Vandals Flip Over Smart Cars in San Francisco

[ZLoth]

From NBC Bay Area:

Vandals Flip Over Smart Cars in San Francisco

Someone's been vandalizing compact Smart cars in San Francisco, flipping the tiny vehicles on their front and rear ends in the city's streets.

NBC Bay Area found four of the targeted Smart cars between Sunday night and Monday morning. Two were found in the Bernal Heights neighborhood on Anderson Street, and another was found a bit south on Sweeny and Bowdoin streets, closer to the Portola district. They were either sitting on their headlights, rear bumpers high in the air, or vice versa.

FULL ARTICLE HERE

[Brandon]

Sounds like what people used to do to VW Beetles at one time.

[bing101]

http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Suspects-Flip-Over-Smart-Cars-in-San-Francisco-254177981.html

I noticed some news outlets here in the Bay Area say that Smart Cars were targets of Income inequality in San Francisco. But then again im left with more questions than answers.

[briantroutman]

http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Suspects-Flip-Over-Smart-Cars-in-San-Francisco-254177981.html

I noticed some news outlets here in the Bay Area say that Smart Cars were targets of Income inequality in San Francisco. But then again im left with more questions than answers.

Depending on who you want to believe, there's growing tension between blue-collar San Franciscans with deep roots in the city and relative newcomers who tend to be young, relatively high income, and connected to the tech industry. The ripple effect on housing demand pushes prices and rents higher at all levels.

Add to that–a Smart is a vehicle that people buy, not because it's cheap, but it makes a statement about buying small for small's sake.

But if this is rooted in the income gap, targeting Smarts seems like a sloppy and inaccurate way to go about it. Perhaps some young tech staffers have Smarts, but probably more have Minis or Prii–but even these people are low on the totem pole. The real 1%-ers all have Teslas.

[agentsteel53]

bleccch. 

Smart cars get unfathomably bad fuel economy (36mpg for 1600 pounds?  how is that physically possible? it should be 80.) and - now that the Aztek is disappearing - are the ugliest car in wide circulation today.  also, the name is pretentious as all shit.

Prii are made of all kinds of complex materials through all kinds of complex processes that do more harm to the earth than their fuel savings will ever make up for.  also, driving one makes a Camry feel exciting.

(I have nothing against Minis.)

want a good reliable small car with excellent fuel economy?  get a fucking CRX.  I did.

[PColumbus73]

I have a 1998 Mercury Tracer, it may be old and ugly, but it gets 30 mpg.

I've often wondered why Chevy hasn't brought back the Metro.

[bing101]

http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Suspects-Flip-Over-Smart-Cars-in-San-Francisco-254177981.html

I noticed some news outlets here in the Bay Area say that Smart Cars were targets of Income inequality in San Francisco. But then again im left with more questions than answers.

Depending on who you want to believe, there's growing tension between blue-collar San Franciscans with deep roots in the city and relative newcomers who tend to be young, relatively high income, and connected to the tech industry. The ripple effect on housing demand pushes prices and rents higher at all levels.

Add to that–a Smart is a vehicle that people buy, not because it's cheap, but it makes a statement about buying small for small's sake.

But if this is rooted in the income gap, targeting Smarts seems like a sloppy and inaccurate way to go about it. Perhaps some young tech staffers have Smarts, but probably more have Minis or Prii–but even these people are low on the totem pole. The real 1%-ers all have Teslas.

I see smart cars in Vallejo,CA (The city that went Bankrupt in 2008 and I live there) at Safeway. Also in previous posts the commuter buses in the area aka Google Buses to San Jose from Berkeley, Oakland And San Francisco. This has more to do with San Jose, Berkeley Oakland and San Francisco handling on income issues and housing.

[Landshark]

Another reason the name of the car is false advertising.  They are the most idiotic cars on American roads today.  Even in the cramped city they are just begging to be pancaked by a delivery truck. 

[US 41]

They should be called "stupid cars." They are a death trap. Imagine getting hit by a semi in one of those things. Not that you'd have much of chance in a normal car, but still. I wouldn't feel comfortable at all on the interstate surrounded by semis going 70+ m.p.h.

[Pete from Boston]

bleccch. 

Smart cars get unfathomably bad fuel economy (36mpg for 1600 pounds?  how is that physically possible? it should be 80.) and - now that the Aztek is disappearing - are the ugliest car in wide circulation today.  also, the name is pretentious as all shit.

Prii are made of all kinds of complex materials through all kinds of complex processes that do more harm to the earth than their fuel savings will ever make up for.  also, driving one makes a Camry feel exciting.

