Car haters suck

xpost

most important : hos is the PERFORMANCE..?

The new Ford Escape Hybrid performs virtually identically to the V6 version!

Something like a Prius would be great for renting, road trips where you've got miles of empty highway. But in a metro area, it would just be on and off the gas like a real car, only without as much power.

that said my ability to do those things is already about asimpaired as it could possibly get by what i currently drive. [4 cylinder automatic cavalier]

There's a GM pickup equipped with a V8 hybrid, 265hp that sounds great, if I had $30k and a burning need for a new truck.

I know, it is semantic but, you know.

cars would be better, if they didn't exist.

By cruising I mean not accelerating or decelerating. Like, tooling along at 45 mph or whatever.

As far as the electric motor never getting enough play in metro areas, well yeah, it uses the gas more in starting/stopping so that you can accelerate promptly. But remember when yr stuck in traffic for 20 minutes, the electric motor is on for about 18 of those minutes, burning no gas at all.

And yeah, tooling along at 45 - when and where, man? City driving is 0 to 45 and down and up at lights and in traffic. Highway driving is 30 to 65 up to 70 down to 50 because of the asshole with the trailer, back to 60, etc. There are very few applications where you're cruising at a stable speed for any length of time in an urban area.

milo you're confusing me. hybrid cars are ideal for metro areas where there's a lot of stop and go because the electric motor is utilized mainly at low speeds, ie from 0-30ish. they don't have much horsepower but they are generally torqueier than gas engines.

tracer are you sure? i think the electric is used during starting and stopping precisely because there is no lag with a electric motor (due mainly to the extra torque)

Milo until you drive one, kindly STFU with yourself, thanks. The whole point of the Prius is that for 99% of everyday drivers it is no worse and no better than any other cheap compact car on the market, which is what you ought to be comparing it to. Except that it gets 60 mpg.

even if all cars were electric, there would still be massive congestion and cars would still be rubbish.

powercrazy people shouldn't be allowed out of houses, never mind into cars.

The old Prius had about 65-70% of the horsepower and torque of a comparable subcompact. Maybe for comparative size they produce more power and torque but that still means the Prius has a smaller engine, less power.

The whole point of the Prius is that for 99% of everyday drivers it is no worse and no better than any other cheap compact car on the market, which is what you ought to be comparing it to
Except that the Prius isn't a "cheap compact car" - MSRP is in the mid-$20k range. That ain't cheap. And it's not suitable for 99% of everyday drivers, else the market share would be much larger.

I'm comparing it to every other vehicle on the road because, wow, it's on the road with all of them and competing with every other vehicle for market share. Hybrids are great, I'm all for anything that saves on gas and pollution. But they need to be paired with better, stronger powertrains and larger models to break out of the tree-hugger ghetto - ie the GM truck.

This is the way to go, you see. All the cars couple up, and little doors at the front and back open up, an aisle forms, and they become trains. Those tense, rude, stressed drivers get up, stretch, and go to the buffet for a beer.

so there were less accidents when cars had less power? did accidents suddenly increase in the early 80s?

milo your second paragraph is incomprehensible. First it sounds like you're saying it's got worse power and torque than other comparable cars, and then you say that actually maybe they produce more power and torque?

As far as the price goes it would be even more expensive if it weren't subsidized. I think the electric motor alone costs $20K. I would imagine more people would buy if it were cheaper, especially once they realized they were spending half the usual on gas.

I don't understand the animosity, milo, the constant "tree hugger" line. You say that hybrids are "great" and you're "all for" them, but that what they really need is to be stronger and bigger and have lots more horsepower. And then you give an example of such an automobile. So what, exactly, is the problem? If anyone is putting hybrid cars in a "tree hugger ghetto" it is you, milo z auckerman.

it's sprawl your fault, in the end, though.

It's easier to build a car to fit consumer's needs and wishes than to make the consumer conform to the car. That's the primary failure of compact hybrids to me and may be a problem that will be solved.

