4 ms·

I don't think we've seen the end game yet. I have an electric cargo bike. During a kids party yesterday I ran 5 different errands with it while someone with a

by noosphr 11mo ago

I don't think we've seen the end game yet. I have an electric cargo bike. During a kids party yesterday I ran 5 different errands with it while someone with a car managed to get stuck in traffic, not find a parking spot, and miss the whole thing. The only reason why cars are the size and shape they are is because ICE engines couldn't be made smaller. Electric engines on the other hand are small enough that I can have the chassis of a fully functioning car be light enough to lift by one man. I think we will see small, light weight and intrinsically pedestrian safe cars made of tubes and canvas replace the heavy monstrosities we have now.

mike50 11mo ago
The Smart for Two existed with an internal combustion engine.
sofixa 11mo ago
> The only reason why cars are the size and shape they are is because ICE engines couldn't be made smaller. Electric engines on the other hand are small enough that I can have the chassis of a fully functioning car be light enough to lift by one man. Nope, the Smart existed for quite a while. Safety standards made cars slightly bigger (e.g. the new Renault Twingo is bigger than the original), but modern American "cars" are massive because that's what marketing has convinced Americans it's what they need. American vehicle manufacturers are pretty terrible at everything, and efficiency standards nudge them that way anyways, so making massive cars with high margins is a good deal for them. In Europe there are SUVs, but the average car is a VW Golf or a Renault Clio sized. They are pretty decently sized, good visibility, can fit a family of 4, etc. Yeah, you can't haul a 50 ton campervan offroading up to Kilimanjaro, sure, but that's not what 99% of car trips are for. > I think we will see small, light weight and intrinsically pedestrian safe cars made of tubes and canvas replace the heavy monstrosities we have now. Renault Twizy ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renault_Twizy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renault_Twizy ) exists, but doesn't sell all that well (compared to "normal" cars). The Citroen Ami ( https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citro%C3%ABn_Ami_(2020) https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citro%C3%ABn_Ami_(2020) ) is pretty popular in certain places (saw a ton of them in Amsterdam and semi-rural areas in France).
- rootusrootus 11mo ago
  > that's what marketing has convinced Americans it's what they need Is there some kind of objective analysis which supports this claim? It seems more likely that people vote with their wallet, and bigger wins out a lot of the time. It's hardly an American manufacturer thing, either, Japanese cars have reliably gotten bigger year after year as well.
  - sofixa 11mo ago
    > Is there some kind of objective analysis which supports this claim It's a bit hard to have objective research on marketing and public perceptions. But how else do you explain all the marketing in that regard, and the fact that Americans, on average, even urbanites, keep buying massive pickup trucks, the majority of which are never used for anything more than a commuter vehicle for 1, maybe 2 occupants? Even in rich countries with very outdoorsy people (Switzerland, Nordics, hell, the Netherlands has camping as a national sport, and during summertime they do mass migrations in towed campers and campervans towards the south of France, Italy, Spain), very few people buy trucks. Marketing, an arms race, manufacturers not offering much else because their marketing works, Americans being very aspirational about what they'll do with their vehicles, idk. > It's hardly an American manufacturer thing, either, Japanese cars have reliably gotten bigger year after year as well. Japanese vehicles in the US or everywhere? Cars in general have been getting bigger because of safety features, but American monstrosities with lower visibility than literal tanks are an almost uniquely American phenomenon (slowly invading the rest of the world too).
    - jack_tripper 11mo ago
      >very few people buy trucks Because most buys SUVs instead. >massive pickup trucks, the majority of which are never used for anything more than a commuter vehicle for 1, maybe 2 occupants? Marketing, an arms race, manufacturers not offering much else because their marketing works, Americans being very aspirational about what they'll do with their vehicles, idk. Not sure why you have this judgmental and holier than though "Europeans better, Americans stupid for buying trucks" stance throughout this conversation. It's not like Europeans are immune to marketing car oversizing with their affinity for SUVs which is why Volvo only makes SUVs for the past 8+ years now.
pmg101 11mo ago
Your first three paragraphs are sound. But surely the problem with the final paragraph is the transition? Assuming the old style of vehicle remains on the road, then my lightweight one is at risk of being crushed. Only a niche minority would choose that (as a cargo bike owner, I'm also one, but I recognise most are not, with good reason.) Unless we built a whole separate infrastructure.... We already see a lot of electric scooters using cycle lanes.
- amanaplanacanal 11mo ago
