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The Death of the Minivan
- zzbn00 2y agoCan confirm (but not recommend) that a VW Sharan will ford a stream (or at least quite deeply flooded road) with only the loss of the plastic engine heat shield from underneath.
- Eddy_Viscosity2 2y agoThey stopped making the Dodge Caravan which was really the only affordable options (not to mention the stow 'n go seats which were very handy). Like this was a really good family car for a big family. Now they still make a grand caravan but under the Chrysler Grand Caravan for many 10s of thousands more. It has a few extra creature comforts, but its basically the same vehicle - just unaffordable.
- throw0101d 2y agohttps://archive.is/RoCwU https://archive.is/RoCwU https://archive.today/RoCwU https://archive.today/RoCwU
- hggh 2y agoI hate reCAPTCHA. https://web.archive.org/web/20240927122501/https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2024/09/minivan-suv-family-car/679919/ https://web.archive.org/web/20240927122501/https://www.theat...
- bell-cot 2y agoYep. Ain't no better way demonstrating your deficiencies in wealth, status, and power than by making an extremely visible choice of "cheap, utilitarian, and unfashionable".
- hindsightbias 2y agoThey should have named models for surfing beaches. The VW van used to be Valhalla-mobile for surfers.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- LeifCarrotson 2y agoI genuinely can't tell if this is sarcasm or not.
- abanana 2y agoNeither can I, but if not it's a hell of a line. Really shows up how pathetic is society's slavery to the concept of "status symbols". Should I buy what does the job best for me personally? No, I'm supposed to follow the herd, otherwise it marks me out in a bad way.
- a13n 2y agocould also be correlated to people having fewer kids?
- michpoch 2y agoIt’s more of a naming change. E.g. Tesla Model X is practically a minivan. It just won’t sell if you call it so.
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 2y agominivan == car chassis suv == truck chassis They're probably dying for the same reason cars are.
- HunterWare 2y agoToyota Sienna == Toyota Highlander It's all the exact same chassis, drive, suspension, pretty much you name it except the doors and body style. So that's not quite true...
- psc 2y agoSUV is a poor term, nowadays it's largely used to refer to crossovers/CUVs, which have unibody car chassis and are really just station wagons with some extra clearance. The nomenclature may be a lost battle at this point, but the rise of CUVs (which are certainly cars, not body-on-frame trucks) is what killed minivans and sedans.
- michpoch 2y ago> suv == truck chassis What does that even mean? If you meant built on a frame, then sorry, but that's not in the SUVs DNA. > They're probably dying for the same reason cars are. Not sure where are you located - cars are doing great.
- jakedata 2y agoMy minivan is proof of virility and demonstrates that I am not compensating for anything. It also moves a hell of a lot of lumber when the seats are folded down. Try that in some bubble shaped car-based SUV or a short-bed pickup.
- hoosieree 2y agoIn the sci-fi series The Expanse, there's a Bezos-style rich tycoon character who flaunts his wealth by purposefully not getting hair treatments and instead allows his male pattern baldness to be on display. He's so rich he can afford to not care what anyone thinks, and he wants everyone to know it.
- adamrezich 2y agoInteresting anecdote about a work of fiction, but what does it have to do with anything?
- rurp 2y agoIt seems pretty clearly related to the post it is a reply to.
- adamrezich 2y agoDrawing a moral equivalency to some random event in some random contemporary work of fiction as a means of moralizing isn't some kind of awesome megadunk “own” or anything—it's actually pretty lame.
- thfuran 2y agoWhy do you think it was attempting to be anything of the sort?
- unethical_ban 2y agoGuy 1 jokes about how he's so confident in himself he drives a minivan. Person 2 says "ha that reminds me of a character in a story". It's two people joking in a subthread.
- exhilaration 2y agoDon't miss the 2003 New York Time article linked inside: https://archive.is/3yox8 https://archive.is/3yox8 It's full of gems, like this: Eventually, though, the minivan became so indelibly associated with suburbia that even soccer moms shunned it. Soon image-conscious parents were going to soccer games in vehicles designed to ford Yukon streams and invade Middle Eastern countries.
