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I agree with much of what this writer has said, though he has made a few factual errors, mostly I suspect due to a not great grasp of engineering on his part. I believe the Bronco has been around since before 1983. I don't doubt that the capabilities of the Porsche Cayenny will vastly exceed what anybody has ever experienced in an SUV, or indeed in most cars. The Cayenne Turbo has lapped the (12.8 mile) Nurburgring only 8 seconds slower than the base model Boxster. Four wheel drive vehicles such as Audi quattros or Subarus etc. do offer advantages in normal driving over two wheel drive cars.
But, IMHO, the fact remains that FUV's as he nicely sums them up, are the next step to removing any form of gun regulation. I remember somebody yelling at me out here in the past because, in his words, "If my wife wants to drive an SUV because she feels safer in it, then I'll darn well let her". My thought would be, if my wife feels safer in an SUV, I would prefer to at least try to educate her that she would actually be safer in another type of vehicle.
Since we in the US appear to be totally ambivalent to the fact that vehicles burn gasoline, which being a fossil fuel has a finite supply, then perhaps a more realistic (and equally fair) way to go after these behemots is by rating their insurance policies in a way that reflects the damage they do (1) to other vehicles (2) to the occupants of other vehicles (3) to themselves in an impact. Since SUV owners appear to think more about themselves than anybody else, this last part may be the easiest part for them to understand.
I understand why Reagan saw a need to give SUVs a legislative break 20 years ago. The Big Three had fallen drastically behind the rest of the world in engineering (IMHO, it is still behind, but not as dramatically as it was, and it is at least much more cost-effective than the Europeans), and if some loophole hadn't been created, we would probably have lost Chrysler and at least one of the other two. The economic chaos that would have ensued would have been catastrophic. Unfortunately, I believe, it should have been made clear at the time that this would be a temporary fix, but instead it has become the lifeline that has kept them alive. Kind of like the patient that is given a short term dose of morphine, but remains on it for the rest of his/her life. It is time for Detroit to come off SUVs, and give us decent traditional cars. They have actually already done this, to be fair, but unfortunately the buying public is too stuck on enormous vehicles, and since they can be sold so profitably, there is little reason for Detroit to stop producing them. Until it pecomes a pain in the wallet to drive a 3 ton 10 mpg vehicle, people will still want to do it. If gas went to $2.50/gallon, and the insurance spiked 50%, all of a sudden, a lot of SUV's would be traded in for normal cars. One way or another, big trucks will go out of fashion, though they are certainly lasting longer than most people thought they would. I thought the situation was pretty bad in 1993 or 1994. (This is why I believe SAAB SHOULD build a crossover vehicle).
The NHTSB must be operating out of shackles. Why don't they run advertisements that show the aftermath of a car being plowed through by an SUV? "If this SUV was a car, the family that died in the car would have survived. Do YOU want to be a killer?" Kind of extreme, but still realistic and very poignant.
posted by 141.154.12...
, Mon, 20 Jan 2003 22:05:09, Mon, 20 Jan 2003 17:55:50
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