Pants-of-dog wrote:[...]
This is also mentioned. The legislation is not actually aimed at SUVs but all vehicles that add to congestion and pollution.
Thanks for your post, but my post was addressing Ombrageaux and not the proposed legislation.
grassroots1 wrote:What is "middle-class?" Who are the ideologues and where do you think they come from if not the middle class?
A middle class lifestyle in North America means a home in the suburbs with a family, convenient appliances, and a car or two. It's a pretty convenient and safe lifestyle conducive to raising a family, but some people have an axe to grind against it.
The ideologues are largely left-liberals from upper middle class backgrounds. For them bucolic suburbia represents white bread middle America, which for some reason they hate and call "sheltered". Usually they do not have families. Apparently life is only "real" if you have a horrible childhood. For some reason, living in some yuppie, gentrified downtown neighborhood and spending all your free time on stupid fads does not receive scorn as being "sheltered". Ombrageaux is a good example--he
hates middle class America from his comfortable, bourgeois-bohemian perch in Belgium.
Sometimes environmental reasons are cited, but they're completely unserious given the lack of attention to other motorized transport, other uses of fossil fuel in the economy, and lack of any attention to EROEI.
grassroots1 wrote:I agree with you that there are situations where people need to drive these cars, in bad weather, in rough terrain, etc. However that doesn't mean that this ban is misguided. There is a tendency to buy these cars regardless of need, in the inner city, where their 4WD is never turned on once. That is a tendency which needs to be fought against, and I think a ban on SUVs in Paris is a good way to do that. I feel sorry for the poor country folk who happen to drive into Paris in their family car, and get ticketed. However that will be the exception and not the rule.
These SUVs that have more fuel efficiency are a positive step, but the trend still exists, and in all likelihood these tiny SUVs could have even better fuel efficiency and probably be safer if they had a lower profile.
I am not complaining about the so-called ban. I understand there are good and valuable reasons to regulate what sort of motor vehicle traffic can access inner cities and at what times. I was addressing Ombrageaux's unfounded invective against SUVs.
QatzelOk wrote:SUVs and really wide vehicles present even greater dangers to non-drivers than narrow, low vehicles.
SUVs - because they are more brick-like, are much more fatal for pedestrians or cyclists in collisions.
And wide vehicles make sharing the road very dangerous for other users.
That's a fair point Qatz, though fortunately new regulations in North America and Europe have forced changes in bumper height and distance between the hood and engine in new automobiles. As new cars (including SUVs) replace the existing fleet, the danger to pedestrian and bicycle traffic will decrease.
Maximum vehicle width has long been regulated and isn't really an SUV issue. The Mercedes Benz S-Class is considerably wider than most SUVs on the roads.
Everything you believe is wrong. Yes,
you!Boom. You just got Dave'd. -Bramlow