7 ms·

Ooooh, related one of my favorite topics. Part of the reason modern lots are so big and why parking covers so much area is simply because cars are too big! The

Ooooh, related one of my favorite topics. Part of the reason modern lots are so big and why parking covers so much area is simply because cars are too big! There is zero reason a person needs to own a 7 seat SUV to transport 3 people or five 2x4s twice a year. The proliferation of oversized vehicles continues to exacerbate a significant number of local and global issues and I'm of the belief that we need strong regulation to limit the size of vehicles.

tw04 5y ago
>Part of the reason modern lots are so big and why parking covers so much area is simply because cars are too big! There is zero reason a person needs to own a 7 seat SUV to transport 3 people or five 2x4s twice a year. The proliferation of oversized vehicles continues to exacerbate a significant number of local and global issues and I'm of the belief that we need strong regulation to limit the size of vehicles. I'll ignore for a second that I completely disagree the size of cars are the issue with parking lots. As someone who has a large truck, the spots are not designed for it, they're designed for a mid-size sedan. So, you aren't shrinking parking spots unless you're planning on massively increasing insurance costs due to all the door dings and bumper scrapes that will follow by making parking spaces smaller. Who decides what is "large enough"? The family with 3 or 4 kids who has to take them to sporting events on the weekend like football or hockey and ALL of the requisite gear just have to take multiple cars now to fit everything? And that's going to be better for the environment or society? What about a weekend trip to the cabin, they need to buy and store a trailer now to have enough room for their stuff? Because unless you've got a solution to those among dozens of other issues, no legislator in their right mind is going to back significantly decreasing the size of cars. If you want to find an issue opposed from both sides of the aisle, try telling people they are going to have to start towing a trailer everywhere to get their kids to sports on the weekend.
- Tiktaalik 5y ago
  > Who decides what is "large enough"? Maybe the market can decide. We could be levying higher prices in taxes on the cars that occupy more space, damage roads more and are more dangerous to pedestrians.
  - skeeter2020 5y ago
    Let the market decide. Pick a winner in advance and tax the outcome I don't want out of existence. This is about as much market-based policy as your typical politician is maiking science-based policy.
  - tw04 5y ago
    By and large we already do that. The larger vehicles are more expensive, and in most states your tabs are based on the price of the vehicle. If you want to go a step beyond that, I'm sure you'd be able to find some support if it wasn't an outrageous tax. This assumption that because OP doesn't need a large vehicle, nobody has a reason to need one is just silly. And as I said, it does absolutely nothing to address parking lots.
- omni 5y ago
  The tax code already makes plenty of allowances for number of children and/ro dependents so I'm not sure why you think it'd be some herculean effort for a car size regulation to allow people with kids to have more cars. There's no reason for a childless couple to be driving a 7-seater SUV around everywhere. If they need a separate trailer for that one trip a year where they need to haul a kayak or something, that's fine, that still means they aren't burning all that extra energy the other 364 days a year.
  - tw04 5y ago
    OP wants to eliminate large vehicles full stop. There's no allowance for a large family. I guess we're also banning anything larger than a small fishing boat as well since there will be no way to trailer it anywhere if we're banning full-size pickup trucks and SUVs.
- aaronax 5y ago
  You could consider just not participating in sports that require strapping on 20 pounds of plastic equipment for protection.
  - Karrot_Kream 5y ago
    I don't think it's necessary to change recreational activities to use fewer automobiles. Plenty of folks in Europe and East Asia participate in sports with lots of equipment and still take trains. It's just an American cultural norm. Most people in the US immediately view transit as unsuitable when you have to bring large objects, when places that actually have a culture of using transit don't.
- turtlebits 5y ago
  Agree on this point. I have a "compact" pickup and I absolutely will not even try to park it in a garage as the spaces are too small. I wish the judgement would stop on what people need/use. If they cause a huge impact, add a tax. (lower the gas guzzler MPG requirement, etc) Any before anyone says anything, I do construction/wood working on the side so yes, I absolutely use it but do not daily drive it.
  - Karrot_Kream 5y ago
    The judgement exists because construction is happening in economies around the world but only Americans drive this many large vehicles. Unless you think Americans are building _more_ than other economies (which it definitely isn't), you'll quickly come to the conclusion that because parking and large lane widths are mandated by local code and vehicle weight isn't really taxed in any way, that Americans have an incentive to buy as big a car as they can that fits within their government mandated built environment.