And that's why I like the V8 hybrid, which isn't going to get 60mpg but is usable by the millions of people who drive trucks and will shave off 20% of the truck's gas use. That's a much better proposition both in human and green terms (and probably a better idea from a profit standpoint). Now adapt that to the SUV market and family sedans and minivans - and you're making people happy with their power and size while moving toward cutting down on gas use. Then you take it to the next step, another slight cut in power for all-electric or fuel cells or CNG or biodiesel or WTFever.

milo your second paragraph is incomprehensible. First it sounds like you're saying it's got worse power and torque than other comparable cars, and then you say that actually maybe they produce more power and torque?
First sentence - car vs. car. Second sentence - engine v. engine.

A small four-cylinder engine is often more power-efficient than a V8, but the V8 will almost always still produce more horsepower and torque. That's the case here - yes, the Prius might have a more efficient wee motor and engine, but it's still going to be slower than most cars in its class and almost everything on the road.

I think they go hand-in-hand. To some extent, the behaviors and attitude exist because of the way the infrastructure is set up presently.

well, not to climb back on my high horse here (*mmph* damn these stirrups are uncomfortable) but uh, my concerns/choices about cars are based more on what I see as the single largest most dangerous sociological issue for humanity at large - ie, energy usage and by extension, our reliance on fossil fuels. Re-distribution of wealth/resources being the other biggie. But energy issues are the more pressing concern in my view, as they could very well spell the end of the species as a whole if they aren't resolved/confronted.

x-post

(water issues are massive, but not insurmountable - that's more of a distribution/resource management problem)

x-post

and what you said about infrastrcuture and behaviour illustrates what i wanted to say before. they are chicken and egg. behaviour and atitude follow the present infrastructure and land use. but it was behaviour and attitude that created those patterns of land use and infrastructure. So that gives credit to a notion that the pattern could be reversed.

xpost so you're also going to not eat anything that was grown in southern california and other such areas, right?

yr arguments are weak like clock radio speakers.

central valley is irrigated, isn't it? yes, food is grown in socal.
not everyone has the access or finances to buy co-op or local food.

er that doesnt make any sense does it

im meant to be thinking about safety testing Human Machine Interface systems*, not this!

*this seems to mean not much more than a car radio, bizarrely

as for pre-emptive change, I guess I should just wait for that magical post-"peak oil" moment and hope I survive the massive riots, starvation, wars, etc. that are bound to ensue, in the meantime happily going about my business like nothing's wrong, eh? you have fun with THAT.

this is extraordinarily pessimistic, and i believe untrue. to believe this is to believe that advertising has no effect for instance. peoples behavious can be influenced all to easily. it also dictates that awareness compaigns in general have no effect, which doesnt soudn that contentious, but in the UK the large decrease in UK drink driving, especially amongst the young (now sadly creeping up), msignalled a major attitudinal shiuft, that an effective and relentless (every christmas) tv ad campaign must have contributed to wards.

there wasnt some cataclysmic drink driving related pile up that had to occur before such a chabnge came about, it was gradual, and in some part, influenced by those behind safety planning, i believe.

there are no co-op veggie places or local butchers in my vicinity. you living in san francisco makes not only your lifestyle possible, but your attitude. explains a lot.

pessimistic or realistic, you make the call.many people died from drunk driving, didn't they? i mean it just wasn't some people swerving around not hitting anything that affected change, right?

haHA! Couldn't have put it better myself. The benefits of city living my friend.

xpost it was tolerated EVEN AFTER many many people died. i think that, and the fact that people STILL don't buckle up strengthens my point that people are very reluctant to pay heed to something unless its consequences are readily felt. I know several people who didn't wear seatbelts until they themselves were in an accident.

shakey, i wouldn't mind living in SF either! how bout hooking me up with a well-paying job?

