. It's infuriating to have to get in a car every time you want to go outside your neighborhood.

That's all fun and games until weather happens...and weather is going to happen a lot going forward.

I drive a fucking roadster from 2001 and somehow it has more internal space than a 2021 sedan.

Problem is that American cities were designed around cars. Getting anywhere on foot, especially for those who live in suburban areas, is basically impossible.

Hard to avoid spending so much time in our cars when rent and housing prices force us to live in them.

I'm not saying you are wrong, because you are definitely right, but I just want to put some context/scale along side this.

28% of greenhouse gas emission comes from transportation. of that 28%, 58% of that is classified as light-medium duty vehicles (consumer vehicles). So ~16% (58% of 28%) of greenhouse emissions are from consumer daily life.

16% is pretty big. Id love to see a dent in that. However, another 48% of the overall greenhouse emissions is energy production (25%) and industry (23%), and I think that's another area we can probably hammer on hard, and should probably start there since its a considerably larger percentage, and the targeted base actually has funds to make changes.

source

tragedy of the commons

TILAW (today I learned a word):

The tragedy of the commons is a metaphoric label for a concept that is widely discussed in economics, ecology and other sciences. According to the concept, should a number of people enjoy unfettered access to a finite, valuable resource such as a pasture, they will tend to over-use it, and may end up destroying its value altogether. To exercise voluntary restraint is not a rational choice for individuals – if they did, the other users would merely supplant them – yet the predictable result is a tragedy for all.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tragedy_of_the_commons

I love my 2017 Volt! I much prefer driving it to my in-law's enormous Dodge Ram and Audi Q7.

Long live the Volt!

Gen1 Honda insight here to corroborate. Trucks seem to intentionally pull in front of me, even when driving reasonably above the limit, just to prove a point. It's dumb.

Japan bases their taxes on engine size and gives significant tax brakes to cars 660cc and under. 3.0L and up are basically luxury vehicles there.

The problem with CAFE is that it does not apply to trucks and SUV's. So bear with me for a moment:

You are a car executive, choosing what car to make. On one hand, say there's a station wagon. On the other, say there's an SUV. The bean counters assure you they cost about as much to produce, but the station wagon has to comply to stricter regulations, and the engineers tell you they'll have to work harder to make the station wagon comply to the law.

Meanwhile, the SUV costs about as much to make, but has way fewer rules it has to comply with. The marketing team tells you they can sell both vehicles just as well, though you may be able to set a higher sticker price for the SUV.

Do you build the more heavily regulated station wagon, knowing your margins are thinner? Or do you take the easier option with bigger margins and build the SUV?

You'll even see the outcome IRL. In the US, Ford tries to convince you that the car you need for your family is a pick-up truck with a crew cab. Meanwhile, in the European market, where larger cars start costing much more much sooner, the same segment gets offered a seven seater minivan.

You list few vehicles but don't appear to know they are in different segments. They're not classified the same so you can't lump them together.

• Civic is small sedan or hatchback
• Accord is mid size sedan
• Corolla is small sedan or hatchback
• CRV is a mid size crossover

Small cars, and mid size cars for that matter, don't sell well in general. They're ~9% of total sales each. Luxury and full size sedans are like ~3% each but they are targeting a very specific demographic that know they'll always have a buyer.

People often blanket both true SUVs and Crossovers into the SUV category for simplicity. But they are in fact different. Crossovers do breakdown into multiple segments itself, though it's typically the mid and full size that sell very well. Collectively crossovers are ~48% of the market. A good example of how to differentiate is Ford Explorer is full size, Ford Escape is mid size, Ford EcoSport is small.

Trucks are ~19%, and actual SUVs are ~8%. For example the Ford F-150 and Ford Expedition share the exact same ladder chassis. Different bodies are bolted on. By this definition, SUVs don't sell well either. Lol. The terms gets muddied up due to mass consumer confusion.

Vans fill the rest of the percentage here, but are typically commercial and fleet.

I thought after 2008 that we had finally gotten over our large car addiction.

They're so addicted to SUVs now that Ford doesn't even make a car other than the Mustang. Their entire lineup is SUVs.

Looks to me like vehicle sales have been taking dramatically, probably due to the increased cost due to "supply chain". Also, EV sales grew 42.7% last year.

Even in Europe, finding a decent used hatchback is way harder than it used to be.

We Americans can't stand walking through the grocery store.

Ebikes are a bigger fucking hazard than cars, I've seen fucking morons on those doing speeds that you should have to be licensed for and should need insurance for.

Never gonna happen. Where I live, it's not safe for my daughter to walk the 1/2 mile to school. To make it safe, we would need to install sidewalks throughout town. That's millions of dollars that less than 100 children non-taxpayers would use. And since the school is in the middle of a residential neighborhood, there's not really any other use of the sidewalks either...

Yeah, changing up cars seems like scratching at a symptom rather than the problem. If there are thousands of cars all headed in the same direction every day... It seems like offering a train would be pretty obvious win.

It is amazing to think of how much land is buried under pavement. The problem is solving the "last mile" issue. You still need a car to get to the train station for instance.

I've been casually looking for when my 80s hatchback dies and the choices are bleak. It seems like there are about 4 options for something of a similar size, half of those are just announced or coming out this year. And none of them start below ~$35k. Which would be fine, except there's been a few decades of everything getting bigger so it'll be another decade til these are in the used market, if they even take off.

The 2+2 is dead and the Crossover killed it.

I was on Greece a few weeks ago and the huge amount of cars were am all ones, like hyundai i2. It was real nice to see haha

And make it so expensive to drive that you kill the ability to drive for every poor person.

One potential remedy could be a powerful enough engine. Small car with fast powertains are preppy and can zip out of a dangerous situation quickly, so that can help your mind.

I want a small truck. Not the new small ones that are the size of 20yr old full-size trucks.

More and better public transport, cycling, and walkable cities would be great. But we can't have nice things because car and gas companies might make less profits.

I love my 2017 Spark. I didn't know they had an EV version.

Same in Europe, small cars either get discontinued or transformed into a SUV...

Honda also pulled the fit. Such a fantastic car no other ones in the US segment came close.

GM has a long history of only half-heartedly offering small EVs.

I love my Chevy Sonic. I hate it when I get surrounded by lifted pickups especially in a parking lot.