As much as I sound as if I am a car/suv supporter, I don’t own one, do use zipcar but would like to see many of the liveable streets projects, congestion pricing, two way tolls on the Verezano bridge, tolls on the East River crossings, etc., established.

However, it pains me to see snappy headlines and covenient analogies when they are not backed up by numbers. See the headline and main thrust of the Green building (Solaire) clamps down on bike owners article as another example of just this kind of post by streetsblog.

Back to your question; the thing I have always found ironic is that car drivers sit lower than pedestrians and cyclists. It is only minivan and suv owners that sit with their heads at the same height as pedestrians. Sedan drivers are definitely worse off than pedestrians and cyclists when it comes to the all important eye contact with SUV drivers.

I honestly believe that the worst offenders are truck (big commerical and sanitation type trucks) and bus drivers. Look at the daily carnage on streetsblog to see how many cyclists and pedestrians have been killed in nyc in recent months by these big trucks vs by cars and sUVs.

When I have driven a zipcar in the city I have not seen any more aggressive driving by SUV vs sedan drivers. I see a lot more weaving in and out of lanes by sedans. It is a lot more difficult to throw a high center of gravity frame based truck around.

When it comes to passenger safety, the irony is that the higher hoods of the car based suvs may be safer for pedestrians than the lower hoods of sedans. In the EU, new rules stipulate higher hoods in order to absorb energy more progressively when hitting a pedestrian. This is due to the greater void or air space between the hood and engine.

With respect to nyc and suv useage, I have heard many more complaints about southern california so I did not think that nyc was guilty of this. However, this last point is pure conjecture and I am willing to be educated on sales increases in nyc of SUVs.

However that’s not what is going on in NYC. The post is primarily an excerpt from an article in the New Yorker, and I think it describes pretty well what is going on here. It’s true that Jason’s headline and lead-in raise the national angle, but he didn’t suggest that he was presenting original research in any event.

And I would be interested in hearing your response to gelston’s point about the significance of the taller profile. I think the higher position of a driver even in a “small” SUV tends to make it harder for those “down below” (pedestrians, bicyclists and sedan drivers) to communicate with the SUV driver via eye contact or signals, and also creates a sense of detachment from surroundings and encourages aggressive and riskier driving. It may be that “these car based SUVs have the same bumper and infrastructure height as sedans so collisions are less dangerous than if hit by a real truck with real truck frame,” but that does not apply to collisions involving pedestrians or bicyclists.

Even the VW Jetta (a compact car) is 3285lbs, it is 179.3″ in length, 70.1″ in width and 57.4″ in height.

CRV numbers are 3415lb, 178″, 71.6″, 66.1″ respectively.

Granted, the height differential is large but all other metrics are close. Hardly differences that would lead to the need to fortify and widen everything.

This goes back to what another person posted on streetsblogs where he said that a lot of these smaller SUVs take up less road space than sedans. Don’t forget also that these car based SUVs have the same bumper and infrastructure height as sedans so collisions are less dangerous than if hit by a real truck with real truck frame (see Ford Explorer and its ilk).

The article talks not only talks about the whole of the USA but also about the apparent dichotomy where the vast majority of ppl surveyed wanted tighter mpg standards but that these findings were not borne out in the sales of large SUVs.

Read the article again and how it introduces the analogy of NHL players and how they acted vs what they said.

All I am saying is that, for this to be true then the sales figures should show this. In fact, it is well documented that sales of the larger SUVs have cratered in the last couple of years whereas sales of the smaller SUVs and car based CUVs (with better fuel economy) are increasing at high rates. This disproves the whole premise of the article.

What you two are talking about is interesting but nothing to do with the article’s premise.

BTW Mark, I gave you a link to numbers. You can’t just make up facts like “the total number is increasing” with nothing to back you up.

As to your comment about my characterization of other posters as having negative stereotypes about the U.S. just look at #2 and #3 for those negative stereotypes.

I think VDH is citing the wrong stats.

Ryan, when you say the ppl who want to drive these big vehicles are getting hurt in the wallet, you are implying that habits are not changing and that people are not buying smaller vehicles now and in recent months instead of the behemoths.

This is patently untrue if you look at the numbers I posted for the Ford Explorer sales which was the perennial #1 sales leader in the US SUV makret for over a decade. Not only that but the number sold annually was greater than that of the Toyota Camry which is the #1 selling car. Now they are at less than half the Camry’s annual sales.

However, doing so is undoubtedly hurting them in the wallet (maybe their conscience?), so of course they’re all for increasing fuel standards on the bigger, more powerful vehicles. I’m guessing they see this as an opportunity to have their cake and eat it too.

I’m a Brit living in NYC and I thought I was supposed to have the negative stereotyped views of America.

As I have posted before when talking about cars, all you have to do is look at sales numbers:

For years the Ford Explorer far outsold any other SUV in the US. Peak annual sales were close to 500K. Well guess what? The public woke up and its sales have crashed. Latest numbers are 180K annual sales and the Honda CRV (a much smaller vehicle) is now the number one selling SUV out there with sales set to reach 180K this year.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601209&sid=a6t2iyxn_ANg&refer=transportation

So are Americans continuing to buy gas guzzlers? Doesn’t look like it does it?

I wish people would actually look up facts before they come up with a neat little theory that sounds great but where they have to make up falsehoods to prove the theory.

Do most Americans really think “more powerful/larger vehicle = higher class,” and are they class-envious of large SUV owners? I’m not sure. Maybe the lower class/underclass might think that, but middle and upper classes?

Of course, living here for years without owning a vehicle does put me out of touch with the rest of the country, so maybe the article is right.