doctrinaire \dahk-truh-NAIR\ adjective
: attempting to put into effect an abstract doctrine or
theory with little or no regard for practical difficulties : dogmatic

but that cant be wholly true, otherwise the entire advertising industry would be out of jobs. and as far as i know, they make quite a bit of money....

as for little or no regard for practical difficulties, that isnt true. again, ILX for me is not the place to set out watertight, scientifically rigourous theories, or wholly formed policies or statements of intent. if you give me a few years, then i will have a clearer idea of what i believe to be an effective way to continue with transport policy, and might be able to set them down, with regards to practical implementation. In fact, i actualyl hope to effect this. By choosing to work with organisations that are interestded in areas of transport which are directyl related to the way people think about transport*, i hope to explre the practicalities of effecting change, and get experience of wha is and isnt possible. its just that i need a bit of time to gain 30 yrs experience. like, about 30 yrs...

* example: persuading parents to abandon the school run and investigating joining "walking buses", which although necessitating a change in routine, could bring many more benefits than sitting in hrs of queus in a Land Rover, with 4 kids messing about in the back, whiole you are late for work.

more of an actual victory, than the alaska vote.

Take that

However in the realm of private transport there is no way we can progress in the way we are. There just isn't the space anywhere for universal 4 wheeled private transport. Let alone enormous inefficient vehicles carrying one person at a time. So this is where the big stick of authority has to come out. OK, so the US suburb has grown up around the car, not around the train as in many european cities. So a solution has to be found that works for the US suburbs and edge cities, which I'll grant is very difficult due to the multi-directional nature of flows. There are very few US cities were commuting transport flows are the very traditional European/East Coast US are radial flows so you have a problem.

So what technological solutions can be offered to allieveate the tangled mess of US suburban commuting in amorphous US cities.

Well for a start everyone should get a more efficient car There is no excuse for 15mpg when 35mpg is easy to achieve.

Next you have to restrict autonomy. Trunk routes are inefficient as they consist of streams of traffic made up of inidividuals with different driving skills, attitudes, urgencies. Stop start flows, tailgating, bunching all cause delays. So hand over control of cars to the road system on the trunk routes. Speeds, flows, routing all controlled centrally by the traffic system, rathwer than by inefficient human autonomy. Increasing safety and efficiency of the overall system. Cells joining and leaving a tarmac railway.

So that's how you backfill into th existing suburbs.

However new suburbs musn't be built like this. Casting aside radial cities will eventually be seen as a great folly, if it in't already. Where is the centre, the identity, the heart of an amorphous city. Does the inherrent inefficiency of an amorphous city choke and restrict economic sucess, intellectual advancement, cutural identity?

Does slavish worship of the steel bubble, the isolation chamber brutalise society. Starving gumanity of the reference points, the interactions, that keep them Human? Is freedom really to be found behind 265bhp of internal combustion engine? Is someone with a 30bhp car less free? Is someone on a bike less free or more so?

-- Ed (dal...), March 18th, 2005.

For many people, carstarring IS something very central to their existence, and keeps them human. Let's say you're at a party and it sucks and some prime badoogadoonk wants to leave - well if you're the guy with the car, you've got the freedom - AND you have the freedom to thunderpimp so hard that kids on the sidewalk start dancing to YOUR beats and men want to kill you because their girlfriends turn they heads and nod at you like "Wow, the gentlemen in that automobile know how to roll hard huh", but they can't kill you because you have the freedom to peel away. I guess they'll just have to kill their girlfriends. Do not ignore freedom forgone when hoofing it either, people.

increases in technology can do a lot to alleviate problems associated with car use, in terms of noise and emissions reduction.

But

this is a mid term solution (if the long term is 60 yrs or so); eventually a greater change in living patterns, behaviour/attitudinal shift will, i predict begin a shift away from car use.

heres the UK Natioanl Road Traffic Forecast for the next 30 years FYI