Why an SUV or utillity vehicle? A study

I have been away from the United States for a number of years and when I returned I found many more utility type vehicles on the road. This includes SUV, station wagons and minivans. Sport Utility Vehicles as the most popular of these utility vehicles. It looks to me that the SUV has become the family car of choice these days in the US. By sales numbers and the general view on the streets. I want to get some opinions on why people are choosing these as a family car, especially SUV. I am vary curious about the vastly increased market share of SUVs, in the US so please tell me something if you bought one. I am a

34 year old male and I would not be caught dead in one and would never buy one. Long ago when I was in the US and in high school during the late 1980's most of us drove older used cars. However when someone got to buy something new they often got Mustangs, Camaros, Firebirds etc,..or imports like the Honda CRX , Nissan 240, or small pickup trucks. . No one would get an SUV if they had a choice in the matter. Now it seems that SUVs are fashionable even in the eyes of younger people. Considering that most families are 2 children or less in the developed world, all that is needed is a 4 door sedan. In places like Asia and Europe, a small 4 door sedan like Honda Civic is what is used for a family of 4. A soccer mom would have to pop out many more babies to need a bigger car. Even a 2 door car would work well if it has 4 seats. It is strange to see people with only 2 children driving a minivan or SUV with seating for a dozen people. My Honda civic 4 door can comfortably transport 4 full size adults and their scuba diving gear vary well. Also an SUV would not work for the farm. Lots of things and equipment need to be hauled that would damage the interior of an SUV. Farmers and ranchers need full size trucks, not SUVs. The average car can turn faster on a twisty road and can avoid accidents when compared to an SUV. You don't need a Corvette for good handling, as even my Honda Civic can handle quite well on roads that make SUVs wobble around or tip over. About efficiency, the 300+ hp v8 in a Ford Mustang can actually be put to use for acceleration instead of pulling the big jacked-up station wagon body of an SUV. This concept also applies to gas mileage. I noticed that SUVs I have driven always got low gas mileage even on the highway. Cars like Corvette will get close to 28 miles per gallon on the highway, and these have 6 liter engines with lighter overall car weight. So big engine size is not the most important factor in miles per gallon. If you want to haul cargo then you can always rent a truck or van for a few days and this would be cheaper than driving an SUV all the time. About space, a mobile DJ said to me that his cargo van holds over double the amount of equipment than the SUV he drove earlier. And finally about driving. SUVs to me are work to park in the city and no fun to drive on paved roads. They are not a pleasure to drive as I have noticed. So why do people buy them?
Reply to
oceansixtyone
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Thanks for sharing...

Did you know that in just TWICE the time it took you to write that, you could have signed up for and written it on your very own blog?

That's what I do... and nobody has to read it.. or does. ;)

Reply to
Backyard Mechanic

You probably don't want one.

Reply to
Oscar_Lives

I am not dissing anyone or putting down anyone that drives an SUV I was just wanting to see the opinions and responses to this if any. I just said what i think honestly. without censorship....anyway blogging is a waste of time. and i don't have time to blog. so my articles will be too infrequent for a blog unless someone pays me for it. that would be geat and ill blog all day and night for that..

Reply to
oceansixtyone

much dribble deleted

We like SUVs, we can afford them, we buy them. You probably will get better gas mileage in your Civic, we are sorry that a cheap import is is all you can afford to drive. Our pity to you .

Reply to
rmac

don't pitty me because, i choose vehicles that make sense. like my mid

1970's single engine airplane. PA-28. burns more fuel than an SUV but i have no speed limits to deal with. i can choose to fly as fast as the max cruise of this aircraft. also flying long distances on autopilot is less stressful than driving. so i may use more fuel but i get something for what i pay. a full open throttle. in contrast an SUV gives me no advantage for the amount of fuel burned. And the offroad capability is not used for 99% of people in the US. Mabye in Namibia, but not the USA for cruising the mall parking lot.. My point is that people here don't choose things like SUVs based on LOGIC. Unless you can prove otherwise i rest my case. anyway I don't need a big car and here in the US even $3 per gallon is dirt cheap compared to most of the world i have lived.. that is why i am used to driving a small car. i would rather invest the money or burn it in an airplane engine. even avgas (aviation fuel for piston powered aircraft) is dirt cheap here. so i am enjoying it.
Reply to
oceansixtyone

Don't pitty me because, i choose vehicles that make sense. like a mid

1970's single engine airplane. PA-28. burns more fuel than an SUV but i

have no speed limits to deal with. i can choose to fly as fast as the max cruise of this aircraft. also flying long distances on autopilot is

less stressful than driving. so i may use more fuel but i get something

for what i pay. a full open throttle. in contrast an SUV gives me no advantage for the amount of fuel burned. And the offroad capability is not used for 99% of people in the US. Mabye in Namibia, but not the USA for cruising the mall parking lot.. My point is that people here don't choose things like SUVs based on LOGIC. Unless you can prove otherwise i rest my case. anyway I don't need a big car and here in the US even $3 per gallon is dirt cheap compared to most of the world i

have lived.. that is why i am used to driving a small car. i would rather invest the money or burn it in an airplane engine. even avgas (aviation fuel for piston powered aircraft) is dirt cheap here. so i am

enjoying it.