- Karrot_Kream 5y ago
  Average vehicle sizes in the US have gotten larger in the US over the last 20 years. Are you telling me it was impossible to have 3-4 children in a vehicle 20 years ago, despite birth rates falling in the meantime?
  - tw04 5y ago
    20 years ago was 2002... yes in 2002 people who had 3-4 kid drove an SUV, a van or a mini-van, just like they do today. The argument isn't about average vehicle size, the argument OP made was to eliminate ALL large vehicles.
    - Karrot_Kream 5y ago
      Average SUV size in the US has gone up in the last 20 years. You're engaging the argument in the weakest way possible (ALL large vehicles, which has to mean anything other than a subcompact right?!) instead of trying to Steelman it. I'm not sure that larger vehicles are doing anything to parking lot sizes (it should be trivial to look this up in revisions to your city code though), but they do pose a large risk to road safety (which is most obvious by seeing the increasing number of pedestrian and cycling injuries and fatalities in US statistics) and contribute heavily to road wear which results in increased tax burden to support the paving of roads.
      - tw04 5y ago
        >Average SUV size in the US has gone up in the last 20 years. You're engaging the argument in the weakest way possible (ALL large vehicles, which has to mean anything other than a subcompact right?!) instead of trying to Steelman it. The AVERAGE size of a vehicle is literally irrelevant to the discussion. You asked what people with 3-4 kids did 20 years ago: My response was they bought the same Tahoe they buy now. Which was nearly identical in size. You keep saying "The average size" when it has little to no bearing on OPs complaint: which is he wants to eliminate full-size SUVs and trucks. YOU implied that full size SUVs and trucks weren't a thing 20 years ago by asking what people did. Now you're moving the goal posts because I pointed out how silly your implication was. The Tahoe having its wheelbase grow 4" in 20 years isn't what OP is complaining about and you know it.
pradn 5y ago
It's unclear to me whether democratic governance is capable of reducing consumption. People want to buy bigger cars, for comfort or perceived safety, or for how they make them feel.
- lozenge 5y ago
  The CAFE standards (fuel efficiency requirements by size of vehicle) pushed the car manufacturers towards making bigger cars, and the ridiculously wide early US road building standards helped them. It's a common example of perverse incentives.
tomc1985 5y ago
Oversized vehicles also feed their owners' egos. And display wealth. Practicality as a factor is in the rear-view mirror, so-to-speak
- stirbot 5y ago
  then let's play into this and charge for oversized parking spots
  - bromuro 5y ago
    Money won’t give land back, sadly.
buscoquadnary 5y ago
I'll just throw out there that I have 3 small children, and we had to upsize our vehicle to accompany them, so now I drive me small sub-compact, but to haul our kids we had to upgrade to a minivan. In a lot of discussions I see around transport it often feels as though people like to pretend that those with small children don't exist. Like no matter how great public transit is trying to transport 3 rambunctious under 6's isn't going to work for our family or anyone else on the public transit for any meaningful trip.
- davidw 5y ago
  Minivans aren't the problem. That's a sensible design for moving a lot of people around. It's those lifted trucks that have a hood taller than some shorter adults, to say nothing of children. New pickups in general are just ridiculous compared to the same models from 30 years ago, which were just fine for, say, actual ranch work.
- Joeri 5y ago
  I have two kids, not three, but we have never had a car, always taken the kids everywhere on public transport. I’m not going to say every trip was a joyful experience, but imho you are making a way bigger deal out of this than the reality. Although to be fair it depends a lot on the quality of the public options in your metro region. Downside of kids that always travel by public transport: on the rare occasions that they do travel by car, they puke nearly every time. For us public transport is a lot less stressful than traveling by car.
  - buscoquadnary 5y ago
    I applaud your efforts my friend, part of our problem is we've never lived anywhere with good public transit. I will also just throw out the world changes quite dramatically from 2 kids to 3 kids, once those little buggers outnumber you things get a lot more exciting in parenting.
    - toomuchtodo 5y ago
      I don’t fault folks who have three kids, but with fertility rates plummeting, it’s not something that should be optimized for. Families are getting smaller over time.
skeeter2020 5y ago
>> I'm of the belief that we need strong regulation to limit the size of vehicles. This is wishfull thinking as cars are manufactured globally, have a very long life and it's pretty tough to imagine this sort of wide regulation fitting with the needs of a major urban center and huge parts of rural environments. I'd argue population controls which are plain crazy would still be easier to implement than regulated the size of vehicles.
