This wanker (Been driving a Land Cruiser 95 since 2001) feels positively out-wanked when driving in the US; my 4x4 is considered large-ish at home, but is dwarfed by what appears to be common fare in at least parts of the US; I was in Port Fourchon, LA last week, driving a Corolla - the Silverados, RAMs, F350s and whatnot surrounding me could almost fit my Land Cruiser in the glove box!
The Corolla? I don't think half of them would even have noticed if they ran it over.
Anyway - point being, I don't think we are anywhere near getting caught up in the giant car fad. Not yet, anyway.
> Anyway - point being, I don't think we are anywhere near getting caught up in the giant car fad. Not yet, anyway.
Oh we definitely are, it’s nowhere near as bad as in the US yet because they are decades ahead in that mess, but around here mid-size and light-duty full-size are becoming more and more common.
They functionally didn’t exist a few years ago, nowadays it’s a good days when I don’t see one. And that’s not including the few I know of parked in driveways on the drive to work.
Because pickups were not generally available in europe so you wouldn’t bother unless you really actually genuinely needed one (e.g. forestry services), and many countries had automobile taxes which approximated power via displacement, so huge american-style engines led to absolutely prohibitive car tax rates (that’s why euro engines have historically been pretty small, and even completely weird e.g. the UK’s RAC horsepower didn’t even use displacement at all it only used bore, so a small-bore long-stroke piston was taxed significantly less than a large-bore short-stroke one, for the same displacement).
Because wankers gonna wank.