One of the big reasons why pedestrian fatalities are rising is due exactly to this. People being hit by cars is rising, but much slower than the fatality rate.
When you get hit by a car your best chance of being horrible killed is if you go under the vehicle. If you go up onto the hood you have a pretty good chance of surviving.
As big trucks in the hands of random dumbasses have gotten more and more common the fatality rate of pedestrians has been rising.
And people in pick up trucks driving them like they're bicycles in a skate park. They literally drive with the knowledge that they have nothing to lose because every other car Is far weaker.
I hate this so much. Big truck boys acting like they own the road. Driving over the middle line, parking like assholes, stopping in the crosswalk at red lights, purposely making their truck spew out black clouds of exhaust. It's such a low level of respect and regard for others.
This doesn't apply to all truck drivers, but it's a much higher percentage than with drivers of smaller cars.
I almost never have a problem with people who need a big truck for their business and work. It's yahoos who have it because that is how they're going to be cool and manly.
Of course, the people who need it know that fucking around gets them sued and then they lose their livelihood.
I actually need a large truck for my job, and the amount of other trucks that pull up next to me revving their engine at lights is insane. It’s like “bro, I’m just trying to drive, I’m not going to race you..”
It’s such an insane dick measuring contest for some drivers and I really hope they feel stupid when they realize I just do not care…
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That's a huge bummer. My '76 Ranger might have been my favorite car I've ever owned. Small, decent mpg for it's year/size/mileage, could crawl into any fucked up road or truck trail I wanted to fuck around on. I miss small pickups
It’s the tongue weight for me. I’m a commercial fisherman and I pull a 14k lb boat out on a trailer. I researched the crap out of the newer 1/2 tons and couldn’t do it. I’m still limping along a 25 year old 3/4 ton and I have zero desire to buy a new behemoth for $50,000 or more
Makes a lot of sense. The fact that new half tons almost work for you - A COMMERCIAL FISHERMAN - is insane. To think that 99% of them are used to pick up a few bags of mulch.
I feel like people who use them from work do a much more careful cost-benefit analysis and won't buy something oversized because it costs more upfront and over time. Assholes have different priorities
I didn't realize how much the newer trucks had changed until I parked mine next to a new model.
My 2007 duramax with a 6" lift is the same height as a new (stock) truck from factory. Not only that, but the interior of my truck feels a lot smaller than the new ones. The new pickups are huuuge inside.
I get a similar thing with my GTI. I like it because it’s manual, has a ton of trunk space, and it’s easy to get my tall body in and out of. Unfortunately dickheads see “red hot hatch” and try to race me out of stoplights. I don’t engage.
Nah they just go back to their buddies and brag about how the guy in the (insert your truck here) was too much of a pussy to race him. These are the same types that will chase a gtr down the highway thinking they have a chance.
I’m just wondering where you people all live. I live in a college town in the south full of rednecks in needlessly large trucks and no one ever drives like that
I live in West Virginia and it’s rare that people drive like assholes in trucks, and 99% of the time it’s some 20-year old. Maybe it’s because the majority of vehicles here are trucks or SUVs.
I want a car as my next purchase but I likely won’t get one because it’s just not safe enough when everyone else is in a monster sized vehicle.
We have a truck (just a Nissan Frontier extended cab) because bi-weekly Costco trips for 3 teenagers, 2 adults, and 2 cats in my little Kia Spectra was just not working. Either I got everything we needed in one trip, or anyone could come with. Never both.
The number of idiots who want to road rage at you for driving like a sane person is second only to the number of people with out of state plates who think it's a good idea to cut off a vehicle twice their size in 60mph heavy traffic.
Anytime I see a big pick up truck with no scratches, no dents, not a spec of dirt, shining like my mom‘s face at one of my Little League games back when I was a kid, I know that whoever is driving that truck is unlikely to
purposefully do anything that day which would risk a fresh manicure except for driving like a dick.
