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Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

economist.com

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Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#481

Post by ricardobayes »

deaddodo wrote: post #464
bluSCALE4 wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans are aggressive as hell. I'm willing to bet that cyclist are maimed and murdered hourly by aggressive drivers and get away with it. I was personally ran off the road by an SUV because I apparently angered the driver, because yeah, killing me totally teaches me a lesson.

I mean, I've seen plenty of jackass drivers threatening or acting aggressively to cyclists in Europe. Even the Netherlands, of all places. The biggest difference is there are more protective laws / dedicated bike lanes and the critical mass of cyclists means you might be swatting at a bee swarm.

Interestingly in Spain cyclists are well-protected and ordinary drivers who otherwise might drive pretty unsafely, take care of them. Coming from a different place it's so weird to experience someone driving 35 km/h behind a cyclist on a country road because there is a solid white line and a "no overtake" sign. Even if they do overtake (legally) they always keep at least 1.5 meters. There was a huge awareness campaign about this and it is working.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#482

Post by ricardobayes »

fortuna86 wrote: post #427
bluSCALE4 wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans are aggressive as hell. I'm willing to bet that cyclist are maimed and murdered hourly by aggressive drivers and get away with it. I was personally ran off the road by an SUV because I apparently angered the driver, because yeah, killing me totally teaches me a lesson.

US isn't even on the top 10 list of worst / most aggressive drivers. They at least respect lanes as drawn on the road.

Taking a school trip to Tunisia was a huge eye-opener how liberally people can interpret driving rules. Think of: tourist bus driving on the wrong side on the road to avoid traffic. On a highway, exiting from the left-most lane without signalling etc. Interestingly, they told us that this is still nothing compared to how it is in southern Tunisia - Sfax. I don't really want to go there, I value my life too much.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#483

Post by foldr »

deaddodo wrote: post #474
burnished wrote: post #472

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How outrageous, they want to use the infrastructure like they're people?

It's almost like, in a society, you sometimes give up some of your personal entitlements for the greater good. It's why you'd also be called entitled for using an elevator for your personal enjoyment, for defecating in a public pool, for playing around in a turnstile or for refusing to get vaccinated during a worldwide pandemic.

If we're talking about people giving up personal entitlements for the greater good, car drivers should be the top of the list.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#484

Post by zirgs »

bombcar wrote: post #443
nickpeterson wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve been downvoted over this before but really we just need weight limits on cars. Efficiency is pretty closely aligned and we seem to regulate that just fine.

Very small cars are available in the USA, people just don’t buy many. Mini Cooper, smart, these exist.

I saw a lot of Smarts in Rome simply because it's easier to find parking spaces for them there.

A typical American pickup truck would be a total nightmare to own while living there.

So fix your city planning issues and people will choose smaller cars.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#485

Post by burnished »

ElFitz wrote: post #371
iambateman wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is all true…and also American drivers are legitimately aggressive toward these kind of vehicles. They have a terrible reputation, primarily because they get used a lot by people who can’t afford a car. I wish it were different, but driving a moped/Vespa on American roads is a pretty big risk.

So American drivers are aggressive towards those they think to be poorer than them? Why do you think that is? (genuinely curious)

Theres this weird animosity, people in cars like to get outraged at people on bikes. I can't pinpoint why, but its almost like a xenophobic reaction? Some people see a bicyclist and launch into a tirade about how aggravating the 'bad ones' are. Real self righteous stuff.

Conversely being on a bike there is a real sense that people in cars are out to do you harm. Theres the people who try to rattle you - honk their horn at you to vent their outrage, completely unaware of how fucking loud those things are, or run you off the road, that sort of thing. The real unnerving stuff is the people who come close to murdering you by accident, just not paying attention as they maneuver their vehicles. One time I made eye contact with a woman while I pulled my bike out from under her SUV (just a foot or two under, right between the wheels on the passenger side, real lucky break for me) as she sped away - people do hit and run but I never experienced it as a driver and don't think a car ever stopped to see if I was alright let alone exchange details when I was on a bike.

I never got the impression it was a class thing. I think part of it is that a bicyclist is not at all threatening and rather vulnerable in fact. The other part I suspect is just regular old 'not one of us' shit - if you listen to people they'll basically tell you how they think they should be allowed to wantonly mistreat bicyclists because they felt mildly inconvenienced at one point.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#486

Post by zirgs »

oyashirochama wrote: post #406
TingPing wrote: post #394

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of course it still is… smaller cars, smaller batteries, better all around.

Versus distance and that is an issue of just the geography of the US, we are insurmountable large, even a high end bullet train would take 8-12 hours crossing the country. Stopping absorbs a lot of time for charging compared to ICE or hybrids.

But how many people, excluding truckers, drive those distances?

Most commutes are under an hour.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#487

Post by burnished »

deaddodo wrote: post #474
burnished wrote: post #472

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How outrageous, they want to use the infrastructure like they're people?

It's almost like, in a society, you sometimes give up some of your personal entitlements for the greater good. It's why you'd also be called entitled for using an elevator for your personal enjoyment, for defecating in a public pool, for playing around in a turnstile or for refusing to get vaccinated during a worldwide pandemic.

Yeah, you're the one comparing riding a bicycle on a public road to shitting in a pool. I really cant imagine why you think other people are acting entitled.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#488

Post by ShadowBanThis01 »

burnished wrote: post #472
deaddodo wrote: post #462

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While LA is hardly a paragon of bicycling accessibility, it does have a ton of dedicated cycling routes (I’m talking 8-12+ ft wide, dedicated pathways) that can get bicyclists to most of the major hubs throughout the city. Even still, you’ll see the occasional bicyclist(s) who wants to drive down Washington Blvd during rush hours Because-They-Can(TM) and the cycling path is a little too inconvenient for them, holding…

How outrageous, they want to use the infrastructure like they're people?

NO. They're leaving the infrastructure we ALL paid to build for them vacant, and blocking that which we paid for to accommodate motorized vehicles.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#489

Post by ShadowBanThis01 »

fortuna86 wrote: post #427
bluSCALE4 wrote: post #381

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Americans are aggressive as hell. I'm willing to bet that cyclist are maimed and murdered hourly by aggressive drivers and get away with it. I was personally ran off the road by an SUV because I apparently angered the driver, because yeah, killing me totally teaches me a lesson.

US isn't even on the top 10 list of worst / most aggressive drivers. They at least respect lanes as drawn on the road.

But they're too dumb to understand the passing lane.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#490

Post by mcv »

nyx wrote: post #29

The 25-year import rule here, which bans Americans from importing vehicles from other countries unless they're 25+ years old, is just awful for those of us who would be interested in driving small, efficient foreign cars. It would be great to live completely car-free, but absent major changes to how we plan our cities, it's just a sad reality that cars are a necessary ingredient to life in the vast majority of Americ…

That 25+ year rule also guarantees that the models are not going to be up to date to modern standards regarding pollution (though I'm not sure they've been updated in 25 years in the US) or safety (but extremely unsafe oversized trucks for personal use are allowed anyway, so apparently nobody really cares about safety).

I think the US needs to update a lot of rules regarding the sale, import, pollution and import of cars, including trucks. Require commercial licenses for the big stuff, have US manufacturers manufacture these practical small cars in the US according to modern US standards, and allow the import of vehicles that US manufacturers refuse to make.

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