- xnx 2y ago> ford Yukon streams and invade Middle Eastern countries That could be a verse from the Canyonero ad jingle
- underlipton 2y agoForgetting that the Yukon is a GMC model, I was trying to figure out what words were missing between "designed" and "Ford Yukon", and then, as my mind was on the cusp of finishing grokking the actual meaning of the sentence, what an "Invade (make) Middle Eastern (model)" would look like.
- UncleOxidant 2y agoMaybe going full circle. There are some gear heads a couple blocks away - you know the type, always working on cars in the driveway - who seem to be pimping out minivans from the aughts. Refurbing them, painting skulls on them, putting on fancy exhaust systems. I first walked by this a few months back and wondered "are minivans cool now?" Maybe these guys have fond memories of their childhood spent in them and are trying to relive those days?
- ramesh31 2y ago>There are some gear heads a couple blocks away - you know the type, always working on cars in the driveway - who seem to be pimping out minivans from the aughts. Car people live for the arbitrage between market sentiment and reality when it comes to older (but not classic) cars. Minivans fall right into that category; insanely useful with powerful engines and good suspension, yet had for cheap with low miles/single owner because "no one wants to drive a minivan anymore".
- underlipton 2y agoTricking out vans has also been a thing since vans were a thing. Which is probably part of why VW is bringing back the microbus (sort of).
- yencabulator 2y ago> putting on fancy exhaust systems Yeah these are not the people we want/need, either.
- jasperry 2y agoI don't think the decline of minivans is because of "uncoolness"; I blame the US auto industry that doesn't want to sell anything but SUVs. Our family was shopping last year for a new minivan to replace our aging Odyssey--our kids are bigger now, but we still go on trips together. We looked for Siennas and Odysseys, but nobody had a good selection in stock, and the newer models felt more cramped with worse visibility than the old ones. I felt that we were not being given the choices we wanted and were being herded toward SUVs.
- jacobolus 2y agoThere are also basically no wagons anymore. Apparently everything has to be a high-off-the-ground poor-visibility pedestrian murder machine to be profitable for the auto industry anymore. Fuel economy standards should be fixed so that vehicles with truck chassis are treated the same as cars, tax loopholes advantaging truck chassis should be closed, there should be much stricter legal requirements for driver view of nearby low objects, possibly urban areas should have special 10 mph lower speed limits for SUV-sized vehicles, and there should be much higher financial liability for pedestrian/cyclist injuries, possibly piercing through directly to manufacturers. Otherwise, car design has been a race to the bottom.
- iamthepieman 2y agoSubaru still makes them. I would buy something else since I hate the anti privacy of the company and cars but it's all I can easily get
- xattt 2y agoVolvo, MB, Audi and BMW continue to make them too.
- Kon-Peki 2y agoNot very well, though (and I don't think BMW sells wagons in the US anymore). They are positioned as "cool & snobby", rather than "useful". Peak wagon was the P3 Volvo V70/XC70, built on the Ford EUCD platform [1], which had amazing utility via tie-down rails, 40/20/40 fold-flat middle seats, and a front passenger seat that folded flat to create a uniform load floor for carrying 10 foot long boards. They were better at being useful than the Subaru Outback and yet had higher quality leather and carpets. And don't forget the vertical rear hatch, giving more interior space with a larger window (and larger rear wiper!) that gave them excellent rearward visibility. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_EUCD_platform https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_EUCD_platform
- zubiaur 2y agoAt least when it comes to Siennas, we are supply constrained. Good luck getting a mid trim level one at MSRP. Odysseys are still hard to get in some areas. The other two are less desirable: Kia's had terrible crash ratings and Pacificas come with Chrysler's poor reliability stigma (somewhat justifiably).