- CyanBird 5y ago
  Just for the record cars are not "manufactured globally" cars are manufactured on specific countries which then have long logistics of acquisition, not all countries make cars and the ones that do can very certainly be pushed through legislation to make "smaller cars", as this problem is specifically poignant on the United States changing united states legislation would have a large footprint by itself in the same manner that air quality standards of California have nearly become international standards for all vehicles That said there is no political will for this to happen, therefore it won't, which is sad given that is a good idea
- fomine3 5y ago
  US is the biggest market that want bigger cars. I believe US market encourages makes worldwide car model bigger.
decafninja 5y ago
I grew up in the 80s and 90s. My recollection is that the family vehicle of choice for my parents and those of most of my friends was what you'd call the "generic midsized family sedan" - Honda Accord, Toyota Camry, etc. All of us managed just fine. Even taking extended multiday family roadtrips. Plus, the Accord of the late 80s and early 90s was closer in size to a 2022 Civic than 2022 Accord. Nowadays people insist that they need at minimum a Honda Pilot, Toyota Highlander, or the current fave - Kia Telluride, to transport a single kid.
- jandrese 5y ago
  While this is true, not all of the exterior volume increase resulted in more passenger space. Crumple zones and other crash protection force automakers to add what is effectively a lot of dead space in the frame and body, and since shrinking the interior is generally frowned upon that extra volume instead causes the exterior to balloon outward.
  - decafninja 5y ago
    Yes, but I'd say the old Accord is still closer to a new Civic than a new Accord. For example: 1990 Accord (source: https://hondanews.com/en-US/honda-automobiles/releases/release-1736b29dbfc20d6e1e8068004c34ca83-1990-honda-accord-specifications https://hondanews.com/en-US/honda-automobiles/releases/relea...) Legroom 42.6/34.3 Hiproom 52.4/52.4 Shoulder: 54.8/54.8 Passenger volume: 93 cu ft Cargo volume: 14.4 cu ft 2022 Civic (source: https://owners.honda.com/vehicles/information/2002/Civic-Sedan/specs#mid^ES1612PW https://owners.honda.com/vehicles/information/2002/Civic-Sed...) Legroom: 42.2/36 Hiproom: 51.2/49.8 Shoulder: 52.6/52 Passenger volume: 91.4 cu ft Cargo volume: 12.9 cu ft 2021 Honda Accord (source: ) Legroom: 42.3/40.4 Hiproom: 55.3/55 Shoulder: 58.3/56.5 Passenger volume: 102.7 cu ft Cargo volume: 16.7 cu ft Though granted - too lazy to do the calculations right now, but I imagine a 1990 Honda Accord might be priced closer to a 2002 Honda Civic than Accord too.
- turtlebits 5y ago
  I feel like this is the same argument on HN regarding memory in laptops. Every argument insists that 8GB is useless, and shame on a company for selling that config (or not offering 32GB).
deltarholamda 5y ago
>Part of the reason modern lots are so big and why parking covers so much area is simply because cars are too big! Spaces are typically 9' apart. I've seen some new ones that have moved to 10'. But part of the reason for "large parking lots" is the building code requires a minimum number of spaces for a building of a certain occupancy. >There is zero reason a person needs to own a 7 seat SUV to transport 3 people or five 2x4s twice a year. While I agree, people do this because everybody else does it. If you're in a Mini, surrounded by Escalades, the Escalade starts to look a lot more attractive. We went through all this in the 90s. The SUV explosion was because women like it. They like feeling safe; they like being up high; the car companies discovered this, and made the SUV a really comfy place. There is no regulation that will fix this. You want to fix it? Make cities and public transportation livable again. It's really not that difficult. A safe, affordable, well-managed city with good schools would be attractive. The problem is achieving this will make certain people unhappy. Pick which one you want more.
ceras 5y ago
For people who are skeptical of how regulation can help with this, Japan actually used to financially penalize buying large cars relative to small cars. The small ones are called kei cars: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kei_car https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kei_car There's much less of a savings benefit to buying kei cars since 2014, but they remain very popular. The decades of government incentive probably helped normalize them, and they really do seem to fit better in Japan's smaller streets.
- Sohcahtoa82 5y ago
  I remember discovering Kei cars in Gran Turismo, and then really wishing I could get a Suzuki Cappuccino [0] in the USA. It wasn't a very fast car by any means, but it was incredibly light weight and nimble, being smaller than even a Mazda Miata. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzuki_Cappuccino https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzuki_Cappuccino