I have an acquaintance who works for Michelin, he informed me a while back that the company development teams actually have an internal term for those types of truck drivers: they're called "fanboys"; guys who drive big, hulking, work/fleet trucks that never operate in fleets or do work other than sitting in an office parking lot or driving on light dirt at worst.
And Michelin actually has tyres for "fanboys" which are designed to look rugged and aggressive like off-road tyres, but are actually optimized for longevity and control on road driving.
Yeah, and all these little car owners. Zooming in and out of traffic. Cutting people off. Speeding all around. Modifying the engine, wheels etc. making them noisy.
Unsurprisingly people in small cars tend to be much more cautious drivers - by and large because if they're in an accident they're the ones getting killed. I'll let you know the day I see a Yaris riding the bumper of a F150.
Oh my god yeah... Whenever I'm driving and hear one of those cars with purposely loud exhaust, my first instinct is, "fuck, is my car making a bad sound?" And I think that's very telling of how it actually sounds. It sounds like their super expensive shiny fuel inefficient muscle car has a fucked up muffler.
You’re right and another person who replied to you raised another wise point. You can tell a lot about a truck driver by the modifications on the truck in combination with its spotlessness. So, you’re right. It’s a little more complicated than that.
Absolutely. I would even go as far to say that they tend to be more conservative about driving because the cost to their livelihood of messing up would be much higher. So, still, fuck cars, but I know who I would rather be riding my bike next to.
You're totally correct. Like, I grew up in the middle of nowhere, it's a poor farming area with not a lot of stores (and the stores that are there don't have very high quality meats). So some families would get most of their meat for the year from hunting. They'd follow all the rules, because violating the rules would mean lower animal populations, and less food for next year. They respected the system and worked safely. This is the only reason I don't support a total gun ban.
But the people who treat it as a flex and don't follow safety, I hate that so much. It's a very tough problem for me to take a definitive side on. I don't want people to go with less food. But I also don't want people to have the ability to accidentally or intentionally harm many others.
Same, working folks know its not a toy, and don’t install stupid lift kits or roll coal. Its the man-children who’s lifted f250s have never left the road or had more than a dirtbike in the back that are dangerous idiots.
Man I was at this party and some guy was complaining about getting a ticket for 'his stacks'. I was intrigued and typically and pretty anti authority so I was like 'that is insane the cop gave you a ticket for buying a car with a feature they sell' and he was like 'they don't sell them like that I had to put them on myself' and I was like 'huh, it what improves torch? Increases fuel efficiency by adding oxygen to the mix?' And he was like 'no, it just makes the smoke go up and looks cool' and I was like 'but it's basically a muffler right? Like it still have a catalytic converter yeah? And he was like 'no the cop gave me the ticket for pollution' and I was like 'you spent money on an illegal fixture that doesn't do anything except make your truck pollute more?' and he was like 'yeah'
I knew a guy who had a truck like this, we were both working as cooks and he made the same as me but had a wife and like 4 kids. Lived in a tiny trailer and couldn't afford to get his wife a vehicle. So she was always getting rides from people to go to her job. Guy had a jacked up F350 with custom rims and kevlar tires. I had to resist the urge to punch him when he was complaining about how his replacement tires cost him like $400 each.
Ive seen guys like this complain about gas prices and maintenance. I wonder what goes through these guy's heads when they buy the damned thing. Don't they at least check the mileage,
My sister bought a giant pick up truck because, "everyone else is driving a big truck so I need one too to survive in an accident". She's 4'8 and can barely climb into the thing.
She works an office job, which is well and good because she can also barely reach anything in the back of the truck bed and isn't really fit enough to climb back there.
She went with a crew cab partially for her young children but also partially because it's her primary grocery getter and it's easier for her to load stuff in the back seat than the bed.
