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Comment by baybal2 | Hacker News Reader

Can say the same about American automobile crashworthiness standards. American standards make cars few hundred kilograms heavier in exchange for few percents higher chance for one to survive a highway collision, but this itself makes almost every other collision case more lethal, simply because there are more potential collision megajoules on the road.

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It's more than a few percent improvement. 2018 car models are far more survivable than what we had 20 or even 10 years ago. Check out the injury and death statistics. For a given size the weight increase in that time hasn't been anywhere near a few hundred kilograms. And with modern high-strength steel or carbon fiber the weight can actually go down, although that drives up prices.

At the same time SUVs are killing more pedestrians due to being taller than previous car models. https://www.freep.com/story/money/cars/2018/06/28/suvs-killi...

Here is an idea: if there is a side walk, the speed limit is automatically capped at 25mph (unless there's a sign that says the speed limit is lower).

Thoughts?

I'm sure it's like with cyclists, only when you have a critical mass of cyclists on the road, the car drivers take notice and caution. The US isn't gonna reach a critical mass of pedestrians except in dense areas where using a car isn't economic or a necessity.

Except optimizing the cars has been very much diminishing returns for 20 years now. Ban all the touch pads and widgets from cars and that is easily double the improvement from whatever car manufacturers have been doing.

A lot of what's been happening with safety features is a steady trickle down from the high-end to the average consumer car of things like automatic emergency braking, lane-keeping systems and so on.

I believe they're speaking about US autos vs other countries. The crux being, the US' reguirements bulk up autos which make them more lethal.

Why do you think there is a significant difference between the US and say, Europe? For apples to apples, is a Honda Fit really verifiably "more lethal" than a Honda Jazz? Or significantly heavier?

Consumer preference seems to drive that one, unfortunately, with SUVs and trucks outselling sedans. Even at sports car price points, people seem to spend their money on size and weight over performance and handling.

It's a prisoner's dilemma, no wonder rational actors chose to maximize personal safety by making the problem worse for everybody else. An arms race of mechanical impulse.

An intervention to restore correct incentives would impose lower speed limits for heavy personal vehicles, electronically enforced.

Like many issues in the US car market, it's exacerbated by CAFE. The light truck segment (which includes SUVs) have a less restrictive fuel economy standard and offers consumers more car for less money.

The US would be better off sunsetting CAFE and harmonizing vehicle regulations with European nations. Just like the train cars mentioned in the linked story, that would allow US consumers to buy fuel efficient cars without the market distortions caused by CAFE.

Except that it doesn't improve safety--for the driver of the suburban tank or their victim.

Better handling and braking due to a lower center of mass and less mass actually improves safety by getting into fewer accidents.

>>> An intervention to restore correct incentives would impose lower speed limits for heavy personal vehicles, electronically enforced.

That is clever and I like it. Kinetic energy limits!

Just like "allow electrics to use the carpool lane" encourages electrics, this would incentivize making smaller cars.

> "Consumer preference seems to drive that one, unfortunately, with SUVs and trucks outselling sedans."

But "preference" is also influenced by the price of gas. A few years ago when gas prices shot up, SUV sales were down, cross-over vehicles became "the thing." But now that gas is cheap again, and getting cheaper, SUV sales a rocketing up again.

If you are distinguishing SUVs from crossovers, I'm not sure what you consider SUVs to be. The SUVs that are popular are crossovers. Thirty years ago, SUVs were body on frame trucks based on pickups, but that is a very outdated concept that has gone by the wayside.

I'm considering the smaller 5 door vehicles to be crossovers. A puffed up boxed out sedan with a hatch. For example the Subaru Impreza hatch.

Those have fallen out of favor for full-sized SUVs.

The Impreza is a compact hatchback, like a Ford Focus. I think there's a wagon version too, which isn't a SUV or a crossover.