tw04 5y ago

>Part of the reason modern lots are so big and why parking covers so much area is simply because cars are too big! There is zero reason a person needs to own a 7 seat SUV to transport 3 people or five 2x4s twice a year. The proliferation of oversized vehicles continues to exacerbate a significant number of local and global issues and I'm of the belief that we need strong regulation to limit the size of vehicles. I'll ignore for a second that I completely disagree the size of cars are the issue with parking lots. As someone who has a large truck, the spots are not designed for it, they're designed for a mid-size sedan. So, you aren't shrinking parking spots unless you're planning on massively increasing insurance costs due to all the door dings and bumper scrapes that will follow by making parking spaces smaller. Who decides what is "large enough"? The family with 3 or 4 kids who has to take them to sporting events on the weekend like football or hockey and ALL of the requisite gear just have to take multiple cars now to fit everything? And that's going to be better for the environment or society? What about a weekend trip to the cabin, they need to buy and store a trailer now to have enough room for their stuff? Because unless you've got a solution to those among dozens of other issues, no legislator in their right mind is going to back significantly decreasing the size of cars. If you want to find an issue opposed from both sides of the aisle, try telling people they are going to have to start towing a trailer everywhere to get their kids to sports on the weekend.

Tiktaalik 5y ago
> Who decides what is "large enough"? Maybe the market can decide. We could be levying higher prices in taxes on the cars that occupy more space, damage roads more and are more dangerous to pedestrians.
- skeeter2020 5y ago
  Let the market decide. Pick a winner in advance and tax the outcome I don't want out of existence. This is about as much market-based policy as your typical politician is maiking science-based policy.
- tw04 5y ago
  By and large we already do that. The larger vehicles are more expensive, and in most states your tabs are based on the price of the vehicle. If you want to go a step beyond that, I'm sure you'd be able to find some support if it wasn't an outrageous tax. This assumption that because OP doesn't need a large vehicle, nobody has a reason to need one is just silly. And as I said, it does absolutely nothing to address parking lots.
omni 5y ago
The tax code already makes plenty of allowances for number of children and/ro dependents so I'm not sure why you think it'd be some herculean effort for a car size regulation to allow people with kids to have more cars. There's no reason for a childless couple to be driving a 7-seater SUV around everywhere. If they need a separate trailer for that one trip a year where they need to haul a kayak or something, that's fine, that still means they aren't burning all that extra energy the other 364 days a year.
- tw04 5y ago
  OP wants to eliminate large vehicles full stop. There's no allowance for a large family. I guess we're also banning anything larger than a small fishing boat as well since there will be no way to trailer it anywhere if we're banning full-size pickup trucks and SUVs.
aaronax 5y ago
You could consider just not participating in sports that require strapping on 20 pounds of plastic equipment for protection.
- Karrot_Kream 5y ago
  I don't think it's necessary to change recreational activities to use fewer automobiles. Plenty of folks in Europe and East Asia participate in sports with lots of equipment and still take trains. It's just an American cultural norm. Most people in the US immediately view transit as unsuitable when you have to bring large objects, when places that actually have a culture of using transit don't.
turtlebits 5y ago
Agree on this point. I have a "compact" pickup and I absolutely will not even try to park it in a garage as the spaces are too small. I wish the judgement would stop on what people need/use. If they cause a huge impact, add a tax. (lower the gas guzzler MPG requirement, etc) Any before anyone says anything, I do construction/wood working on the side so yes, I absolutely use it but do not daily drive it.
- Karrot_Kream 5y ago
  The judgement exists because construction is happening in economies around the world but only Americans drive this many large vehicles. Unless you think Americans are building _more_ than other economies (which it definitely isn't), you'll quickly come to the conclusion that because parking and large lane widths are mandated by local code and vehicle weight isn't really taxed in any way, that Americans have an incentive to buy as big a car as they can that fits within their government mandated built environment.
Karrot_Kream 5y ago
Average vehicle sizes in the US have gotten larger in the US over the last 20 years. Are you telling me it was impossible to have 3-4 children in a vehicle 20 years ago, despite birth rates falling in the meantime?
- tw04 5y ago
  20 years ago was 2002... yes in 2002 people who had 3-4 kid drove an SUV, a van or a mini-van, just like they do today. The argument isn't about average vehicle size, the argument OP made was to eliminate ALL large vehicles.
  - Karrot_Kream 5y ago
    Average SUV size in the US has gone up in the last 20 years. You're engaging the argument in the weakest way possible (ALL large vehicles, which has to mean anything other than a subcompact right?!) instead of trying to Steelman it. I'm not sure that larger vehicles are doing anything to parking lot sizes (it should be trivial to look this up in revisions to your city code though), but they do pose a large risk to road safety (which is most obvious by seeing the increasing number of pedestrian and cycling injuries and fatalities in US statistics) and contribute heavily to road wear which results in increased tax burden to support the paving of roads.
    - tw04 5y ago
      >Average SUV size in the US has gone up in the last 20 years. You're engaging the argument in the weakest way possible (ALL large vehicles, which has to mean anything other than a subcompact right?!) instead of trying to Steelman it. The AVERAGE size of a vehicle is literally irrelevant to the discussion. You asked what people with 3-4 kids did 20 years ago: My response was they bought the same Tahoe they buy now. Which was nearly identical in size. You keep saying "The average size" when it has little to no bearing on OPs complaint: which is he wants to eliminate full-size SUVs and trucks. YOU implied that full size SUVs and trucks weren't a thing 20 years ago by asking what people did. Now you're moving the goal posts because I pointed out how silly your implication was. The Tahoe having its wheelbase grow 4" in 20 years isn't what OP is complaining about and you know it.