  Yes. More separated lanes leads to increased usage. We need to do this anyway.
bastawhiz 11mo ago
I own three electric motorcycles and respectfully disagree. You can't make tube and canvas that let a passenger survive getting t-boned by a Yukon Denali or an F-250. One high-profile accident with a mother and her child getting peeled off the road with a coal shovel are all it'll take to kill such a form factor forever. The problem isn't the form factor you're describing, it's that you can't put those on the road with 1000+ horsepower machines that are 50 times heavier. And on top of that, a lot of people just don't want to give up their heated massage seats and connected infotainment and removable third row or whatever crap they pack in minivans these days.
- Zigurd 11mo ago
  The elements of the form factor implied here are already on the road. Series hybrid bikes exist today. Fully faired bikes exist today. A fully feared tricycle recumbent could get you to work, clean and dry, on a dimes worth of energy. Cities like Barcelona and Taipei that already move on gas scooters, would smell immensely better if e-bikes took over. American pick up trucks with their butch looking front ends that kill a lot of children are a stupid idea under any circumstances. But evidently we have to live with that death and destruction until they rust out. Kids are already dying because of the stupidity and we have not got what it takes to stop it. It means other places will benefit from better mobility sooner.
  - bastawhiz 11mo ago
    A fully feared tricycle recumbent will get you killed in a city with poor bike-ability. I have friends that have been in the hospital for weeks because of bike accidents in SF and NYC, which are arguably the exact kinds of places where you'd want bikes to replace cars. But instead, we have "Vision Zero" projects that still have staggeringly far to go. I don't disagree with you: it would be great if we could replace more cars with bikes, but the reality is that there's almost nothing serious we can do in the US to undo the omnipresence of massive vehicles in most cities.
slurrpurr 11mo ago
Of course ICEs can be tiny. Look at motorcycles, rollers and motorbikes. The demand for small cars is just not there anymore
kakacik 11mo ago
This is a bit out of touch with reality, presumably you don't have a car and seemingly are against any normal sized cars or bigger. A very narrow use case should change the world we all live in? Tiny cars can't do longer distances (aka higher speeds) safely, physics of car collisions won't let you. They have been around for quite some time and popularity is as it is. If you are hit by 50kmh car as a cyclist (seems like frustration/fear of yours thats behind your words), whether car weights 600kg or 1300kg doesn't make much difference to your resulting state. Personal cars have specced brakes according to their weight so breaking distance is cca same regardless of weight. Where I live (also went through kids birthday party today back & forth few times) - somebody with ebike would freeze their ass in windchill of fast moving bicycle would be below -10C (situation 5 months of a year), slip on partially frozen road could be fatal, moving around on rather narrow roads that have very little room for anybody but cars (Switzerland here but no high altitude) would be literal playing russian roulette with rest of traffic, triple that with wide cargo ebike. Alas, all parents came to the party in forest hut just above our village in their ICE or hybrid cars.
EliteGadget 11mo ago
> The only reason why cars are the size and shape they are is because ICE engines couldn't be made smaller. Electric engines on the other hand are small enough that I can have the chassis of a fully functioning car be light enough to lift by one man. You have seen a motorbikes/mopeds, scooters and micro-cars surely? An electric bike is essentially a moped which have existed for like 70-80 years now? A small cars have been around since the 1950s. Cars are the shape they are because normally you want the option of carrying 1-5 people. 5 people is 2 adults and 3 children. BTW cars in the past were much smaller. Compare the size of any car from the 1930-40s in the UK to a modern European car and you will notice it is much smaller they are.
carlosjobim 11mo ago
Episode n# 348 of hackers never having heard about motorcycles. There's almost a billion motorcycles in the world currently.
- cindyllm 11mo ago
  [dead]
cmxch 11mo ago
They’re called golf carts.
JojoFatsani 11mo ago
Have fun hauling a spouse, three kids, a dog and a Costco load a couple hours up the interstate in February in the Lego Technics car.
bgnn 11mo ago
This isn't correct. There were ICE mini and micro cars. It's just not popular in some countries like the US or Canada, but wildly popular in some (mainly Asia). Nowadays there are electric micro cars too, like Citroën Ami. I believe Renault has sth too, and the Chinese brands too. They are cheap, often cheaper than an electric cargo bike!
ponector 11mo ago
>> The only reason why cars are the size and shape they are is because ICE engines couldn't be made smaller Is it? Microcars are real, with ICE as well. Kei cars from Japan is another example. Small cars like mini cooper and Smart are also out there for decades. Typical EV is a large car/SUV, because that is what people would like to buy.

