Unpopular Anything Road-Related Opinions

[interstatefan990]

Sorry, but this discussion is kind of pointless. SUVs have rapidly and widely proliferated in the USA over the last three or so decades. There are tens if not hundreds of millions of them on the road today. They're here to stay, and it would be next to impossible to get them banned. SUV owners don't really care about how you feel about their vehicles. Just being honest.

[HighwayStar]

Sorry, but this discussion is kind of pointless. SUVs have rapidly and widely proliferated in the USA over the last three or so decades. There are tens if not hundreds of millions of them on the road today. They're here to stay, and it would be next to impossible to get them banned. SUV owners don't really care about how you feel about their vehicles. Just being honest.

I don't expect them to care, but the idea that you cannot get a ban on them is ludicrous, there have been pushes in that direction before and we have the prospect of a much more environmentally minded administration in the future now as well. The point is not to convince them to quit driving them but to lobby congress to prohibit additional sales. Once you cut off the supply the existing stock will naturally dwindle with time, it does not matter how many are on the road today, once you stop the influx that's it. Throw in something like cash for clunkers 2.0 to buy old ones off the market and call it good.

[interstatefan990]

Sorry, but this discussion is kind of pointless. SUVs have rapidly and widely proliferated in the USA over the last three or so decades. There are tens if not hundreds of millions of them on the road today. They're here to stay, and it would be next to impossible to get them banned. SUV owners don't really care about how you feel about their vehicles. Just being honest.

I don't expect them to care, but the idea that you cannot get a ban on them is ludicrous, there have been pushes in that direction before and we have the prospect of a much more environmentally minded administration in the future now as well. The point is not to convince them to quit driving them but to lobby congress to prohibit additional sales. Once you cut off the supply the existing stock will naturally dwindle with time, it does not matter how many are on the road today, once you stop the influx that's it. Throw in something like cash for clunkers 2.0 to buy old ones off the market and call it good.

Okay let's say you do somehow get them banned. You can take the person out of the SUV, but not the SUV out of the person. How do you deal with the opposition from the millions of SUV owners and families? From automakers and industry lobbyists? Manage the massive negative economical impact? Classify what is specifically an SUV? We'd have a ton of lawsuits on our hands.

Banning SUVs and getting them off the roads is like a gigantic maze with dozens of hurdles, and not as straightforward as you're making it out to be.

[hbelkins]

• SUVs need to be banned for on road use

  How do you get them to wherever you think they should be used?

Chris

Not really an issue, once you make them illegal for road use they will cease to be manufactured in quantity as road vehicles. I suppose you can grandfather the existing stock in in the interim.[/list]

I'm curious how I would have been able to drive a couple weeks ago when I had 27" of snow at my house and my newly-mandated Honda Civic-type car couldn't get through it?

Chris

People always pull out some kind of extreme edge case to try and justify those ridiculous things, but the reality is that 99% of miles driven can easily be accommodated with a sedan. I have spent years living in northern snowy climates driving a FWD sedan and never needed an SUV. Usually if it snows 27" you just clear the driveway and wait for the road to be plowed anyway. The once in a decade storm is not a justification for driving that thing all the time. Believe it or not people in the 70s did just fine without them.
The SUV only came into existence as a result of unintended consequences of regulation, so it should meet its demise by regulation. End of story.

So, then, you would prefer drivers to put their children in the beds of their pickup trucks to transport them somewhere, if the driver likes the height and comfort and visibility an SUV provides, along with the ability to travel in adverse weather conditions when other vehicles can't?

It's a pain for me to get in and out of low-to-the-ground vehicles. I can't even imagine what it would be like if I still owned my old Z-28. The higher ground clearance of an SUV or a pickup truck allows me to see road conditions better and makes me a safer driver.

I'd rather ban the little econoboxes that fold up like accordions if you hit a deer with them.



(Actually, I'd rather not ban anything of that sort. Let freedom and the free market reign.)

[HighwayStar]

Markets do not always produce good outcomes, and in any case the SUV is not the result of a free market anyway. Putting people in a pickup truck bed, etc. is already illegal so we need not concern ourselves with that.

[formulanone]

Markets do not always produce good outcomes, and in any case the SUV is not the result of a free market anyway.

Then why didn't the SUV fad go away?

You could ague that our choices are limited now, but it's currently the culmination of 25-30 years of past buying habits.

(I'll take the response off the air.)

[hbelkins]

I'm beginning to think HighwayStar is a troll and the user name is a waste of a perfectly good Deep Purple song.

He's pining for banning SUVs in the name of fuel economy, yet he brings up a 1993 Crown Vic. Those things were gas guzzlers. I'd rather have the MPG of a modern SUV than that of the Crown Vic (or of my dad's 1967 Chevy Impala with the big V-8 engine.)

[webny99]

... on the nearby thru street that parallels our neighborhood people routinely do 60 mph in a 35-mph zone.

My area specializes in suburban connector roads posted obtusely low at 35 mph, so I can think of several 35 mph zones where I'd feel comfortable doing 60 mph. Probably not the case in northern VA, though.

[SEWIGuy]

Sorry, but this discussion is kind of pointless. SUVs have rapidly and widely proliferated in the USA over the last three or so decades. There are tens if not hundreds of millions of them on the road today. They're here to stay, and it would be next to impossible to get them banned. SUV owners don't really care about how you feel about their vehicles. Just being honest.

I don't expect them to care, but the idea that you cannot get a ban on them is ludicrous, there have been pushes in that direction before and we have the prospect of a much more environmentally minded administration in the future now as well. The point is not to convince them to quit driving them but to lobby congress to prohibit additional sales. Once you cut off the supply the existing stock will naturally dwindle with time, it does not matter how many are on the road today, once you stop the influx that's it. Throw in something like cash for clunkers 2.0 to buy old ones off the market and call it good.

I mean you CAN ban them. But it would be extremely unpopular.

And how can you claim to be concerned about the environment yet advocate for German style autobahns?

[HighwayStar]

Sorry, but this discussion is kind of pointless. SUVs have rapidly and widely proliferated in the USA over the last three or so decades. There are tens if not hundreds of millions of them on the road today. They're here to stay, and it would be next to impossible to get them banned. SUV owners don't really care about how you feel about their vehicles. Just being honest.

I don't expect them to care, but the idea that you cannot get a ban on them is ludicrous, there have been pushes in that direction before and we have the prospect of a much more environmentally minded administration in the future now as well. The point is not to convince them to quit driving them but to lobby congress to prohibit additional sales. Once you cut off the supply the existing stock will naturally dwindle with time, it does not matter how many are on the road today, once you stop the influx that's it. Throw in something like cash for clunkers 2.0 to buy old ones off the market and call it good.

I mean you CAN ban them. But it would be extremely unpopular.

And how can you claim to be concerned about the environment yet advocate for German style autobahns?

To be honest the German style autobahns are not necessarily bad for fuel economy. They imply people will drive at whatever speed they choose, which for most people will be close to their existing speed. And keep in mind our existing vehicles are engineered for our speed limits, some German Automobiles do very well on fuel at high speeds. In any case I do not consider speed a dead weight loss like ride height, and the offset of more aerodynamic vehicles will compensate for whatever speed we gain. Win Win.

With this many responses I feel like I won the "unpopular opinion" thread.   

[I-39]

1. Gas taxes/other road fees should always be, without exception, indexed to inflation

2. WisDOT massively overbuilt their highway system.

3. I-69 between Indianapolis and Texas is a massive waste

4. The forthcoming I-490 tollway in Chicagoland isn't needed.

[HighwayStar]

1. Gas taxes/other road fees should always be, without exception, indexed to inflation

2. WisDOT massively overbuilt their highway system.

3. I-69 between Indianapolis and Texas is a massive waste

4. The forthcoming I-490 tollway in Chicagoland isn't needed.

The economist in me agrees with 1 

[SkyPesos]

3. I-69 between Indianapolis and Texas is a massive waste

It seems like most of this forum agree that the AR and MS sections are a waste. Not sure what the opinion is on for TN, but I think Indy-Evansville is useful for the state.

[Hwy 61 Revisited]

It seems like most of this forum agree that the AR and MS sections are a waste.

With the new legislation that just passed, perhaps Arkansas doesn't deserve the Interstate after all.
Well, that and that 30 and 40 work perfectly fine between Little Rock and Memphis. I mean, sure, Pine Bluff, but that's already got a spur to it.

[SkyPesos]

It seems like most of this forum agree that the AR and MS sections are a waste.

With the new legislation that just passed, perhaps Arkansas doesn't deserve the Interstate after all.
Well, that and that 30 and 40 work perfectly fine between Little Rock and Memphis. I mean, sure, Pine Bluff, but that's already got a spur to it.

369-30-40 looks shorter and is good enough for Tenaha-Memphis. Maybe some improvements could be made with increased traffic, but it doesn't need a parallel interstate. Also, when I-57 gets extended to Little Rock, that would be the default route to Indianapolis from Houston via 57-70, as 69's route is longer. 40-65 between Memphis and Louisville could use some improvements for the truck heavy traffic (I think 65 is 6 laned from Nashville to Louisville now, correct me if I'm wrong), and could continue to serve the role as the I-71 corridor connector to Memphis without the help of I-69 in KY and TN.

[Hwy 61 Revisited]

It seems like most of this forum agree that the AR and MS sections are a waste.

With the new legislation that just passed, perhaps Arkansas doesn't deserve the Interstate after all.
Well, that and that 30 and 40 work perfectly fine between Little Rock and Memphis. I mean, sure, Pine Bluff, but that's already got a spur to it.

369-30-40 looks shorter and is good enough for Tenaha-Memphis. Maybe some improvements could be made with increased traffic, but it doesn't need a parallel interstate. Also, when I-57 gets extended to Little Rock, that would be the default route to Indianapolis from Houston via 57-70, as 69's route is longer. 40-65 between Memphis and Louisville could use some improvements for the truck heavy traffic (I think 65 is 6 laned from Nashville to Louisville now, correct me if I'm wrong), and could continue to serve the role as the I-71 corridor connector to Memphis without the help of I-69 in KY and TN.

Which leads to another unpopular opinion: I-69 should just take over I-30 from Texarkana north to Little Rock, then have a long-ass concurrency with 40 and such. Sure, it's 139 miles, but whatever, it uses less road. That old stub next to 269 could just be an extension of 269.

[SkyPesos]

It seems like most of this forum agree that the AR and MS sections are a waste.

With the new legislation that just passed, perhaps Arkansas doesn't deserve the Interstate after all.
Well, that and that 30 and 40 work perfectly fine between Little Rock and Memphis. I mean, sure, Pine Bluff, but that's already got a spur to it.

369-30-40 looks shorter and is good enough for Tenaha-Memphis. Maybe some improvements could be made with increased traffic, but it doesn't need a parallel interstate. Also, when I-57 gets extended to Little Rock, that would be the default route to Indianapolis from Houston via 57-70, as 69's route is longer. 40-65 between Memphis and Louisville could use some improvements for the truck heavy traffic (I think 65 is 6 laned from Nashville to Louisville now, correct me if I'm wrong), and could continue to serve the role as the I-71 corridor connector to Memphis without the help of I-69 in KY and TN.

Which leads to another unpopular opinion: I-69 should just take over I-30 from Texarkana north to Little Rock, then have a long-ass concurrency with 40 and such. Sure, it's 139 miles, but whatever, it uses less road. That old stub next to 269 could just be an extension of 269.

You could truncate I-30 at Texarkana if you'll have I-69 take over it to Little Rock. This will shorten concurrent sections to have one only with I-40. Yes, this will make I-30 even shorter and intrastate for a x0, but that can be renumbered if an only 220 mile long x0 is a issue. After all, the I-30 corridor was originally an odd number in the US routes system, as US 67.

[I-55]

It seems like most of this forum agree that the AR and MS sections are a waste.

With the new legislation that just passed, perhaps Arkansas doesn't deserve the Interstate after all.
Well, that and that 30 and 40 work perfectly fine between Little Rock and Memphis. I mean, sure, Pine Bluff, but that's already got a spur to it.

