Rational transportation choices, or "My 3 ton SUV"

[dogman dan]

Everybody that buys a car has his reasons. I have, over the years and living in a place where registration is cheap, adopted the multiple vehicle approach.

Your choice of one big suv in the fleet makes a ton of sense if it get's driven less than 5,000 miles a year. What cracks me up is the guy that tows a horse trailer perhaps once a month or less, but daily drives his one ton 4 door pickup, with no cargo or passengers, 25,000 miles a year. Ever try to park one of those at the grocery? Your lexus Suv makes sense only if it's truly driven only in the bad weather. If your wife would drive it daily, get a second car for the daily beating, like an accord or whatever.

For a daily driver that's not too bad in the luxury department, fairly decent mileage, roomy enough inside, decent resell, sturdy enough in a crash, and really will go places you'd think only a rock crawler could go, you might just go test drive a subaru. You mentioned able to drive in snow? Go to a ski town and count the subarus in the ski area's employes parking spot.

Certianly a forester or whatever is no lexus, but it's a pretty green choice for an SUV. They aren't that tiny, I carry 8' long 2x4's and pipe inside instead of on the roof rack. But 25 mpg for a car that comfy that will do wicked jeep trails is pretty good. That's not EPA sticker MPG, thats what I get now in one with 140,000 miles on it. BTW, 100 mph is also no sweat for this car. Try doing 100 mph in a ford suv with 140,000 miles on it. 8) Anyway, the point is, it's got a decent power to weight, and even with a kayack on the roof it merges and passes just fine. Only a moron would need help parking one, and driving over a curb or around deep ruts in dirt roads is not a problem. Only thing that ever scrapes is the hitch.

As for safety, not crashing is the key. A subaru or similar honda small suv is going to be far more nimble than anything in the Suburban, Lexus, Lincoln, Hummer, etc class of Suv's. I don't know about the other small suv's but I have found that subaru every bit as nimble in the wierd suprises on the road as any small hatchback. Sure couldn't say that about the older larger version of the cherokee, or any of the many suburbans Ive driven.

But I repeat, if that Lexus is really going to be driven 5,000 miles a year or less, then it's eco impact is still pretty small. Go for it if this is the case. It's just driving one of those with one person in it to the city center daily that's stupid. Buy more cars and dive the tiny one, or the motorcycle when you can. Drive the monster when you must. I own a one ton truck. I drive it about two miles on the weekend to haul dogs to a rabbit chase. About once a month I drive it to work to haul cement or rock. Takes me a year to put 2000 miles on it. But when I need it, I need it. Mostly it sits, getting driven a mile or two a week to keep the tires round.

 

[Toshi]

But you're a physician right? So you are familiar with the Hippocratic oath - "do no harm"....does that only apply to your medical practice? or to your practice in life in general?

Buy whatever car you want, but don't expect people on an EV forum to give you the green light if you decide to run a Lexus tank.

The way I see it, if you are prepared to compromise on some of your rather exacting requirements, you could save some money and sleep better at night....and be an ambassador for a more environmentally sound way of life. If you have the income to do so (many don't) then why not?

eg why not run two used vehicles - one economical vehicle for when you are commuting, and one larger safer vehicle for weekend runs with the family?

The difference in carbon impact between the most austere Western lifestyle and the most lavish (excluding crazy outliers like Al Gore with his mansion and private jet) is well under an order of magnitude. As I'm not willing to live in a treehouse and renounce modern, petroleum-intensive technology (ever think of the energy input to design, create, and run an MRI machine?) then why delude myself and have a few selected pieces of environmental austerity in my life to falsely salve my conscience?

I used to be with you--I thought that raising awareness (in true Stuff White People Like fashion) and getting other people to live more like me would fix things ultimately. I don't think that's true any more.

Finally, with regard to your two vehicle solution, I already do something like that. Most days I commute by a Euro 3-compliant, 45 mpg motorcycle. I enjoy riding it, even though I know it carries with it an inherent risk. I don't enjoy driving my Honda Fit, on the other hand, and wish that my wife's Prius were quicker, less raucous under acceleration (it's very quite while cruising, on the other hand), better in the snow (even with snow tires it's limited by being low and FWD), and safer yet. It's the safest "small car" per the most recent IIHS data yet is not that great in absolute terms despite undoubtedly being driven by a cadre of conservative, slow drivers.

 

[Toshi]

If you can't bet em, join em? Double-down on your BP stock too.

Perhaps a couple of years working for the VA is in order... Tell those Vets thanks for losing your legs so I can drive my SUV.