(I have nothing against Minis.)

want a good reliable small car with excellent fuel economy?  get a fucking CRX.  I did.

Only $2K for one with 335,000 miles.  I can't believe the number of times I allow myself to consider something like that.

[Laura]

I have a 1998 Mercury Tracer, it may be old and ugly, but it gets 30 mpg.

I've often wondered why Chevy hasn't brought back the Metro.

Seriously. This could be their competition to the Prii. I'd buy one.

[SteveG1988]

[agentsteel53]

Only $2K for one with 335,000 miles.  I can't believe the number of times I allow myself to consider something like that.

do it do it do it. 

mine has 217000.  well, 218000 now; it's been two weeks

I paid 1800 for the car, 600 in repairs I knew had to be made, so 2400 altogether.

[ARMOURERERIC]

bleccch. 

Smart cars get unfathomably bad fuel economy (36mpg for 1600 pounds?  how is that physically possible? it should be 80.) and - now that the Aztek is disappearing - are the ugliest car in wide circulation today.  also, the name is pretentious as all shit.

This is what I don't understand about auto engineering, my late lamented 1992 Fleetwood Brougham, with a curb weight of 5350 and a 5.7L engine got 27 highway.

Prii are made of all kinds of complex materials through all kinds of complex processes that do more harm to the earth than their fuel savings will ever make up for.  also, driving one makes a Camry feel exciting.

(I have nothing against Minis.)

want a good reliable small car with excellent fuel economy?  get a fucking CRX.  I did.

[oscar]

Imagine getting hit by a semi in one of those things. Not that you'd have much of chance in a normal car, but still. I wouldn't feel comfortable at all on the interstate surrounded by semis going 70+ m.p.h.

I also would not feel at all comfortable in a Smart on a freeway out west, with speed limits in the 75-85 mph range and actual speeds higher than that, for both keeping up with traffic and also getting buffeted by passing trucks.  My Prius (which is basically a cut-down Camry, with hybrid drive making up for the downsized gas engine) is at least semi-competitive out there.

Smarts can be terrific for parking in cities, where they fit nicely in "make your own" parking spaces left between larger cars.   You could even park them sideways in a pinch (as I saw a few times in Milan), since they're not much longer than some regular cars are wide.  But non-city dwellers with money to spend who want to make a green statement are better off with a Prius or a Leaf, or (if they're filthy rich) a Tesla.

[SidS1045]

Prii are made of all kinds of complex materials through all kinds of complex processes that do more harm to the earth than their fuel savings will ever make up for.

...and your source for that assertion is...?  No, wait, let me guess:  the 2007 "study" from CNW entitled "Dust to Dust."  The same study that has been repeatedly and thoroughly debunked for its lack of science, evidence and data, but which contained arbitrary assertions and assumptions, and even managed to sucker in commentator George Will.  Try reading it sometime, if you want a good laugh.

[formulanone]

want a good reliable small car with excellent fuel economy?  get a fucking CRX.  I did.

Excellent choice, but they're sometimes hard to find in unmolested condition. Their CR-Z is kind of the answer, but it's also a hybrid, although the only manual hybrid-engined car out there. (How hard would it have been for Honda to engineer a 140hp CR-Z just like the legendary CRX? Oh yeah, the Fit is for that territory...sort of.)

Chevy's Volt is the answer to the Prius...although it's around $10K more. (Your option packs and markups may vary).

Whether the hybrid batteries and generator motors are recycled is totally up to the manufacturer and locality; I'd imagine the latter are, since there's a core value for them at the Toyota dealers I've been to.

A lot of the fear over Smart accidents is completely overblown. I think the bigger problem is that they're suceptible to cross-winds, but most light and/or small vehicles suffer from that. Personally, they're not very entertaining to drive (they're rather sluggish and don't handle like mini-CRXs), and the novelty factor probably wears thin the moment you have to carry much of anything.

[Takumi]

Their CR-Z is kind of the answer, but it's also a hybrid, although the only manual hybrid-engined car out there. (How hard would it have been for Honda to engineer a 140hp CR-Z just like the legendary CRX? Oh yeah, the Fit is for that territory...sort of.)

When it was introduced, the CR-Z had 112 horsepower, but according to Honda's website, it now has 130, with a supercharged HPD (Honda Performace Development) version carrying a whopping 187 coming out soon. Compared to Honda's glory days, when their cars were carrying more than that without forced induction (in the late 1990s, all four of their 4-cylinder cars sold in America had a version in Japan that carried more than 190), seems relatively paltry.