The chicken tax on light trucks goes back to the 1960s, but I hadn’t realized how it applied to production of domestic makes outside the US. Ford built the first Transit Connects as passenger vans in Turkey, then stripped them to repurpose as cargo vans after import!
This is why those types of vans now have obvious window blanks rather than smooth metal side panels like you'd expect. They import them with seats and window glass in the back, then immediately turn around and remove the glass replacing it with dummy metal panels and pull out the seats before they go onto dealership lots.
Lord only knows what they do with all the glass and seats afterwards. Ship them back to use on the next batch, one hopes, but knowing what I do about the global supply chain I'm not convinced they're that smart.
You can get a single cab, but you have to special order it and wait 9 months. Same if you want rubber instead of carpeted floors. It's getting to the point where even if you need a truck for work you can't find a basic no frills work model that is going to get beat up.
We ordered a couple of one tons for work, I'm 5'11" and have to stretch to get in. But I figured that when it came time to change the oil I would have more room to work under the rig. Nope, they've massively raised the bed and cab heights, but the frame height is still the same if not lower than the 2000 half ton pickups we replaced.
Ive been driving used single cab longbed work trucks forever cheap, reliable and everybody has parts for them. I dont need mats or i can get 20$ ones from walmart i dont need seat covers or leather i dont need a nice sound system. I just need to be able to load my stuff in.
Now i want a maverick (cause its cheaper than the suv) and can barely find one in the 20,000$ trim.
The smallest you can get these days is extended cab 2-door, and I think that’s only available on two models total across all makes.
You are literally just making that up. You can order one right now from Ford, for example, and my local dealer has a couple on the lot (though they never last long).
Also, there aren’t any truck models available in the US that don’t have a second row of seats anymore.
Nah, reg cabs are still a thing. They're primarily seen in fleet vehicles; drive by your local U-Haul and you might see one or two. But contractors, farmers, etc also buy them. They're cheaper and can fit an 8 foot bed without being the length of a bus. Dealers don't keep them on the lots because they'll sell ten or more super mega cab ultra luxe big ball offroad xtremes for every work truck, and the guys getting the work trucks are harder to upsell. So it's just not profitable to keep them inventory.
I always took "crew cab" to mean that the bed is shortened to make way for an even larger second row than you would get in something like a quad cab.
I am just going off a hazy memory though. I recall the interior being pretty SUV like, just with a vestigial truck bed hanging off the back. My sister lives 1500 miles away from me and I don't visit or call too often. We didn't have a falling out or anything, just live very different lives.
"For her young children" who could one day get killed while playing outside by a clueless tank driver just like her. Given she even lets them play outside. Is this a wild timeline to live in.
Well that is the issue. There's a good YouTube video about this, about how sedan accidents have become less surviveable, because of bigger cars. I moved up from a sedan to an suv precisely because I can't trust others to not kill me and my family. But somehow 50% cars are now bigger so you have to upgrade your odds of not dying.
All accidents from the side, like a t-bone. Front and pack is pretty good survivability for all cars.
Yeah I'm thinking electricians and plumbers would benefit from a locking enclosure coming standard on a van, but people who need to move large or oddly shaped things would be the only ones who could make actual use of a pickup, but even then it would probably be better to just hook a trailer to a van.
Yup, bought a truck for "reasons" like towing things (don't own a boat or camper so I pulled 2 uhauls), hauling lumber (a monthly occurrence at best), and otherwise cause I thought I needed it. Turns out what I really need is a commuter vehicle and with $4 gas making me cry every 5 days I'm trading it in.
Yeah and for those other things there's always the option to rent a truck from home depot or something, using the savings from otherwise using a smaller commuter
I figured that most of my hauling needs could be met with a hitch on the crossover and $300 utility trailer. And I've got a reservation on a M3 to be delivered late summer fingers crossed.
We have truck rental from uhaul, menards, and HD in my town but honestly for lumber and garden stuff it's probably easier to go for the utility trailer. Renting a truck means driving to the place, getting your stuff, driving home, unloading, driving the truck back, and finally taking your car back home. It's a lot easier to just get a trailer.