I'd love nothing more than to see our troops recalled from all foreign lands, the gas tax raised significantly, and a true carbon tax implemented. That would make a difference, but it's not going to happen secondary to our political system.

 

[Toshi]

Your choice of one big suv in the fleet makes a ton of sense if it get's driven less than 5,000 miles a year. What cracks me up is the guy that tows a horse trailer perhaps once a month or less, but daily drives his one ton 4 door pickup, with no cargo or passengers, 25,000 miles a year. Ever try to park one of those at the grocery? Your lexus Suv makes sense only if it's truly driven only in the bad weather. If your wife would drive it daily, get a second car for the daily beating, like an accord or whatever.

I like your thinking, but you're still trying to optimize for carbon footprint. I've decided that that's not going to be my priority when it comes to transportation, for the reasons I've laid out above and because depreciation on any newer/nice vehicle will be significantly more than the price of our artificially cheap (and likely to stay that way) gasoline.

Mind you, if I end up somewhere like Portland, Oregon, where the incentives really align to make things like home solar panel installations affordable, then I'll be the first in line. I'm not out to maximize my carbon footprint. I'm just not hell-bent on minimizing it at all costs.

As for safety, not crashing is the key. A subaru or similar honda small suv is going to be far more nimble than anything in the Suburban, Lexus, Lincoln, Hummer, etc class of Suv's. I don't know about the other small suv's but I have found that subaru every bit as nimble in the wierd suprises on the road as any small hatchback. Sure couldn't say that about the older larger version of the cherokee, or any of the many suburbans Ive driven.

As I mentioned in my original post above, I thought similarly to you. Then I looked at the IIHS data and found conventional wisdom/my preconceived notion to be untrue. To quote myself again:

I used to resent the large vehicles that soccer moms throughout the US tend to favor. I thought that they only lent a false sense of security, what with their bulk, high seating position, and, often these days, high "cocooning" door sills. I thought that superior active safety, the increased nimbleness and maneuverability that a smaller, lighter car offers, would trump passive safety when the time of reckoning arrived.

I was wrong.

It turns out that, all other things being equal, physics trumps all... and now, thanks to lower rates of SUV rollovers, "all other things" are indeed equal.

 

[dnmun]

i think being in new york has driven you insane. solar in portland is a sure sign you have reached dementia. the fact that you can say you don't care about your carbon footprint after all your previous incarnations indicates you are suffering from social induced hypersensitivity to the social class implications of the vehicle size and bling. you need time alone in the mountains. at least two years minimum. no juice or water bottles either. please.

 

[Toshi]

i think being in new york has driven you insane. solar in portland is a sure sign you have reached dementia. the fact that you can say you don't care about your carbon footprint after all your previous incarnations indicates you are suffering from social induced hypersensitivity to the social class implications of the vehicle size and bling. you need time alone in the mountains. at least two years minimum. no juice or water bottles either. please.

Portland may not be ideal in terms of solar radiation, but the city and state's solar and wind incentives are pretty much unparalleled. If you click through to the link from that post above then you'll see that the subsidy, as I worked out, is near 90% (!).

With regard to being sensitized to class from having been in a very class-stratified region: you probably are right, at least in part. That said, I'm still totally fine with looking like a clown and riding around on my $3500 (used) motorcycle in high-viz.

I do have an intense feeling of vulnerability when on the bicycle, but I think that's more an appropriate reaction to the unsafe, uncaring assholes in the cars around me when I'm on the road rather than any projection of class and status.

8)

 

[vanilla ice]

Like dog said, cars can do as well or better off-road or inclement weather as SUV's. You can even get AWD minivans now. Anyway what percent of SUV really get used for their unique capabilities. 1 or 2%? Half of them in my city have 22" chrome rims on them..

 

[Toshi]

Like dog said, cars can do as well or better off-road or inclement weather as SUV's. You can even get AWD minivans now. Anyway what percent of SUV really get used for their unique capabilities. 1 or 2%? Half of them in my city have 22" chrome rims on them..

Rainy weather, sure. Snow? The AWD cars would do fine until the snow depth was greater than their ground clearance. Off-road? Not a chance. There is no substitute for a two speed/low range transfer case, ground clearance, underbody protection, locking diffs/sufficiently advanced traction control (such as Toyota's A-TRAC).

