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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

#561

Post by pbmonster »

Aeolun wrote: post #307
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…

If it’s legal for BMW to import it’s cars and sell them, then it should be legal for Toyota to import it’s kei cars and sell them in the US right? You just can’t do it as an individual.

Almost all BMWs on the road in the US are built in Spartanburg, South Carolina.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#562

Post by colinsane »

HPsquared wrote: post #442
yosito wrote: post #430

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an American who grew up feeling annoyed and aggressive toward people driving motorcycles, but now drives a motorcycle regularly for the past 10 years, it never had anything to do with how poor someone was. Motorcycles aren't the most practical vehicles on American roads, so I always perceived them as a sport, not a necessity. And motorcycle drivers has a reputation for pulling stupid stunts and causing accidents o…

Cyclists are perceived as the opposite: hobbyists who go too slowly and hold everyone up. By the simple act of riding down a busy street, a well-placed cyclist can necessitate hundreds of questionable overtaking maneuvers as each car has to pass them. "Trail of chaos" in other words.

cycling is my dominant way around the city during the warm months here. i used to take complicated, meandering routes to stay on the residential roads during my trips so i could avoid that type of passing. but at a certain point, i step back and realize that it doesn’t make sense to radically inconvenience myself in order to make auto drivers’ lives more convenient. we both pay for public roads: i have as much right to the good routes as any other resident; if it’s not working for you then vote for better infrastructure (in this case, perhaps a bike lane).

also FWIW this same problem exists in dense residential streets, just with the roles reversed. all those narrow intersections with no clear right of way and so many cars parked by them that you can’t see far: cars have to slow down way more for that whereas cyclists have maneuverability that lets them go a bit faster — until they catch up to a slow car on the same street. so anyway, don’t think that slowing down other classes of vehicles is a problem exclusive to bikes: on a mixed-use road every class of vehicle, including yours, will at some point require another vehicle to slow down for you.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#563

Post by GiorgioG »

mcv wrote: post #556
GiorgioG wrote: post #539

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My F150 pollutes much less than my wife’s car simply by virtue of me working from home while she commutes every day. Taking up more space is not an issue for people who don’t live in big cities. Trucks are not more inherently dangerous than any other vehicle just because of their size. If that were the case let’s outlaw semis, delivery trucks and anything larger than a VW Golf (a car I had & loved in my youth.) You f…

> My F150 pollutes much less than my wife’s car simply by virtue of me working from home while she commutes every day. Awesome, but that's not about the car, it's about working from home. > Taking up more space is not an issue for people who don’t live in big cities. But it is for those who do. And still for a lot of people outside big cities. > Trucks are not more inherently dangerous than any other vehicle just bec…

> They should probably be required for all trucks.

In your opinion

> It doesn't have to fit all, but it does have to fit the environment, or at least take it into consideration.

What does that even mean? It's a completely arbitrary non-specific statement. Look - if people don't want large vehicles, trucks or otherwise, they'll stop buying them and manufacturers will stop making them. It's entirely your right to dislike the state of things, but I don't believe it's anyone's job or authority to force people to buy a Fiat 500 (a perfectly fine car for many) when they prefer an F-150.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#564

Post by pigsty »

fooker wrote: post #523
vlovich123 wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t know either way but DDG led me here [1] > The largest automobile manufacturing facility in the world for Toyota, Toyota Motor Manufacturing, Kentucky, Inc. (TMMK) is able to produce 550,000 vehicles and more than 600,000 engines per year. Two years after breaking ground in Georgetown, Kentucky, > Where are the majority of Toyotas produced? > The majority of Toyota vehicles you see on the road are made in your…

The marketing trick here is 'assembled'. Nothing major is manufactured here.

At my previous job, I made the robots that Toyota, Suzuki, etc use in their manufacturing lines and directly installed them inside their factories. My experience is, for the most part, first hand.

The vehicles Japanese companies make for the American and US markets have no overlap. Nothing sold in America is made in Japan, and nothing sold in Japan is made in America. A lot of those vehicles are loaded up into tractor trailers and hauled off to their destination—Japanese tractor trailers that those manufacturers use aren’t large enough to haul American vehicles in Japan. Furthermore, the economics for manufacturing huge vehicles in a tiny country that can barely build for its own needs and shipping across the world wouldn’t make sense. The raw materials, energy, and real estate needed for the factories are simply far cheaper in the US.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#565

Post by bombcar »

zirgs wrote: post #484
bombcar wrote: post #443

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

The Romans I was riding with agreed that the sideways parking was the only reason to get them, otherwise they considered them expensive for the size.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#566

Post by DontTrustOver25 »

bioemerl wrote: post #559
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.

> primarily because they get used a lot by people who can’t afford a car. Primarily because they are slow and constantly get in your way, building a train of cars and making many people late for work.

Which is why we need to invest more in non-car infrastructure like ample bike lines, reliable publish transit, and pedestrian friendly sidewalks :)

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#567

Post by Etrnl_President »

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…

Why stop there? If the Toyota Hillox is good enough for Al-Quaeda, why not import it for Americans? It lasts longer, is easier repaired, and is tougher than an f350.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#568

Post by Etrnl_President »

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…

> can't have a 2020s Japanese kei car shipped to a US port at my expense because it'd be illegal to register it.

IIRC the frame makes the car, so you could bolt your kei to a Geo Metro frame, and register it in one of the more lenient states (KY, AZ)

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#569

Post by argiopetech »

afavour wrote: post #258
tonyarkles wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I understand, the two main drivers are: - safety standards (eg crumple zones) - emissions and efficiency regulations that vary with the footprint of the vehicle. Vehicles with larger footprint (= width x length) are allowed to have lower fuel economy numbers, which perversely means that one solution to a truck having poor fuel economy is to make it… bigger.

Another driver is everyone getting pickup trucks and the resulting market distortion. Farmer that needs to haul equipment? You need a pickup truck. Family of four that needs to do the school run? For some reason you’ll also be getting a pickup truck. And there are a lot more of the latter to market to.

There's a lot of room to talk yourself into a pickup. They aren't cheap. If you can afford one, you can also probably afford a boat or a trailer. If either is of more than diminutive size (even theoretically, as a planned future purchase), that basically narrows you down to a pickup or equivalent size SUV. If you also want to carry home improvement goods (concrete blocks, plywood, drywall, or anything longer than 8'), it's way easier to get those in and out of a pickup.

I don't think most people use their trucks this way most days, but it's easy to convince yourself you will.

Re: Rural Americans are importing tiny Japanese pickup trucks

#570

Post by smolder »

chrisco255 wrote: post #315
JKCalhoun wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, what the hell happened? And I miss my manual (1980's?) Chevy Luv.

If you want to actually carry passengers in your truck, you want 4 doors and a full back seat. The new Tacomas are great trucks, because it's practical to carry cargo or people in them. Old single cab Rangers, Luvs, Tacomas, etc, were fine, but not as broad market.

If you need to carry passengers, a truck probably isn't the right choice. Four doors and a bed make for an oversized and inefficient vehicle for hauling either people or cargo alone. You say "broad market", I say "ill suited for most tasks."
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