Reply to
oceansixtyone

Perception of safety.

Safety trumps all other costs. If you save $500 per mile driven but become a paraplegics in a car wreck what have you saved.??

Reply to
joe schmoe

FWIW... Having owned a truck based vehicle for nearly 30 years, it has become my preferred "format". I can't speak for others but I will mention more a bit later in this treatise.....

Our current ride is a 2002 F SuperCrew.... In retrospect, I would have preferred a CC SuperDuty but that would have me buying a diesel (by choice) and then abusing it by not driving it hard enough, often enough. The SC does pretty good at my very few, very short trips with the holiday trailer (no need to go too far when there's a wonderful lake on my doorstep). I had a 92 Explorer and loved it but missed the utility of the pick up truck. The crew cab part was for my son, large (tall, not rotund) at an early age.

My wife loves sitting higher than most (at home, we see many more trucks than cars) when she ventures to Edmonton... many miles to the south. She also likes (and sometimes needs) the pick up bed.

My son is now 18 (Gawd, don't time fly) and has a 95 F140 4X4.... never a nice thing to say about the gas mileage, but it's hard to haul his quad in the trunk of a car.

For my family, 4 wheel drive (ever experienced a gung ho Alberta winter?) makes sense...

Now... where we do see many concerns.... those that suddenly "want" a large platform vehicle. The transistion from car to truck, for many, is umpleasant and, on occasion, deadly. There are those that will have an abject disregard for the laws of physics... who needs to understand physics, anyway? After all, we have Sam Bernstein and Jim "the hammer" Shapiro on our side.....

Reply to
Jim Warman

I like the comment by Joe Schmoe. I was doing some research about that subject and found that when a car and SUV collide, the people in the SUV often walk away and the people in the car die. This is a valid point that I agree with and did not think about before. If you buy a quarter million dollar Ferrari it is still just a car. In a car and SUV collision I would bet on the SUV driver as survivor. OK you win on this one.

Also I think there is too much negative bias against SUVs. I think it is the fact that in the people in the US have cheap gas. I mean that as under $3 per gallon and many people in the world pay much more in taxes on each gallon.

I am sure that environmentalists would go nuts if they knew that I like to keep my home at above 80 degrees F heating all winter. My heating bills here in the Midwest are really high. at this rate I am not conserving natural resources, but as long as I pay my natural gas bill that is my business. so I have no right to point at hummer drivers.

And anyone out there if you are going to get an SUV, please get the truck based ones, not the car based "crossover". Lets not support this crap. they are starting to cross SUVs with cars. If you are going to get an SUV at least get the real thing, not some ugly ass 4X4 station wagon.

They said "Pontiac Aztec" and I said "Oh shit".

Reply to
oceansixtyone

Well, I'm getting REAL confused here.

Just what IS your POINT!

Here's mine. The car makers uh, ,Chrysler.. once had a really GREAT idea, they called it a minivan.

The capacity of a small truck, the economy and comfort of a station wagon.

What was wrong with that?!!

!!!!ONLY the driving of the people who bought them!!!!

And THAT is, to a great extent, WHY people bought SUV's instead.

They were a 'cooler' ride.

Dont get all hissy about a car based SUV... it's a 'cooler' minivan, aint it..or really a station wagon?

"oceansixty \

Reply to
Backyard Mechanic

But no one bothers to buckle up. Many SUV drivers don't bother to buckle up. The "perception" of safety is entirely at odds with the realities of safety.

Sure. Far better to kill the driver of the smaller car. It's like an arms race. I was driving a Ford Aspire regularly but bought a bigger vehicle after two SUVs blew through stop signs in front of me.

I keep hearing that we live in a "Christian" country but I see very little evidence of that.