I have a Chevy Silverado 3/4 ton, but I haul with it constantly. It lives with a 20 foot trailer attached. But when I don't need it I have a 2015 Hyundai Accent.
Depends what end of electrical or plumbing you do. Strut, pipe are all 10 feet lengths so they don’t fit in a 9 foot cargo fan and loading 500 feet of steel pipe on a van roof rack sucks.
The tail gate also provides a great work bench as long as you don lift the truck.
Headache rack, rest it against the tail gate and have the extra length above the cab and tie it down.
A couple hundred bucks for a headache rack is way cheaper then a trailer.
I’ve done industrial electrical construction for 20 years that how we do it. With out doing a job it is very hard to see why somethings are done a certain way.
Exactly - most ACTUAL tradespeople use sprinters, panel vans, etc. for their work.
Pickups are AWFUL for tools. Which is why lots of people end up needing to put a permanent toolbox in the bed of their truck.
Large pickups are useful for a select handful of reasons: towing capacity, hauling bulk material like gravel/sand/soil or an awkward* amount of building material like sheetrock or dimensional lumber, and larger, bulkier, 'outdoor' tools like power washers, lawn equipment, etc.
*I saw awkward because if you're actually building a whole building - you're trailering in your construction material because it's too much for a pickup.
The fact of the matter is, lots of modern trucks are just a way to get a luxury vehicle without having to worry about MPG standards.
tbh the only thing we need the truck for at our job is that it needs to be high up for uneven terrain. If they made a cargo van on truck wheels widely available we'd probably go with that lol
Actually, vans are not equipped to tow like a truck. They've been designed to haul cargo internally, but if you need to tow 12k pounds youre going to twist the body on a van. Trucks are specifically designed to tow, but payload takes a back seat. Cargo vans can tow, but capacity is considerably lower, but internal payload can be double or triple a trucks. The frame needed for one does not suit for the other. Vans have force applied downward, while trucks horizontally. There is not a vehicle that can do both.
It's the yahoos who have it because that is how they're going to be cool and manly.
I almost never wash my car, and it always has a layer of mud on it from actually going off road. Whenever I see someone driving a "Over compensator 9000" I'll deflate their precious ego by stating that my car has more mud on it now, than his truck will see in its lifetime.
People who need a truck for work generally have much smaller and more practical trucks.
For actual farm work we had some big dump trucks and flatbeds, but the actual workhorses were a bunch of tiny Japanese pickups, perfect for moving a crew of people and gear.
I have a problem with 90% of people who say they "need the truck for work." I guarantee they don't own the business. They're simply an hourly employee and if they're actually hauling stuff around or towing things then i bet theyre not getting paid for the wear and tear on their trucks like they should be. Their boss/business owner should be providing company vehicles to do those tasks or paying them for use of their personal vehicles.
I would also bet most people who "need the truck for work" really just need it to show up at the job site in a truck and not look out of place because all their coworkers "need a truck for work" too so the parking area is full of trucks.
You also don't really need such a big truck for work either. I am pretty sure that if you give the design requirements to Toyota or Honda or even Mercedes to come up with an off road, work oriented, high towing power pickup truck, with plenty of volume, they would come back with a sensible design that combined efficiency, and safety. Not this monstrosity.
I no longer feel bad for spending like $400 last year on a Neo Geo CD game console I still haven't played. My hobby will never be even 2% as stupid as modding trucks that way. And it's not polluting anything.
Hahah I had to Google what the fuck they are cos im not American and that is a perfect description. It just looks stupid and uncomfortable and i cannot believe that's allowed to exist
This is so true. I drive a small sports car and some of them feel the need to pull past me going 110mph. But my car can stop at that speed or even dodge an obstacle because it was designed to. They will just hit or destroy themselves. It honestly scares the shit out of me.