pradn 5y ago

It's unclear to me whether democratic governance is capable of reducing consumption. People want to buy bigger cars, for comfort or perceived safety, or for how they make them feel.

lozenge 5y ago
The CAFE standards (fuel efficiency requirements by size of vehicle) pushed the car manufacturers towards making bigger cars, and the ridiculously wide early US road building standards helped them. It's a common example of perverse incentives.

tomc1985 5y ago

Oversized vehicles also feed their owners' egos. And display wealth. Practicality as a factor is in the rear-view mirror, so-to-speak

stirbot 5y ago
then let's play into this and charge for oversized parking spots
- bromuro 5y ago
  Money won’t give land back, sadly.

buscoquadnary 5y ago

I'll just throw out there that I have 3 small children, and we had to upsize our vehicle to accompany them, so now I drive me small sub-compact, but to haul our kids we had to upgrade to a minivan. In a lot of discussions I see around transport it often feels as though people like to pretend that those with small children don't exist. Like no matter how great public transit is trying to transport 3 rambunctious under 6's isn't going to work for our family or anyone else on the public transit for any meaningful trip.

davidw 5y ago
Minivans aren't the problem. That's a sensible design for moving a lot of people around. It's those lifted trucks that have a hood taller than some shorter adults, to say nothing of children. New pickups in general are just ridiculous compared to the same models from 30 years ago, which were just fine for, say, actual ranch work.
Joeri 5y ago
I have two kids, not three, but we have never had a car, always taken the kids everywhere on public transport. I’m not going to say every trip was a joyful experience, but imho you are making a way bigger deal out of this than the reality. Although to be fair it depends a lot on the quality of the public options in your metro region. Downside of kids that always travel by public transport: on the rare occasions that they do travel by car, they puke nearly every time. For us public transport is a lot less stressful than traveling by car.
- buscoquadnary 5y ago
  I applaud your efforts my friend, part of our problem is we've never lived anywhere with good public transit. I will also just throw out the world changes quite dramatically from 2 kids to 3 kids, once those little buggers outnumber you things get a lot more exciting in parenting.
  - toomuchtodo 5y ago
    I don’t fault folks who have three kids, but with fertility rates plummeting, it’s not something that should be optimized for. Families are getting smaller over time.

skeeter2020 5y ago

>> I'm of the belief that we need strong regulation to limit the size of vehicles. This is wishfull thinking as cars are manufactured globally, have a very long life and it's pretty tough to imagine this sort of wide regulation fitting with the needs of a major urban center and huge parts of rural environments. I'd argue population controls which are plain crazy would still be easier to implement than regulated the size of vehicles.