[Pete from Boston]

Only $2K for one with 335,000 miles.  I can't believe the number of times I allow myself to consider something like that.

do it do it do it. 

mine has 217000.  well, 218000 now; it's been two weeks

I paid 1800 for the car, 600 in repairs I knew had to be made, so 2400 altogether.

My '87 Accord got 36 miles a gallon highway (with a 17 gallon tank it had a theoretical maximum range of over 600 miles!).  I owned two more Accords of later generations after that, and each one went steadily down in mileage, even with all three having manual transmissions.  The 2000 was down to 27mpg.  It's amazing how dumb we all got for a while until gas got expensive again.

[Brandon]

Only $2K for one with 335,000 miles.  I can't believe the number of times I allow myself to consider something like that.

do it do it do it. 

mine has 217000.  well, 218000 now; it's been two weeks

I paid 1800 for the car, 600 in repairs I knew had to be made, so 2400 altogether.

My '87 Accord got 36 miles a gallon highway (with a 17 gallon tank it had a theoretical maximum range of over 600 miles!).  I owned two more Accords of later generations after that, and each one went steadily down in mileage, even with all three having manual transmissions.  The 2000 was down to 27mpg.  It's amazing how dumb we all gone for a while until gas got expensive again.

Part of them problem is that we keep adding weighty stuff to vehicles and growing their size.  I remember many '80s cars getting much better mileage than similar cars do now, and not just because of the change in how the USEPA calculates mileage.

[Laura]

Only $2K for one with 335,000 miles.  I can't believe the number of times I allow myself to consider something like that.

do it do it do it. 

mine has 217000.  well, 218000 now; it's been two weeks

I paid 1800 for the car, 600 in repairs I knew had to be made, so 2400 altogether.

My '87 Accord got 36 miles a gallon highway (with a 17 gallon tank it had a theoretical maximum range of over 600 miles!).  I owned two more Accords of later generations after that, and each one went steadily down in mileage, even with all three having manual transmissions.  The 2000 was down to 27mpg.  It's amazing how dumb we all gone for a while until gas got expensive again.

Part of them problem is that we keep adding weighty stuff to vehicles and growing their size.  I remember many '80s cars getting much better mileage than similar cars do now, and not just because of the change in how the USEPA calculates mileage.

This doesn't make sense to me at all. I don't understand why newer cars aren't getting better gas mileage. I don't find hybrids impressive for this reason: why only 45 mpg highway? Yes, if I lived in a city, it would be impressive for saving money on gas, but otherwise, why such a premium for so little gas mileage increases?


iPhone

[PHLBOS]

My '87 Accord got 36 miles a gallon highway (with a 17 gallon tank it had a theoretical maximum range of over 600 miles!).  I owned two more Accords of later generations after that, and each one went steadily down in mileage, even with all three having manual transmissions.  The 2000 was down to 27mpg.  It's amazing how dumb we all got for a while until gas got expensive again.

Over the years, the Accord got bigger (& heavier).  While your '87 Accord was considered a compact; today's Accord is considered a mid-size; there was even a few years where the sedan model slightly nudged into the full-size category.

Part of them problem is that we keep adding weighty stuff to vehicles and growing their size.  I remember many '80s cars getting much better mileage than similar cars do now, and not just because of the change in how the USEPA calculates mileage.

I concur.  Even before the EPA changed the way it calculated its mileage ratings (which took effect for the 2008 model year); mileage ratings were collectively dropping largely because of the added weight put on cars due to increased safety regulations/standards as well as more added standard equipment.   

Think about it.  How many of those high mpg compacts/subcompacts from the 1980s & earlier had airbags, ABS, side-impact beams, automatic transmission, power seats, mirrors & windows; and, yes, air-conditioning?  All those features, while nice do add extra weight to the vehicle and drag down fuel economy.  A generation ago, a stripped-down economy car was just that; no-frills transportation that got better fuel economy than other (usually larger) vehicles.

Additionally, overall performance of the majority of today's cars are light-years ahead of the cars of the 1980s.  Most of cars today can do 0-60 in under 9 seconds.  A generation ago, one was lucky if their cars could do sub-10 second 0 to 60 times.  The trade-off for this improved performance is rather obvious... lower fuel economy.

AWD, which is offered for many car models now, doesn't exactly help fuel economy either.  Similar could be said regarding increased emission standards (primarily more states adopting California more stringent emission standards).  Increased emission controls = less fuel economy.

[Takumi]

Over the years, the Accord got bigger (& heavier).  While your '87 Accord was considered a compact; today's Accord is considered a mid-size

Indeed, even today's Civic is larger than an old Accord. Same for the Corolla/Camry, Altima/Maxima, etc.