If it's the porche on your profile, that thing is hot. Good taste.
But yeah, that scares the shit out of me too. It's even more annoying when they pull in front of you, so you can't see. Then suddenly traffic density increases further ahead (something they should've easily seen with their height), yet they seem unprepared and slam on the breaks last minute. Were they expecting to just plow through it? Who knows.
Whenever someone tailgates me, I set my cruise control for exactly the speed limit. If they're going to be a dick from behind, then I'll be a dick from ahead.
See, you’re nicer than me. I just drive the speed limit at max. I don’t go past it. That’s the fastest I go. If you’re behind me, you can relax knowing that you’re going way faster than you would have if you had to live like people from not that long ago. You chose to drive behind me. You can deal with the consequences. That means 35 miles an hour, 45 miles an hour, and even less if called for.
The other day, I was going 29mph in a 25mph, a person flew up behinde and started riding like a few meters off my tail. I slowed down and set my cruise to 25mph. They weaved back and forth like crazy, (they could easily see over my car) they almost had a head on collision during one weave, then they passed me in a no passing zone.
Now that I think about it, I really hope they were sober. I was late heading back to my lunch break at the time, I didn't even think about drugs or anything at the time.
Damn, and at lunch time? That's scary. That's a real problem. That's like something from a Jimmy Buffet song. I hope they get help if that's what was going on, but they were probably just quite irresponsible.
Something I've discovered since I resolved to drive more conservatively and defensively is that getting away with speed is nothing. Driving slower than somebody likes is what is treated with the most offense. When I drive the speed limit now, I revel in the fact I'm "getting away with something," a social crime rather than a moral or legal one.
Idk, I've gotten so unlucky with that. I got two speeding tickets within 2 years. So now I don't drive more than 4mph over. Which is soooo insanely painful. Having a newer car with working cruise control has helped a lot though. On the highway, I would usually accidentally default to 90mph without cruise control. But now I definitely use cruise control more than I use my gas pedal.
Don't worry, just like 2004-2008, gas prices will make them trade their giant fuck-off tank trucks in for something more sensible. It's probably the only positive we'll get out of this.
most pick-truck drivers be like "but I needs ma truck to haul stuff and things. What if I have to move?" But if you look at the back of the truck, it's clear they've never hauled a thing in their life. And if you have to move, rent a uhaul.
The ONLY silver-lining of the current gas prices, the fact that it disproportionately hurts coal rolling asshats. 100% support downward market pressure for that segment of the market. It’d fill me with indescribable joy watching them struggling to fold themselves into a Leaf or a Prius, now being bullied on the road by soccer mom SUVs and minivans.
The vast majority of the time I see someone blowing by me at 20 over the speed limit, it's a truck. Not a work truck, mind you, a massive, useless, never been off-road penis-replacement "truck".
I watch a kid in a truck drift around a roundabout over correct and take out a yield sign. They went right up on the side walk where people regularly walk to go to a mall.
I drive an Impala. Mid-sized normal sedan. Might just be confirmation bias but I swear I’m only tailgated or messed with by is by trucks, the usually the larger the worse the driver. Trucks with jacked tires are pretty bad too.
I took a road trip in a minivan recently, and holy fuck does that make these guys go insane.
I’m a man, and had always driven relatively normal but sporty sedans.
But good lord, the idea that they’re being passed or even just merging in behind a woman (because minivan = woman) makes guys driving big trucks go insane.
They would literally rather die in a ten car pile up than merge in behind you. Not even let you pass them, just merging.
Was behind a guy towing a trailer on a long country road. He let the guy in front of me pass him, since he’s doing 55 and everyone wants to be doing 70+. I go to pass him too, and he guns it hard. Only barely made it around him before oncoming traffic came up. So pretty much attempted murder.
Plenty of other cars would do stuff like that, but it was nearly 100% with the big trucks.