- mmh0000 2y agoAs someone who bought a Honda Odyssey a few months ago, I don't believe this article. I wanted to save money and buy a used minivan. However, in my area, used minivans (in decent condition) cost nearly the same as brand-new ones, so I got a new one. Nearly every house in my neighborhood has a minivan parked out front. They are such useful vehicles. I can't throw my kids in the back of a truck. And if I'm hauling non-human objects, I usually want to cover and protect it from weather and theft, a minivan does that! A truck... not so much.
- derwiki 2y agoWe bought a minivan (Sienna) but it barely fit in our garage (had to fold in the mirrors). Ended up returning it for a 3 row SUV. But it made us notice and wonder: do we see so many minivans parked out front because they don’t fit in the garage?
- mmh0000 2y agoWe have a "four-car garage," and the minivan /barely/ fits. Once the garage door is shut, there's about 12" of clearance in the rear and 6" in the front. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8wnnFUazOY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8wnnFUazOY
- xnx 2y agoI'm hoping that part of the Tesla Robotaxi unveiling in nine days is a minivan-esque vehicle.
- xnx 2y agoThe 2025 Kia Carnival is trying hard to sneak the benefits of a minivan into something that can still pass for an SUV.
- timeon 2y ago> It is the least cool vehicle ever designed VW Caravelle is pretty cool. Unlike SUVs.
- drivebyhooting 2y agoMinivans are not as survivable as a full sized SUV. Also the rear row is basically useless for adults.
- move-on-by 2y ago> Minivans are not as survivable as a full sized SUV This is an interesting line of thought I had not considered- as a van owner. I would appreciate some more details on how you consider an SUV is more survivable. Totally not scientific, but comparing the safety results of the 2024 Toyota Sienna with 2024 Toyota Highlander and they have very similar scores (I think it’s important to compare within the same manufacturer). Close enough for me to think there is not a big inherent difference in the two models at least. What are your thoughts? https://www.nhtsa.gov/ratings https://www.nhtsa.gov/ratings
- drivebyhooting 2y agoI didn’t dig into their crash experiments but I guess it’s car against immovable object. That’s not a realistic real world scenario. My family has been in two minor low speed crashes in a compact SUV against a truck. Both times our car was obliterated the passengers concussed and the other car was perfectly fine. I said enough is enough. The only thing that matter is mass.
- jaymmartin 2y agoWhy you would compare a minivan to a compact SUV in terms of mass? The Sienna and Odyssey both weight ~4500 lbs. That's more or the same as the Grand Highlander or Pilot, both mid-size SUVs. Compact SUVs typically weight in the 3500-4000 lb range. It's true that full size SUVs and trucks weigh even more though. What is the physical mechanism that would cause a vehicle hitting a more massive vehicle to be worse than the same vehicle hitting a wall at the same speed? My understanding is the impulse is greater in the wall collision. It feels like a wall is the ideal test. I know there has been talk of getting the NHTSA to test offset frontal collisions, but it would still be stationary. Regardless, I'm sorry that happened to your family. I would fear for mine if a similar thing happened. The arms race of ever more massive vehicles is an unfortunate social dilemma problem.
- maxglute 2y agoGive me a cute kei van. Honda NBox isn't cool, but it's not lame either.
- sys32768 2y agoI drive a 2009 Sienna with only 96k miles. Got hooked on them when I bought one to transport my aging parents. They're fantastic for road trips thanks to the huge field of view and extra storage, and they can double as a camper van for two people if you remove the back seats. Most guys my age here own oversized trucks but real men drive minivans.
- move-on-by 2y agoIt’s my wife’s daily driver- not mine- but I love driving the Sienna. Heck, it even has AWD. When we go on trips, there is no question if there is room enough to bring something. We travel a lot, so it’s got way more miles on it than yours, but miles well spent in comfort and I expect to get a ton more miles out of it for years to come. Love the van, anyone dissing on vans has never owned one. Both luxury and utility with no compromising.