I looked into it a while back, and most "AWD" systems on car-based vehicles are entirely useless when 2 (let alone 3) wheels don't have traction. Subaru's fancy system (VTD) and Acura's SH-AWD were the exceptions in an otherwise sad field of contenders:

Video demonstrating that Subaru VTD > 4Motion > Honda Real Time 4WD or Toyota Full Time 4WD: http://tinyurl.com/6krp8oa

Video showing A-TRAC's effectiveness. First up is an open diff Land Cruiser, next up a modern one with A-TRAC, third one with mechanically locked differentials:

[youtube]of-0KOCmUpU[/youtube]

This is separate from the question of whether I'd use this ability, of course. Regularly? Probably not--I admit this without reservation. Then again I don't crash regularly, either, yet I'd like to be prepared for such an occurrence.

Another rationalization is that I'm a general whore for technology. Part of the appeal of my wife's Prius is the technology underlying it (not to mention that it works pretty well in its intended application). Part of the appeal of building an electric bike was the technology, not to mention the novelty. (A larger part of it was the free parking at both of the hospitals at which I was working, as opposed to $15/day car parking.) With this latest lark, with which I probably won't follow through in all honesty , I demonstrate that I'm similarly fascinated with 4WD technology...

 

[Erogo]

I like how you head it up "Rational" transportation choices, then run a whole list of emotional arguments about "flashy and trashy," "I don't care", "dont want to look like" etc etc. Why church it up as "rational" if you don't care about that? I'm not going to diagnose you as a sociopathic misanthrope, as I'm sure you're more highly qualified than me to make that judgment. From my emotional standpoint though, it seems a shame that individuals still take part in the sort of vehicular arms race that justifies to them the purchase of a vehicle as a defense system. Emotionally I'd like it if more of youse jokers could take inspiration from the careful disassembly of the nuclear threat that collectively your good country has gone through recently. Now that was an irrational, yet mutually and individually beneficial, act.

Cheers,

Eric

 

[Toshi]

What's rational, then? A hope and belief that making incremental changes to our overall unsustainable Western lifestyle will have an appreciable effect? The assumption that if we all switch over to clean energy then the BRIC countries will as well, instead of following their nose to cheap coal and oil? The intimation that transportation choices are what really ail us as a society?

We've constructed something nice: a world where we live longer, eat better, at least have the option of engaging in a more healthy lifestyle, and generally toil and sweat much less than did our forebears. All of this is predicated upon cheap energy. Renouncing a little piece of it won't absolve you of guilt, and the political reality is that not a damn thing will be done to address it in a meaningful way. I'm quite sure that even if the whole world lived with a per capita carbon footprint of the most frugal of E-S members (live ones, that is ) the whole house of cards would still come tumbling down. Hell, that'd be an unimaginable step up in energy use for the vast majority of humans on this planet.

Given this, who then would be making the more rational decision: someone choosing a vehicle based on its attributes and what he desires; or someone so devoted to the cause of carbon footprint reduction that he pronounces a possible vehicle choice that'd marginally affect the same as a "sociopathic misanthrope"?

 

[dogman dan]

I would have thought that nimble would have counted for more. Obviously not, according to the numbers. Especially if the small vehicle driver was texting.
My bias was that nimble should be worth somthing to those who do look out the front window of the car.

I could care less about my carbon footprint. Making less than 20k a year for my entire lifetime, I only care about not wasting my money. So I don't drive my 9 mpg one ton much. It's a dollar a mile vehicle.

You of course, need to make your car decision on your own needs, whatever they may be. For me, one major need that gets more important as I age, is that I don't have to try to park that big mofo one ton at the grocery store unless I have to.

The size is safer deal reminds me of helmet arguments. I know a nurse, who based on what she's seen in the ER, wants to die immediatley in a crash. Me, I'm a glutton for punishment. I'd rather be alive to suffer. You decide that one based on your own criteria. I do know for sure, people that see that one ton tend to yeild. 8) You can definitely crush those texting idiots in hatchbacks all day in the one ton. Still gonna have to park it though. I can totally understand a wanting to put a child in the safest, most crashworthy car you can.

Real 4x4 will go places my subaru won't. At my age, real 4x4 goes where I won't. But I'll go places few will in my subaru, and enjoy the look on the faces of the rock crawlers as I go by. I can drive dirt, so I can take the subaru nearly anywhere it's an actual track. Low range would be nice, but I tell you, those engines are torquey. So you drive it a bit faster than low range, no prob. Snow a foot deep is just a joy to drive through. 15 inch tires is sufficient clearance. Better than many trucks with 15's.

You really going to go real 4x4ing in that Lexus? It would be the first one I bet. Till guys like me get em used and dented. nice video, I'd likely not try to take the subaru up that. But steps 2" tall are routine. I saw more driver difference than anything. The good system does give your more brave though.

 

[Erogo]

What's rational, then?