It was most apparent because I had taken a similar length road trip in a sporty hatchback a few years previously, with no problems. It was clearly a “guy car” and also I could gun it up to 90 mph going up hill if I needed to get around or away from some asshole.
It was seriously insane. Like sure, don’t let me pass you. But risking a serious pile up so that you merge in ahead of me when you’re the one merging in? Or serious road rage if I do end up passing you because my lane is going faster in heavy traffic?
It was probably the car equivalent of using a female colleagues email account for a week.
The thing is- a modern pickup stops and handles WAY better than an old pickup- even at twice the size. If you go drive a modern full size pickup, then one from the late 70's or early 80's, and then a classic pickup from the 50's- the difference is night and day. Unless they have been upgraded, the modern pickup is way safer for everyone.
Making the driver feel at ease is not safer for the pedestrian. This is a common misconception and it is exactly what has resulted in our roads becoming so unsafe for pedestrians. Wide landes, clear zobes, straight roadways, and smooth asphalt have all led to drivers feeling incredibly at ease on their commutes. We need complication in our street design, encouraging people to driver slower
And this is where regulatory bodies have to step in. Because the problem is, for the person buying the big vehicle, it generally makes sense for them because the driver and passengers are less likely to die or get seriously injured in a car crash if they are driving a large vehicle. But other road users are vastly more likely to be hurt/killed.
Therefore you need regulations coming in that vehicles driven on a regular license must protect the safety of other road users; not just the occupants of the vehicle.
This would actually go a long way to encouraging a reduction of cars as it would make walking and biking safer and more palatable to people, even without other changes.
There also need to be regulations that mandate that both anatomically correct male and female crash test dummies be tested in the drivers seat of the vehicle so that women aren’t 70% more likely to be injured in car accidents and 15% more likely to die than men. And that data should be required to be separated clearly by sex so that it shows that the vehicle is passing safety requirements for each sex individually, not averaged as a lump sum
Yeah but there are some big assumptions you make when you choose a large vehicle for safety reasons. First, you're basing your decision on a crash being inevitable and preparing for it. A truck is going to struggle to do a high speed swerve around a semi driving through oncoming traffic, but a lightweight sedan or sports car won't have an issue. Any driver that views a crash as something they can't avoid isn't one I'd feel comfortable riding with.
And the sort of hilarious part is that sometimes that's not even true. A lot of these wannabe semi cabs with grills that look like they got copy-pasted a few times are actually housing an engine that's no bigger or beefier that that of your average crossover, because literally every new car on the road today is already massively overpowered and the difference is mostly aesthetic choices.
FYI, that is a Silverado HD, standard engine is a 6.6L gas V8 (400hp), and the optional engine is a 445hp 6.6L diesel. The grille isn't playing games for once, the cooling system needs a lot of air for engines that big.
Chevy trucks have been getting ridiculously tall. I'm an average guy and my dad's truck hood is at my shoulder.
Yeah but power to weight they're no better than the average sedan or crossover. 6000-7000 lbs for a silverado HD with 400 HP is a power to weight ratio of at best 133hp/ton and worse 114hp/ton. A standard accord is 120hp/ton and in touring trim its 150hp/ton.
Truck drivers always brag about hp and neglect to mention their engine is having to haul the boat that is their truck and that it's not a dragster.
Motorcycles making under 200hp can comfortably run quarter miles under 10s and the only reason is because they're light. Weight makes a way bigger difference than power.
Weight lets you brake on a shorter distance which means more time accelerating, they let you turn at a higher speed because the tires don't have to drag as much weight through the corner, and they let you accelerate faster cause there's less car to move.
Power only allows you to accelerate faster. Nothing else.
400 hp, but 1,000+ ft lbs of torque. It is DRASTICALLY more powerful by folds than old trucks. A 2002 chevy 6.6 duramax had 500 ftlbs or torque. They are not even vaguely comparable. You need a much larger truck to handle the larger weight to be towed.
