I really wish we could buy a Citroen Ami in the US, which is a small, light, and slow (28 mph top speed) electric car for city driving. Plus, it looks super cute!

Why on earth would you think that that would ever happen?

Because governments could mandate it.

Yes, we're at the stage now where democracies need to become far more dictatorial, otherwise their populations will continue mindlessly along the path of 'Tragedy of the Commons'.

You don't even need dictatorial. Just tax breaks and the like for small light vehicles and penalties for large heavy ones.

The only thing that will do that is regulation, either mandating the types of cars we can buy, or taxing the kinds of cars we don't favor.

People in the majority prefer large, powerful cars, given the choice. And those cars already cost a lot, so any strategy of price increases to discourage them will have to be significant. This is why most people in Europe drive small, economical cars. Big cars are heavily taxed, and so is the fuel they use.

I drove smaller cars in Europe simply because bigger cars don't fit in many places. I don't think it has much to do with price.

Small streets mean fewer drivers. That means your overhead demands that you charge more per customer since you have fewer of them.

All that said, smaller roads mean smaller trucks which means more trucks more often which means more tires.

A slower car?

They already make plenty of them

The vast majority of people would not buy those.

Depends entirely on price.

I hear this a lot and I am quite skeptical. Price-sensitive buyers do not buy new cars, they buy used ones. What is available on the used market is directly controlled by what the minority of people who buy new cars put their priorities on.

Bullshit. The top selling car in half of us states is an 80k pickup that dodges regulations because it weighs so much. People, especially men, want giant trucks at any cost. There are plenty of affordable smaller cars but those are for weakling pussies. The us has a petromasculinity problem.

I see it as less a masculinity problem and more a "common view of physics" problem. IE it's less about masculinity and more about the perception of "winning a crash".

Cars can pass all the safety standards they like but the common view is a multi-ton ladder chassis truck keeps the kids (and themselves, their loved ones, friends...) safer than the small city car (containing others). So stupidly sized trucks are desirable...

The only way out I think is regulation. Otherwise the "outsizing" will continue.

That's quite the hot take, more worthy of Reddit than HN.

Pickups are super useful. Especially if you live in a place that does not have narrow roads, and if you have a family to tote around. It's in many ways the modern equivalent to the luxury barges of the 70s.

Plus, modern trucks are frequently as efficient as a mid size sedan from 10-15 years ago, which is pretty wild. Some of them, like my Lightning, are more efficient than pretty much any car which uses gasoline.

Lastly, 80K is a lot even for a truck. The vast majority are more like 40-50K. 80K is a top trim, brand new, no discounts price.

except there aren’t any affordable smaller cars anymore…

It depends on the incentives. In Japan the top selling car is the Honda N-Box https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honda_N-Box which is on the small light and slow side.

The US has dumb mileage policies to get everyone to drive huge trucks, and pretty much bans things like the N-Box.

In Japan you get a parking exemption with cars like the N-Box and it seems quite useable - top speed 87 mph. Review https://www.motortrend.com/reviews/honda-n-box-slash-review-...

I wouldn't mind them bringing in something like that - I'm in the UK where they don't have N-Boxes either but it would do the job and I mostly get around by e-bike these days so I prefer others to drive small light cars.

The US in particular has many oversized cars. Fuel is cheap, the roads are wide and there is a general imperative to get a car bigger than others for safety and status. If this pollution could be used as a means to reduce sizes to something more proportionate to what they’re generally doing it will be a good thing.