Vehicle Size Creep

[Irrev-Black]

This!

https://kolektiva.social/@markmetz@sfba ... 4541948907

[two dogs]

I’m currently sitting outside my motel room in Goondiwindi, having a beer, and watching a bloke unpack some items from his Chevrolet Silverado pickup “truck”.

First, he raises the tonneau cover on the pickup bed, reaches over the side, which is level with his armpits, to extract a set of portable steps, which he then uses to gain access to items to take into his room!

Of course, the vehicle does have a tailgate, so the steps may not always be required, but in this case what he wanted wasn’t easily accessible via the tailgate, which I would call poor planning.

I’ve attached a cropped version of an image taken on my iPad.

IMG_0083.jpeg (73.57 KiB) Viewed 978 times

[stylofone]

Big cars remind me of a bit of child psychology I vaguely recall. When you give a baby a present, it doesn't understand what it is and will play with the wrapping.

Later, toddlers will judge the value of a present by its size. A big teddy will delight a child more than a little one.

Soon after, they will value the number of presents. Parents will make sure that all the children at the party receive the same number of gifts.

Finally, older children will appreciate the monetary value of a gift, and you have to make sure you spend enough on them.

It looks like we have added a bit more of the toddler's criterion to cars. "I wanna BIG one!"

They are bloody expensive so I think the last category is still important.

[Irrev-Black]

I’m currently sitting outside my motel room in Goondiwindi, having a beer, and watching a bloke unpack some items from his Chevrolet Silverado pickup “truck”.

First, he raises the tonneau cover on the pickup bed, reaches over the side, which is level with his armpits, to extract a set of portable steps, which he then uses to gain access to items to take into his room!

Of course, the vehicle does have a tailgate, so the steps may not always be required, but in this case what he wanted wasn’t easily accessible via the tailgate, which I would call poor planning.

I’ve attached a cropped version of an image taken on my iPad.


IMG_0083.jpeg

Dinky man is no doubt chuffed to sit so high, above puny sedan drivers and those with lesser utes.

[Irrev-Black]

bmw.jpg (71.18 KiB) Viewed 917 times

Found object, for your consideration.

[stylofone]

Now we can hate EVs too. The BYD Shark will be bigger than a Hilux or Ford Ranger. The initial model is a hybrid, still burning plenty of petrol at 7l/100km. It will be interesting to see what the uptake is like when the EV only version arrives. With all that metal, it is still going to be a climate killer even if it runs on electricity.

https://www.whichcar.com.au/news/2025-b ... -confirmed

[Irrev-Black]

Paris hits the heavies where it hurts.

Parking for six hours on a Paris street in an SUV or large car will cost €225 under a new system endorsed by the city’s voters last night.

In a city referendum, 55 per cent of residents who voted backed the move by Anne Hidalgo, the Socialist mayor, to punish the large 4x4s and other private vehicles that are deemed to be the worst offenders for polluting and crowding the compact French capital.

Only six per cent of 1.3 million potential voters, however, turned out for the Sunday poll on whether to triple the parking charge for heavier vehicles, many of which enter the city from the surrounding greater Paris area.

The narrow margin of approval reflected opposition in the affluent western districts of the capital, where more residents own vehicles, many of them in the SUV category. Hidalgo said: “The Parisians have made a clear choice, with the considerable divisions that we always see between east and west.”

The conservative council opposition, led by ­Rachida Dati, President Macron’s ­newly appointed culture minister, ­opposed the referendum and motorists’ groups called it a pub­licity stunt.

Only a third of Parisian households own any vehicle and there is widespread hostility to “les 4×4 de ville” as they are popularly known. The question on the ballot left little doubt about the expected answer: “For or against creating a special tariff for parking passenger cars that are heavy, bulky and polluting.”

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/pari ... -ls0tz5vwl

[joele]

Can we just get smaller cars and add some audio on loop for the insecure men who feel they need a giant Ranger?

"you are big"

"you are powerful"

"you don't need to compensate for any perceived phallic shortcoming"

mmmm, maybe not the last one, lol..

EDIT - I may be stereotyping due to small sample size, but all the worst road range I have been on the receiving end of is from Raptor and Wildtrak drivers (both versions of the ranger). So to me it is more than just giant cars, it's giant cars matched to giant levels of aggression.

[Irrev-Black]

Tooned!

6e6ebcf7333135ff.gif (199.54 KiB) Viewed 794 times

[stylofone]

The Dodge Ram is one of the worst wankpanzers. It seems that they also want to make it harder to repair them. They lock mechanics out of the system unless they have "accreditation" which includes one million dollars commercial liability insurance.

https://www.dailydot.com/news/mechanic- ... r-systems/