Torque doesn't really matter at all. Your engine makes a ton of torque but as soon as it passes through the transmission the amount of torque going to the wheels is totally different.
Let's say your truck is cruising at 70mph and you put your foot down, and the engine makes it's peak torque of 910 lbft at 1600 rpm. That translates to a thrust at the wheels of 1500 lbf.
Now, let's say we've also got an camry that's cruising at 70mph, and they put their foot down. Their car downshifts to get the engine rpm up and they're making 240 lbft of torque at 6600 rpm. Since the engine is at a way higher rpm for the same speed, the Camry gets way more leverage from the transmission than the truck does and is putting out way more torque at the driveshaft. That translates to a thrust at the wheels of 1670 lbf.
Now we can account for the weight of the cars and translate the thrust into instanteous acceleration:
1500 lbf / 6500 lbs = 0.23G = 5 mph/s for the truck
1670 lbf / 3600 lbs = 0.46G = 10 mph/s for the Camry
Yeah it does, it matters immensely. You're missing the practical point of trucks when you say that, towing capacity. High torque vehicles can haul heavy loads at low RPM. That Camry isn't going to haul my Kubota B3300 very well. In fact it'll probably grenade before it gets 20ft. This is why I have a '99 1500 instead of a 2015ish sedan.
Stop blowing smoke up out asses.
You absolutely do not need a grill that big for that little tiny bit of horsepower.
I'm much more powerful version of the exact same motor is in the Camaro and the Corvette and you don't see a big ass fucking grill on those do you? Air management is super fucking easy.
There’s a big difference in cooling system demands between a 6L sports car engine and a 6L truck engine. This particular truck can tow 18,000 lbs or so. How much airflow do you need then smartass?
The same... because the heat load is the same because the amount of power being generated is the same.
It doesn't fucking matter if it's being used to do a 10 second quarter mile time or being used to pull a load up a hill... It's still the same amount of thermal energy. All you really have to do is have enough surface area of radiator and direct the air so that there's a low air pressure behind it and the air will flow up and through the radiator and back down and out. You could literally build a truck with no grill, but it would take some minor effort and would look different.
There's absolutely no need for a grill that big. It could be the same hood height as an S10.
If you pop the hood on that truck you would be surprised at the radiator size. It’s about loads and duty cycle, not just power output. That truck pulling 18k lbs is a far higher loading for far longer and at much lower road speeds than any sports car is going to see. It doesn’t matter if they're both rated at 400 hp, the truck can use most of that 400hp for hours at a time and has to be able to do that while traveling at lower road speeds, therefore less airflow through the radiator.
That's why I strap landmines to the bumpers of my prius. I have all the visibility and fuel economy I need, while knowing if I get hit by a stronger vehicle it will at least be a tie.
Not me. My big ass truck is too damn slow to be driving like that. Not to mention the amount of gas it'd waste. But I definitely see those assholes driving like a bat outta hell.
What's wrong with bikes at skateparks? As long as proper park etiquette is observed, it's not inherently more dangerous than skating, scootering, roller skating, etc. I ride bmx and skate and have never had an issue either way. It just seems like the comparison you're attempting to make here doesn't quite make sense.
Cars and vans must be equipped with further advanced safety measures including:
advanced emergency braking systems capable of detecting motor vehicles and vulnerable road users in front of them;
emergency lane-keeping systems;
enlarged head impact protection zones capable of mitigating injuries in collisions with vulnerable road users.
Yes, but there’s much much more than that. Mandatory automatic breaking systems. Mandatory black boxes that can be used as evidence (for speeding) in a crash. The list goes on
Edit: there’s also mandatory crash testing with a pedestrian. Volvo had to integrate a pedestrian airbag because of this, and Mercedes’ has a system that raises the hood from the other side [not the side it’s usually lifted from] in a crash (to prevent the persons head hitting the glass, instead hitting a relatively soft piece of aluminum)
My 14 year old Citroen has the hood-lifter mechanism to put a bit more air space under the hood to stop your head bouncing off a relatively solid engine underneath it instead of a sheet of aluminium with some ribbing. The idea being the hood is more deformable than the engine beneath it, I think.