Reply to
DH

You HAVE been out of the US for quite some time. The US is the largest vehicle market in the world and the US has the most robust economy in the world. that is why so many foreign manufactures have entered the US market. Those Americans, that dot need a vehicle that can haul more than four people and can not afford to by the larger safer more expensive vehicles, tend to buy small cars or CUVs. CUVs re the SUV types that are built on car chassis rather than a sturdier truck chasses as are SUVs. Those buyer that require larger more powerful vehicles, to haul their family and all of their 'stuff,' tend to buy larger safer cars SUVs and CUVs. Many American that can afford to buy both a small car, to use when they do not require the abilities of the other type of vehicles, as well as the other type of vehicle for when the do need that type of vehicle. Over the past five years or so light trucks, including SUVs etc have sold at a rate greater than cars, as high as 55% in 2004. In 2005 however cars accounted for just over

50% of the 18,000,000 new vehicles sold in the US. The number of new vehicles sold in the US today is more than twice what it was just twenty years ago. According to the US census the average American family owns three vehicles, not one

mike hunt

wrote in message news: snipped-for-privacy@g49g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...

Reply to
Mike Hunter

Well "perception" never had any basis in reality in any of it's permutations.

If you were the husband of the woman "blowing through" the stop sign with your children would you rather she be in a huge SUV or in a Sprint. Arm's races are only disadvantageous to the poor and unarmed.

Oh contraire~ Quite the opposite, you have even described above how Christian American's are. They are not only confident in the belief of an afterlife (not wearing safety belts themselves) but are also generous to a fault (offering to help free you from the earthly shackles of your body and your Ford Aspire).

Not limiting the generosity to America they also share their material wealth (Lead, High Explosives) with people's of different faiths in different parts of the world.

Name one other country that gives the Middle East as much money as the US? Or a country that gives the Middle East as much Lead ? (well aside from England 100 years ago) or their local governments presently

Thankfully I have access to Newsgroups and in the past few years I have learned that All Americans are Pentecostal Christian Bush Supporters, All Europeans are Roman Catholic Chirac Supporters, All Russians are Atheists, All "AaaRabs" are generic "Muslim Fanatical" all Africans are VooDoo believers, all "East Indians are Hindu's and all Oriental's are Buddhists

In a few more months I will fully understand SUV drivers, Corvette Drivers, Jap car drivers (including those designed and built in the US) and all aspects of Geopolitics.

Reply to
joe schmoe

For one thing, tha automakers have practically stopped marketing wagons and hatchbacks in the US. Presumably this is to force people to buy more expensive SUV's. And a lot of people are really "sheeple". That and a lot fo people will but something and hardly ever use it. By that I mean if they need to haul something big enough to require a truck once or twice over the life of their next vehicle, they will buy the truck or SUV instead of doing something smarter like buying a car and renting the truck on the rare freak occasion that they actually need one.

Reply to
scott21230

If the American buyers would buy station wagons and hatchback cars, the manufacture would still be building them. The fact is both were discontinued because of lack of sales, period. Both were offer by domestic along side SUVs, Mini vans but they did not sell and were dropped generally when new models came onto the market.

mike hunt

Reply to
Mike Hunter

I think station wagons will come back into vogue in a big way. They kind of are already (certain ones, anyway). As for minivans and SUV's--I think people like sitting up higher. And a minivan will get almost as good fuel economy as a passenger car, so why not? They are easier to get in & out of for elderly and otherwise physically challenged. I was looking for another Chevy S-10 pickup when I stumbled upon a Dodge Caravan c/v (cargo van). I decided I could haul anything in that van that I could in a pickup, with the exception of a refrigerator standing up. Plus it gets as good of gas mileage, and it's front wheel drive, which I like in winter time. Anyway--I never bought another S-10; and have had 6 Caravans. I don't have SUV's because I drive so much that fuel economy is of high concern.

Reply to
Gomer Einstein

I've also heard Americans aren't exactly geting smaller.

Reply to
James Goforth

If the population of SUVs becomes over 65% of all cars on the road, it will become a safety issue for those that don't drive one.

To stay safe and one step ahead of everyone else I will be forced to get a Kenworth tractor trailer. Without the trailer it would make the ultimate commuter vehicle. I like the dump truck version with 18 wheels even better. I will consider this as my daily driver. In fact Kenworth has one of the highest ratings in the world for quality. The 16 liter engine provides plenty of torque.

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Here is my favorite quote on the website about the Kenworth heavy dump truck:

"The C500 cab is heavily reinforced to withstand rugged environments and the optional cab air suspension smoothes out rough terrain. The optional sheet-metal hood and fenders shrugs off branches, choke chains, or whatever comes its way. But this rugged durability doesn't mean you have to give up driver comfort. Regardless of what is going on around the truck, inside the cab it is quiet and comfortable."

Reply to
oceansixtyone

I just grabbed the quickest link I could find, but I'm sure these are being built in the States also.

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Family or co-workers are entitled to comfort during the commute. Happy modeming, Bill

Reply to
Berkshire Bill

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