Ok. Then how about the Subaru Outback or Forester? I'm talking about vehichles styled like an SUV, but shrunk. And per this article my __general__ definition aligns.

Regardless, the point is, the price of gas drives - no pun intended - comsumer preference. Only on HN can pointless minutia / noise be used to bury a topic / thought / fact.

https://www.autotrader.com/car-shopping/suv-vs-crossover-wha...

Whatever you want to call them, the vehicles that most people buy and are generally called SUVs or crossovers no longer have a large differential in gas mileage compared to cars, which is why people prefer them.

It wasn't that long ago that I used to read comments on the internet about Americans being foolish and backwards for preferring vehicles with a trunk, instead of hatchbacks and wagons like Europeans did. Now Americans have essentially switched to hatchbacks (at least for new vehicle purchases) and yet people come up with a lot of pettifogging arguments why this is foolish and inferior because the hatchbacks are called SUVs.

Crossovers are much larger than Europeans hatchbacks, which are more like the Golf, Focus, Mazda3, etc. Despite being larger, they are not much roomier, and drive significantly worse. So again, it really looks like a preference for size over all other concerns.

I don't think that to the extent "crossovers are much larger" is meaningful, that it is accurate. Crossovers and non-crossovers come in all sizes, but we can look at the most popular.

One of the most popular mid-size crossovers in the US is the Nissan Rogue. Compared to the VW Golf (which I assume is one of the most popular hatchbacks in the place you consider normative), the Nissan is: 1.6 inches wider, 16.9 inches longer, and has 16.3 cu ft more cargo space.

The Rogue Sport is the smaller cousin of the Rogue, and compared to a Golf, is 1.5 inches wider, 4.8 inches longer, and has 7.4 cu ft more cargo space with seats down.

There is also a Golf wagon, which I think is in between the Rogue and the Rogue Sport in length.

The only substantive characteristic that defines a crossover these days that I know of is a few inches in ride height. Subaru has gone so far as to sell a crossover that is virtually a twin to a hatchback, with nothing more than a suspension lift (CrossTrek vs Impreza).

In the US, some of the most popular SUVs, which I would also call crossovers are the Nissan Rogue and the Rogue Sport. The latter is sold in other countries as the Qashqai, I believe. Most SUVs today are unibody vehicles with AWD that is not intended for serious offroading nor does it have a low range. They are typically based on FWD platforms. So they are what I would call (and I think most people call) crossovers.

If we are discussing Subarus, and you call the Impreza a crossover, then you are left without a distinction between the Impreza and the Crosstrek. The Crosstrek only has a few cosmetic differences and a higher suspension, but that is what would make it a crossover to most people.

Body on frame SUVs with a selectable low range transfer case are a very small portion of the market even in the US these days. So the criticisms applicable to such vehicles aren't relevant to mass market SUVs in my mind.

Yes, people are driving the biggest vehicles they can afford to drive in any given economic climate. That’s what I mean.

Do you have any data to back up this very broad generalization?

What exactly is being added to the car? More steel to pass some fixed collision test invented in the 1970s?

Pretty much, which means the weight goes up, which means heavier equipment, which means more wear on the vehicle and trackwork.

We went "build them like tanks". Europe went "what if we just spent all that money on not crashing in the first place?"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positive_train_control

Modern cars are dramatically safer than old detroit steel:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fPF4fBGNK0U

Yes they are.

But choosing a pre-seatbelt GM X-frame sedan to compare to is a less than honest way to prove that point to put it charitably.

The biggest improvement in road safety since 1940 has been seatbelts. Everything since has just been chasing edge cases.

Surviving crashes is nice. Avoiding them is even better, and that's been the main safety development between 1940 and now. Better tires, way better brakes, better suspensions, dramatically improved handling, hydro-assisted braking, ABS, ESP, EBD... On top of that you have all the recent innovations in computer-assisted driving, like automatic emergency braking, lane-checking, rear view cameras and sensors, car-following cruise control...

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