Quote:
Originally Posted by Red-86
I hate them with a fiery passion. For one thing, many of them are huge. They hog the road and fill up car parking spaces that still seem to be sized for much smaller 1980s cars. But I also hate what they have done to normal car sales… coupes, hatches, sedans and wagons are all dying off, being replaced by SUV lineups. Other than the elevated seating position and slightly easier loading of heavier items, there is nothing the typical SUV does that a good wagon cannot do better. The wagon is more aerodynamic, lighter and so uses less fuel on average. It has a lower COG and handles better. It doesn’t block the forward view over the roof as much. It looks better! And many wagons actually have more cargo space than many SUVs (especially these fugly ‘coupe’ SUVs). But the market has spoken apparently, and passenger cars are going the way of the dodo as SUVs take over the roads.
The thing that really irks me is that at the same time we have a push to make vehicles as ‘green’ as possible, we live in the heyday of the lumbering great SUV! I mean, look at the things that make a car as efficient and environmentally friendly as possible… aerodynamic (so it must have a low profile), lightweight (so it has less mass to move), small (uses less materials). The SUV is the antithesis of all of these! Even as engineers wring every last ounce of efficiency out of engines, many of the fuel efficiency and emissions benefits of improved engines are lost because these modern engines need to haul around these huge and heavy vehicles! It’s so ridiculous.
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but look at the numbers. a 2019 86, a nearly textbook example of a small, lightweight, barebones car, only manages to achieve 21mpg city/ 28mpg highway.
the 2019 kia sorrento for an example, in all it's 'heft' lays claim to 22mpg city/29mpg highway.
so the SUV
is more efficient by the numbers, even if it's only 1 mpg... if one's got a family, there's really no difference, so people are understandably buying the biggest thing that they can afford that suits their needs. small cars have a ton of caveats. i'm single and i don't even like taking the 86 for grocery shopping. no matter how few bags i get, it always somehow turns into a champion-level tetris game...