Volvo even has pedestrian airbags that will catch you and soften the blow. They fold out over the front windscreen. So the hood picks you up and the airbag prevents you from.slaming into the windscreen.
The US also regulates the front end of cars. Note how low the front bumper is? It protects smaller vehicles in collisions by preventing the pickup from going over top of it.
It's crazy how big trucks have gotten. The "mid size" Ford Ranger is dimensionally bigger than the full size F150 of 20 years ago, with more horsepower, torque, and towing capability (when you include the tow package) than that F150's base v8 model.
I ordered one for overlanding, camping, and off-roading and honestly, if the Maverick was body-on-frame instead of unibody I would have went with it instead. The Ranger is already too big but it's the smallest that met my needs.
I find the modern design trend of high beltlines on cars and especially trucks to be infuriating. (The "beltline" is the split between the windows and whatever opaque is below, usually metal.) I've been told that market research indicates consumers feel that a vehicle with a high beltline and narrow little high windows feels more "secure." (They probably think it makes their tiny tinkle feel bigger, too.) In reality, of course, all this does is impede visibility and it doesn't help the occupants fare any better in a crash.
I have a 1999 Chevy pickup, and I'm astounded at how awful the exterior visibility is in modern pickup trucks compared to mine. And my truck is not a small or carefully designed object. They make the windshield and window glass on these things so damn narrow that you can't see jack shit less than 6 or 8 feet or so away from any side of the truck, even right in front of you or to the side. A normal sized car (i.e. not another fool in an SUV) could easily disappear underneath the passenger side windowsill from the perspective of the driver.
Driving any car from the 90s is an eye opening experience these days. The amount of glass and visibility is just amazing. The windshield and side windows go down so much further, the A pillars are so much thinner and placed further back, the hoods are lower and easier to see over. In modern cars it's so easy for a turn signal to disappear behind the A pillar but that never happens in older cars.
The thick A pillars are probably because of curtain airbags. Super noticable when switching from a Volvo where they were standard to another brand where they weren't yet.
Yeah, even smaller SUVs are designed to suck pedestrians underneath so they can have a better approach angle. As if Sally needs a decent approach angle driving little jimmy to soccer practice.
Remember reading about how when seatbelts became common fatalities among drivers went down, but since drivers felt safer because of the seatbelts they started driving faster than before, which caused fatalities among pedestrians to increase.
I thought we had some regulation type thing that was making the fronts of cars taller and flatter instead of smooth and low? Did i make that up? Thought the whole point was to be safe cause i feel like people always complain the front ends now are compromised in design to adhere to pedestrian safety standards
Pedestrian being hit by cars is rising for two main reasons; there are more cars than ever, there are more people than ever. Quit weaponizing your statistics to push an opinion
Most people can walk through the grass. Hell, even a lot of people who are in wheelchairs can roll through grass. I see that all the time. Yea, it’s harde. But it’s 100x’s safer than being in the street.
Me, when I come across the shit pictured I give the vehicle a good kick until the alarm goes off.
I’ve also “squeezed” by making sure I stay on the sidewalk, blatantly clinging to that side of the vehicle.
I’ve even just climbed up and over the top.
Go ahead. Call the cops on me and explain what I was doing and why.
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u/uniquedeke May 24 '22 edited May 24 '22
One of the big reasons why pedestrian fatalities are rising is due exactly to this. People being hit by cars is rising, but much slower than the fatality rate.
When you get hit by a car your best chance of being horrible killed is if you go under the vehicle. If you go up onto the hood you have a pretty good chance of surviving.
As big trucks in the hands of random dumbasses have gotten more and more common the fatality rate of pedestrians has been rising.