You tell me, you started it!
But I'll say this isn't a rational decision process you're going through. I don't like the decision you've come to, and I don't like that you frame it as "rational". I have no problem with either rational or emotional choices, but why frame one as the other?

As if you give a toss about what I do and don't like, here's a few more

I don't like (but do appreciate) the insight into this american car-buying psyche, it explains a lot, thankyou. It is far from the love-thy-neighbor ideal that I thought was core to the american religious beliefs. I have no idea whether you hold christian religious beliefs; I for one don't but still think some of the guiding principles are "nice" (not rationally, just emotionally ) Would my principles extend to helping someone out of trouble, if I knew that they had been as selfish as you are? I don't know, would you like to test me?

We've constructed something nice: a world where we live longer, eat better, at least have the option of engaging in a more healthy lifestyle, and generally toil and sweat much less than did our forebears.

I think there are also arguments against this, I wouldn't say it's totally settled. We've balanced our riddance of various physical ailments with the adoption of psychological ones (stress, depression etc), we've replaced them with new modern conditions (obesity, diabetes, etc). You can fill in this list better than I can, being a physician.

No, an individual's personal choices won't save the planet on their own, but their influence (and you're an important influential person, Mr Physician) on others may lead to the snowballing effect that could then help a bit more. Arms races have bad outcomes, disassembling the vehicular deterrent is nicer.

But none of this has anything to do with "rational", as far as I can see.

Sorry for the implication that you're a sociopatic misanthrope, I truly don't believe it's up to any of us readers of your post to make that judgment.

Eric

 

[Toshi]

You really going to go real 4x4ing in that Lexus? It would be the first one I bet. Till guys like me get em used and dented.

Although if I did go this route I'd go used, it'd still be a late-model expensive vehicle with nice paint, so no hard core trail use. Anyway, that fancy front bumper fascia won't take a winch.

I would try to make it out on as many "high clearance 4x4 only" roads as I could at our nation's beautiful National Parks, on the other hand. (Most of those roads would be passable by, say, a Subaru Forester but for the odd obstacle, but the odd obstacle holding one's progress up is the last thing desired when 60 miles from civilization or cell service. My open-diff Pathfinder at stock height on street rubber did fine, but then again, the weather conditions were perfect.)

Here's a photo I took in 2003 while midway through a long off-road loop in Capitol Reef National Park followed by another from a similar "high clearance 4x4 only" road at Guadulupe Mountains National Monument:

With regard to going quickly with a helmet or unhelmeted: Head injury, morbidity, and mortality are higher for unhelmeted riders. So, too, do they represent a disproportionate share of hospital expenses. From this last link:

Conclusion: Non-helmeted motorcyclists have worse outcomes than their helmeted counterparts independent of the use of alcohol or drugs. Furthermore, they monopolize more hospital resources, incur higher hospital charges, and as non-helmeted motorcyclists frequently do not have insurance, reimbursement in this group of patients is poor. Thus, the burden of caring for these patients is transmitted to society as a whole.

In my experience in the hospital, helmeted riders break limbs just like everyone else (duh). They also die outright if they really get whacked by a left-turning car, or run over by a truck, etc.--they're certainly not immune to injury, and I've seen riders in full gear die. I've also seen a lot of 4-wheeled vehicle drivers die, on the other hand, and anecdotal evidence only goes so far…

In any case, I haven't seen any long-term vegetables who had been helmeted at the time of injury, though: that very unfortunate crew of largely middle-aged white males, whom I presume to have been riding cruisers, possibly drunk (although I can't verify either of the last two claims), were uniformly from the "too cool for school" unhelmeted crowd in my limited experience. It's a shame to see an unresponsive-but-otherwise-physically-intact 40 year old man with nothing left in his future except for decades of long-term nursing home care, trached and PEGed.

 

[vanilla ice]

If you're REALLY going to go places an AWD car/minivan can't go.. I can see the LX making sense. Or if you're not going to do enough miles where MPG matters, I can see it too.

 

[dnmun]

ok, rational response to fear of cars and the idiots who will kill you with them. i agree, same cure, 2 years in the mountains. and hope they are all dead when you get back.

you forgot about the 11% income tax rate, and the city tax too. i see the panels on a lotta houses here in this neighborhood of hybrids and commie artists, but the tax rebate is the wrong reason, imo.

instead the city should be encouraging people to build EV charging spots in their driveways to share with other EV owners. that would be a more effective property tax incentive. imo

 

[Erogo]

Oh man? Who invited these fellas?!