CyanBird 5y ago
Just for the record cars are not "manufactured globally" cars are manufactured on specific countries which then have long logistics of acquisition, not all countries make cars and the ones that do can very certainly be pushed through legislation to make "smaller cars", as this problem is specifically poignant on the United States changing united states legislation would have a large footprint by itself in the same manner that air quality standards of California have nearly become international standards for all vehicles That said there is no political will for this to happen, therefore it won't, which is sad given that is a good idea
fomine3 5y ago
US is the biggest market that want bigger cars. I believe US market encourages makes worldwide car model bigger.

decafninja 5y ago

I grew up in the 80s and 90s. My recollection is that the family vehicle of choice for my parents and those of most of my friends was what you'd call the "generic midsized family sedan" - Honda Accord, Toyota Camry, etc. All of us managed just fine. Even taking extended multiday family roadtrips. Plus, the Accord of the late 80s and early 90s was closer in size to a 2022 Civic than 2022 Accord. Nowadays people insist that they need at minimum a Honda Pilot, Toyota Highlander, or the current fave - Kia Telluride, to transport a single kid.

jandrese 5y ago
While this is true, not all of the exterior volume increase resulted in more passenger space. Crumple zones and other crash protection force automakers to add what is effectively a lot of dead space in the frame and body, and since shrinking the interior is generally frowned upon that extra volume instead causes the exterior to balloon outward.
- decafninja 5y ago
  Yes, but I'd say the old Accord is still closer to a new Civic than a new Accord. For example: 1990 Accord (source: https://hondanews.com/en-US/honda-automobiles/releases/release-1736b29dbfc20d6e1e8068004c34ca83-1990-honda-accord-specifications https://hondanews.com/en-US/honda-automobiles/releases/relea...) Legroom 42.6/34.3 Hiproom 52.4/52.4 Shoulder: 54.8/54.8 Passenger volume: 93 cu ft Cargo volume: 14.4 cu ft 2022 Civic (source: https://owners.honda.com/vehicles/information/2002/Civic-Sedan/specs#mid^ES1612PW https://owners.honda.com/vehicles/information/2002/Civic-Sed...) Legroom: 42.2/36 Hiproom: 51.2/49.8 Shoulder: 52.6/52 Passenger volume: 91.4 cu ft Cargo volume: 12.9 cu ft 2021 Honda Accord (source: ) Legroom: 42.3/40.4 Hiproom: 55.3/55 Shoulder: 58.3/56.5 Passenger volume: 102.7 cu ft Cargo volume: 16.7 cu ft Though granted - too lazy to do the calculations right now, but I imagine a 1990 Honda Accord might be priced closer to a 2002 Honda Civic than Accord too.
turtlebits 5y ago
I feel like this is the same argument on HN regarding memory in laptops. Every argument insists that 8GB is useless, and shame on a company for selling that config (or not offering 32GB).

deltarholamda 5y ago

>Part of the reason modern lots are so big and why parking covers so much area is simply because cars are too big! Spaces are typically 9' apart. I've seen some new ones that have moved to 10'. But part of the reason for "large parking lots" is the building code requires a minimum number of spaces for a building of a certain occupancy. >There is zero reason a person needs to own a 7 seat SUV to transport 3 people or five 2x4s twice a year. While I agree, people do this because everybody else does it. If you're in a Mini, surrounded by Escalades, the Escalade starts to look a lot more attractive. We went through all this in the 90s. The SUV explosion was because women like it. They like feeling safe; they like being up high; the car companies discovered this, and made the SUV a really comfy place. There is no regulation that will fix this. You want to fix it? Make cities and public transportation livable again. It's really not that difficult. A safe, affordable, well-managed city with good schools would be attractive. The problem is achieving this will make certain people unhappy. Pick which one you want more.

ceras 5y ago

For people who are skeptical of how regulation can help with this, Japan actually used to financially penalize buying large cars relative to small cars. The small ones are called kei cars: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kei_car https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kei_car There's much less of a savings benefit to buying kei cars since 2014, but they remain very popular. The decades of government incentive probably helped normalize them, and they really do seem to fit better in Japan's smaller streets.

Sohcahtoa82 5y ago
I remember discovering Kei cars in Gran Turismo, and then really wishing I could get a Suzuki Cappuccino [0] in the USA. It wasn't a very fast car by any means, but it was incredibly light weight and nimble, being smaller than even a Mazda Miata. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzuki_Cappuccino https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suzuki_Cappuccino