- Kon-Peki 2y agoThe current Sienna is severely compromised from a utility standpoint - the design team just didn't try very hard. And, again on the current model, you have to get the AWD or it is drastically underpowered for driving when loaded up (the AWD option adds a ~30HP electric motor for the rear wheels). And to make matters worse, it is built in the same factory that makes the Highlander, Grand Highlander, and Lexus TX. They adjust the output mix to ensure that dealers will never have a large inventory - so you are guaranteed to be forced to pay full price and will never get a good deal on it. This wouldn't be such a bad thing, except that the sticker price is expensive.
- dave333 2y agoOld minivans never die, they just fade away. We bought a new Grand Caravan in 2014 (our fifth Grand Caravan) as our "forever vehicle" to last a long time as we were approaching retirement. Now 10 years later it has done only 100k and is still going strong and has long since been paid off. I took part in a focus group for the Chrysler Pacifica that is a bit more upmarket feature and pricewise than the Grand Caravan but otherwise identical. When demand fell the grand caravan was discontinued but they are still selling the Pacificas. I guess the Pacifica and particularly the hybrid version is what counts as "cool" among the non boy racers.
- dave333 2y agoMinivans are a rock bottom alternative to homelessness which is actually pretty cool: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=living+in+a+minivan https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=living+in+a+min...
- jinushaun 2y agoIt never gets brought up, but minivans lack ground clearance. When back SUVs were on the rise in the 90s, I remembered higher ride height as a popular reason that was frequently mentioned. That and the arms race of being in the bigger vehicle during and accident.
- chalcolithic 2y agoBeg my pardon but what high ground clearance is needed for?
- fvdessen 2y agoSpeed bumps and high curbs
- Phrodo_00 2y agoDrive slow and don't go up curbs (there's generally people there!)?
- chalcolithic 2y agohigh curbs? is it even legal?
- alamortsubite 2y agoIronically, the pretense of an adventurous lifestyle.
- daotoad 2y agoI used to joke about creating spray on mud as my million dollar product idea. Macho up your suburban assault vehicle with some many mud splatters without getting your hands dirty.
- yencabulator 2y agoI see a lot of very well waxed and polished "off-road" vehicles in the nearby smallish city. I've never seen a rolling coal lifted pickup on a forest road. Actually looking dirty is not part of their aesthetic. Yours truly, former owner of a ridiculously lifted jeep that's been all over the western half of the US and regularly went up & down dry creek beds with 1+ foot vertical drops/climbs that needed the clearance. That thing never saw a clean day. Hose it until there's no longer mud on the door handles.
- shswkna 2y agoIn Germany, the VW Minivan (“T models) were and still are iconic, and desirable. They are just very expensive.
- pmg101 2y agoConvincing but inaccurate. In the UK, the small SUV body style is associated with nothing more than the suburban family. MPVs (minivans) are disappearing, driven mainly now only by older people who appreciate the easier access and have zero interest in cool. The French have always been the masters of the MPV. Renault arguably invented it with its first Espace. Manufacturers such as Peugeot and Renault have successfully transformed their MPV offerings, keeping them almost as practical as the MPV form that preceded them, while reshaping the body to look more shoe-like. My own take is that certain forms are just more appealing. Large wheels, high waistline, jutting bonnet (hood). Why this should be I have to admit I cannot work out. But do aesthetics have a "why"? I drive an MPV, an Opel Meriva, and I love its practicality while hating its aesthetic.
- drcongo 2y agoRenault also gave us one of the maddest cars of all time with the 2 door MPV Renault Avantime. All a matter of taste, but personally I love the Avantime.
- SebFender 2y ago"If you live in a driving city, and especially if you have a family, a minivan conversation will eventually take place." No. Never. Not even close. My wife knows better than to start this conversation. We always went with wagons instead and they've been cheaper, actually fun to drive and don't look like you gave up on your life and dreams.