 

[vanilla ice]

IMO if you want a used LX, go get one. Looks like with you as the next owner it at least has a shot at getting used for what it was made to do. Basically its a Land Cruiser with a nice interior so I know they can wheel pretty well..

I don't like (but do appreciate) the insight into this american car-buying psyche, it explains a lot, thankyou.

Speaking of insight- Have you guys tried to fit a rearward facing baby seat into a medium sized car? Believe me, its not an easy fit in a lot of cars, we did it with our kids for years. I think the regulations on how young ones need to be seated have done as much to boost SUV sales as anything else has. The logic for many families goes like this.. Read up on laws. Buy huge awkwardly shaped baby seat. Too difficult to fit the baby seat in car. Need something larger. Don't want to be seen in a minivan. Shop for SUVs.

 

[chroot]

*cough*cough* I own 1996 Jeep Cherokee 4x4 and It runs 13MPG. I use my Jeep for the towing, cargo or 4x4 off-road and sometime had to use my Jeep drive to work (If my area rainy and cant use my ebike).


My jeep can eat any obstructed due my jeep has lockers in both axles. 8) :lol:

 

[Toshi]

If it were just a matter of fitting a rear facing car seat then we'd pick a minivan or large car, anything with over 34" or so if rear leg room but ideally with more for back of front seat "kicking room". I have a whole list made out for my wife of everything from a Prius V to a Lexus LS (and some crossover SUVs, too). She will never go off road so a body on frame SUV with low range 4WD would be entirely lost on her.

 

[dogman dan]

Nice pics. Looks like you DO drive dirt. Sooo many think they do, and get stuck. So go for it if you will use it, particulary for that baby seat issue. But maybe haul your ass to work on a merely rainy day, in a cheap little hatchback. Minivans get such a bad rap. I've loved a few caravans I owned at times, especially the long body ones. Carry plywood inside, and still park easy. Worked construction out of those vans for many years.

Off topic a bit, much more depends on the driver than the vehicle. One day deer hunting, my buddy and I sloshed by on a road 6" deep in mud. We grinned past 4, 4x4 pickups, that had all slid off the road into the ditch. Me in a 62 chevy pickup with a huge camper and bald rear tires, my buddy in a VW campervan. Both of us with 2wd. :lol: Grinning, we slithered on by the floor it works better club.

 

[Toshi]

I don't think I'd ever go to an ORV park simply to climb rocks or play in the mud--not with that nice paint, like I mentioned before!--but I do try to use my toys. I put more miles on my motorcycle than on my car over the last two years, used to drive up to Whistler from Seattle and Portland in order to go downhill mountain biking, and actually regularly autocrossed and HPDE-day-ed my WRX and RX-8:

Wasteful activities, these? Yeah, as compared to being dead or reading notes scrawled in biodegradable ink on recycled paper by candlelight in an unheated room, I suppose. It did bug me, though, and part of the reason I stopped mountain biking and autocrossing (and sold my car entirely, going without wheels for 15 months) was because I felt guilty about the waste.

From now on I'm not going to feel guilty about the things I enjoy irrespective of their carbon cost, within reason: no burning old growth forests or mutilating endangered species for fun, of course. On the other hand, you'll never hear me complain about our gas prices, I promise you that.

 

[number1cruncher]

IMO if you want a used LX, go get one. Looks like with you as the next owner it at least has a shot at getting used for what it was made to do. Basically its a Land Cruiser with a nice interior so I know they can wheel pretty well..

I don't like (but do appreciate) the insight into this american car-buying psyche, it explains a lot, thankyou.

Speaking of insight- Have you guys tried to fit a rearward facing baby seat into a medium sized car? Believe me, its not an easy fit in a lot of cars, we did it with our kids for years. I think the regulations on how young ones need to be seated have done as much to boost SUV sales as anything else has. The logic for many families goes like this.. Read up on laws. Buy huge awkwardly shaped baby seat. Too difficult to fit the baby seat in car. Need something larger. Don't want to be seen in a minivan. Shop for SUVs.

Wow, you're good. That's what happened to us. But we went from a Mini to an Escape. Not much difference in MPG...

 

[chroot]

Exactly, Depends on driver's skills and sometime you can be screwed big time like getting stuck or roll over damage to the SUV or Jeep.

Off topic a bit, much more depends on the driver than the vehicle.

 

[Erogo]

Hey Toshi,

ah, ... just read your other threads...

... may have overreacted wrongly ....

..would like to apologise - you've obviously put more thought into this over the years than I gave you credit for.

Eric

 

[Toshi]

Fair enough. Of all the things people accuse me of, not putting enough thought into things isn't a typical one... :lol: