Sadly, we cannot really ban them as they are utility vehicles that a small portion of the population needs. However, I still see freakin’ ads that frame them as fancy cars.
“The new Amarok V6. Pick-up truck for every day. Powerful and comfortable”
I suggest making it illegal to buy them without a registered company or have them in any color other than matte excavator yellow (for construction) or green camo (for hunting and forestry).
I disagree on all accounts. Instead of banning/restricting trucks, we should instead make them less convenient and more expensive. So:
- restructure cities to be transit and pedestrian first, not traffic first - see The Netherlands
- charge vehicle registration fees based on curb weight, since heavier vehicles destroy roads more; multiply this by miles driven, less any documentation the owner has about driving on private land
- charge an extra fee for vehicles falling net mpg targets; don’t special case SUVs and trucks, just tax them (and have certain exceptions to the tax, like if you actually use the higher passenger capacity of minivans, have a farm, etc)
The taxes would go toward pedestrian and transit infrastructure to offset the lower efficiency and greater danger larger vehicles pose.
They are already expensive. People feel it is ok to have an insane monthly truck payment because they must have a massive truck.
At a certain point, it won’t make sense. But cost alone isn’t going to solve it, hence the need to rework infrastructure to make owning massive cars inconvenient. If driving takes twice as long as the train, far fewer people would drive, and that eventually kills the car culture.
They’re already expensive and inconvenient.
The problem is that (many) Americans are emotionally unfulfilled consumers first and contributing members of their communities second, or third… or last, if at all.
Most of the people driving these vehicles only care about themselves. They’ll removed and moan about these restrictions you’d like but they’ll still buy them because their egos are so utterly fragile.
And for those who have legit reasons to operate one of these vehicles, we’ll end up subsidizing the commercial fees as write offs with taxpayer dollars.
As with many hot topic issues, it’s easy to apply band-aids detrimental to one group while appeasing another group – but the core of the issue still remains.
I’d argue that Americans are poorly compensated for their labor, our culture applauds those who work the hardest for the least reward, the family and community structures are sacrificed in exchange for appearing financially powerful. Our culture is about what you’ve acquired, not what you’ve given (other than your time). A big truck says you’ve acquired a lot.
Regulations for corporations permit them to grow and advertise without enough accountability – specifically in how their “freedom of speech” impacts the perception and lives of everyday Americans. Corporations are motivated by profits and returns more than they are consumer satisfaction or safety. As long as consumers keep believing these big trucks are what they need to show how much they’ve acquired, how financially powerful they are, vehicle makers will keep increasing prices while reducing costs to get a better return on Wall Street investments.
we’ll end up subsidizing the commercial fees as tax write offs with taxpayer dollars
That’s not really how it works though. All that does is move money from one bucket into another. Yeah, maybe your federal income tax receipts will go down marginally, but you’ll need to allocate less of your budget to infrastructure since that’s being funded by the tax.
It’s really not an issue.
the core of the issue still remains
A huge part of the core of the issue is our car-centric culture, as in we’ve equated driving a car with freedom somehow such that waiting in traffic is preferable to sitting on a train actually getting somewhere because you’re in your car.
To solve that, we need to drastically change city centers to be inconvenient to navigate by car. We do this by eliminating car corridors in cities, which pushes cars to the outside along a belt routes. Every part of the city is still accessible by car , it just takes longer. This allows lots of good things to happen, such as:
- lower taxes - fewer roads means less road maintenance
- safer streets for pedestrians, cyclists, etc
- more room for parks and other green space
- longer distance, high speed rail travel becomes cost effective - you’d need to ride an airplane (with the security nonsense) far less frequently
Once people no longer need cars to get around, the culture can change. That’s precisely what happened in the Netherlands (they used to be very car centric), and it can happen elsewhere too.
People will always want status symbols, but perhaps they’ll pick more environmentally friendly ones if cars aren’t as central to the culture, such as jewelry or designer clothing. Ideally they’d pick fully funded retirement accounts instead, but that’s not as flashy.
Corporations are motivated by profits
And that’ll always be true.
Instead of trying to restrict how they can make profits (they’ll just lobby for carveouts in any regulation that impacts them), governments should instead try to change the demand side of the equation. For example:
- If large cars are causing issues, redo the roads so big cars are less convenient. Also raise gas taxes, registration taxes, etc.
- If suburbs are causing too much sprawl, increase property taxes, build more high density housing, and build commuter rail to other dense cities.
And along with all this, government agencies should be producing high quality research to present to the populace in an effective way (hire an actual marketing team, don’t just publish papers).
The trick is to get the ball rolling. Someone needs to pilot these ideas to show they work, then others will follow suit.
In what way? The idea of only two color options, or would you be willing to buy such a truck?
I just like the colors. If there’s only going to be two I think those are solid choices.