- mdip 2y agoUncoolness is a bigger factor than people give credit to. I remember when I was about ten years old my parents having a conversation with the new neighbors about cars which bled into how they'd "never ever own a Station Wagon." I remember the conversation because the neighbors had not fully moved in and the following day pulled up in their 80s (was it a Caprice Classic) Station Wagon complete with that weird wood door stripe (later making an appearance on minivans!) It even had a Barry Manilow bumper sticker on it! My folks didn't do the Minivan, either, but it was just the 4 of us. Growing up, everyone I knew spoke about minivans like the Station Wagon. Ironically, all buying up things that are generally classified as Station Wagons, look exactly like station wagons but are now marketed as "crossovers." I doubt that would have worked in 1989, but style is fickle. All of my data is anecdotal, but everyone I know that "chose to get a car that a Minivan would have served better" did so because "they hated minivans." Sure, they'd usually come up with a reason or two beyond "they're uncool" but the reasons were superficial and usually came with more sacrifices on the crossover/SUV side (not the least of which was fuel economy). But one of the better driving experiences I had was in a fully loaded Chrysler Town and Country Anniversary Edition (the last year they made them) which I owned for a few years. It had a lot of power, reasonable fuel economy, was incredibly comfortable and had every convenience gadget you'd expect to find in a solid luxury car and then some. Plus, the kids can't slam a sliding door into a car or pole in the parking lot.
- ToDougie 2y agoWhen I was a kid, I thought my friends with giant SUVs were sooo cool. But those kids thought my mom's minivan was cool, too. Now I have kids and they are begging us to buy a minivan, but as another poster pointed out, the price premium for a minivan is extraordinary. We're going to make it work because we have to, but it isn't going to feel good on our budget.
- reginald78 2y agoI definitely heard similar disdain for the minivan. But the other day I was really looking at cars going by in traffic and realized 90% of people are driving the same oblong crossover thing in the same 3 colors, popular because of their blandness. I never cared much about coolness of a car and it looks to me like most actual car owners don't either these days. I skipped minivans because they're actually quite expensive.
- anarticle 2y agoI showed this video to my friends, and everyone agrees this Suzuki Solio (MPV, meaning has sliding passenger doors) would be perfect for getting their kids to and from school: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iA2t06RAGTk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iA2t06RAGTk A great feature of sliding doors, which minivans have, is your kids can never nail a car parked next to you with the door. I think we don't really do pragmatic vehicles in USA. Bias: I am a mini cooper owner who has transported a dishwasher inside. My car is the apex predator of parking in the city! One negative is that all truck/SUV headlights are at eye level.
- nkotov 2y agoIn my neighborhood, practically 1/3 of the houses have a minivan. Sienna is the popular choice compared to the Odyssey. Buying one brand new has been a challenge, we were put on a waitlist and eventually settled with a used one instead. By far one of the most comfortable family vehicles we own. It's extremely practical, fits our family of five comfortably with car seats and all, little kids can get in and out without assistance. It's awesome. It might not look cool but at this point in my life, it's not something we care about.
- simne 2y agoI once read very interest review, which could explain some things (sure, not 100%). In review compared vw caddy, and same niche machines from Fiat and Peugeot, and also they added Kia H1. There was many interest, but one thing - when H1 was totally other niche machine (light truck), it was nearly two times more expensive to buy than others in comparison, but in long run, if you you have constant feed of loads, light truck is cheaper and more convenient to use than minivan. For example, few weeks ago I hear on one new EV tires not last usual 1000s miles, because they use tires for typical machine, but this one weight much more and run much faster.
- yellowapple 2y agoI would drive a minivan in a heartbeat if they were easier to find with AWD/4WD.
- RecycledEle 2y agoNonsense. The minivan and the hatchback are the 2 most popular styles of automobile in the USA right now, but people call them "crossovers." Look at crossovers. They are all minivans or hatchbacks.
- knowitnone 2y agowith a growing homeless problem, a minivan would be ideal. I'd get one just to go camping and "bum" around when I retire.