369-30-40 looks shorter and is good enough for Tenaha-Memphis. Maybe some improvements could be made with increased traffic, but it doesn't need a parallel interstate. Also, when I-57 gets extended to Little Rock, that would be the default route to Indianapolis from Houston via 57-70, as 69's route is longer. 40-65 between Memphis and Louisville could use some improvements for the truck heavy traffic (I think 65 is 6 laned from Nashville to Louisville now, correct me if I'm wrong), and could continue to serve the role as the I-71 corridor connector to Memphis without the help of I-69 in KY and TN.

I-65 is six laned through the entirety of Kentucky now but is not complete between basically the state line and Goodlettsville, though TN is beginning to widen at least an exit south of the state line.

[Hwy 61 Revisited]

REALLY hot take:

Yes, the Claiborne Expressway should be closed. But it should not be demolished. It should be left as a sort of Grafitti Highway.

There's too much art down underneath it that would be lost if it were simply demolished.

[Ned Weasel]

It's a pain for me to get in and out of low-to-the-ground vehicles. I can't even imagine what it would be like if I still owned my old Z-28. The higher ground clearance of an SUV or a pickup truck allows me to see road conditions better and makes me a safer driver.

I'm surprised nobody has mentioned CUVs, which are a thing, and are often outwardly indistinguishable from SUVs, but are different because they're on car bodies instead of truck bodies.  I actually prefer to call them tall station wagons, because that's pretty much what they are (which isn't a bad thing).

He's pining for banning SUVs in the name of fuel economy, yet he brings up a 1993 Crown Vic. Those things were gas guzzlers. I'd rather have the MPG of a modern SUV than that of the Crown Vic (or of my dad's 1967 Chevy Impala with the big V-8 engine.)

Maybe a better idea would be stronger efficiency and safety standards for SUVs.  It's not like every SUV is a 9-MPG Ford Excursion, anyway.

[kernals12]

Car culture is good
Urban freeways are good
Trains are a massive waste of money

[Roadgeekteen]

Car culture is good
Urban freeways are good
Trains are a massive waste of money

Given your bio we knew that already. I disagree to an extent...

[HighwayStar]

Car culture is good
Urban freeways are good
Trains are a massive waste of money

Hear ye hear ye 

[kphoger]

First, its not so much about efficiency but safety for all drivers by removing commercial vehicles from passenger use.

That is wasteful of fuel and does not solve for the rollover risk, relatively poor braking, handling issues, etc. of SUVs.

I don't see that your assertions are backed up by actual data.

Compare the 2017 Nissan Quest minivan to these three seven-passenger SUVs from the same year, below.  I fail to see why you'd advocate for removing the SUVs from the road but keep the minivan.



Acura MDX – Has lower ground clearance and slightly worse fuel economy, but has an advantage in both of the other categories I measured, plus AWD

Hyundai Santa Fe – Has a 2mpg lower fuel economy, but has an advantage in every other category I measured, plus AWD

Mitsubishi Outlander – Has an advantage in every category I measured, same 2WD as the minivan

[HighwayStar]

First, its not so much about efficiency but safety for all drivers by removing commercial vehicles from passenger use.

That is wasteful of fuel and does not solve for the rollover risk, relatively poor braking, handling issues, etc. of SUVs.

I don't see that your assertions are backed up by actual data.

Compare the 2017 Nissan Quest minivan to these three seven-passenger SUVs from the same year, below.  I fail to see why you'd advocate for removing the SUVs from the road but keep the minivan.



Acura MDX – Has lower ground clearance and slightly worse fuel economy, but has an advantage in both of the other categories I measured, plus AWD

Hyundai Santa Fe – Has a 2mpg lower fuel economy, but has an advantage in every other category I measured, plus AWD

Mitsubishi Outlander – Has an advantage in every category I measured, same 2WD as the minivan

The regulation is not to keep the minivan but get rid of the SUV, you picked that up from someone else. Its more of a mandate for sedans and station wagons.