by noosphr 11mo ago

mike50 11mo ago

The Smart for Two existed with an internal combustion engine.

sofixa 11mo ago

> The only reason why cars are the size and shape they are is because ICE engines couldn't be made smaller. Electric engines on the other hand are small enough that I can have the chassis of a fully functioning car be light enough to lift by one man. Nope, the Smart existed for quite a while. Safety standards made cars slightly bigger (e.g. the new Renault Twingo is bigger than the original), but modern American "cars" are massive because that's what marketing has convinced Americans it's what they need. American vehicle manufacturers are pretty terrible at everything, and efficiency standards nudge them that way anyways, so making massive cars with high margins is a good deal for them. In Europe there are SUVs, but the average car is a VW Golf or a Renault Clio sized. They are pretty decently sized, good visibility, can fit a family of 4, etc. Yeah, you can't haul a 50 ton campervan offroading up to Kilimanjaro, sure, but that's not what 99% of car trips are for. > I think we will see small, light weight and intrinsically pedestrian safe cars made of tubes and canvas replace the heavy monstrosities we have now. Renault Twizy ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renault_Twizy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Renault_Twizy ) exists, but doesn't sell all that well (compared to "normal" cars). The Citroen Ami ( https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citro%C3%ABn_Ami_(2020) https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citro%C3%ABn_Ami_(2020) ) is pretty popular in certain places (saw a ton of them in Amsterdam and semi-rural areas in France).

rootusrootus 11mo ago
> that's what marketing has convinced Americans it's what they need Is there some kind of objective analysis which supports this claim? It seems more likely that people vote with their wallet, and bigger wins out a lot of the time. It's hardly an American manufacturer thing, either, Japanese cars have reliably gotten bigger year after year as well.
- sofixa 11mo ago
  > Is there some kind of objective analysis which supports this claim It's a bit hard to have objective research on marketing and public perceptions. But how else do you explain all the marketing in that regard, and the fact that Americans, on average, even urbanites, keep buying massive pickup trucks, the majority of which are never used for anything more than a commuter vehicle for 1, maybe 2 occupants? Even in rich countries with very outdoorsy people (Switzerland, Nordics, hell, the Netherlands has camping as a national sport, and during summertime they do mass migrations in towed campers and campervans towards the south of France, Italy, Spain), very few people buy trucks. Marketing, an arms race, manufacturers not offering much else because their marketing works, Americans being very aspirational about what they'll do with their vehicles, idk. > It's hardly an American manufacturer thing, either, Japanese cars have reliably gotten bigger year after year as well. Japanese vehicles in the US or everywhere? Cars in general have been getting bigger because of safety features, but American monstrosities with lower visibility than literal tanks are an almost uniquely American phenomenon (slowly invading the rest of the world too).
  - jack_tripper 11mo ago
    >very few people buy trucks Because most buys SUVs instead. >massive pickup trucks, the majority of which are never used for anything more than a commuter vehicle for 1, maybe 2 occupants? Marketing, an arms race, manufacturers not offering much else because their marketing works, Americans being very aspirational about what they'll do with their vehicles, idk. Not sure why you have this judgmental and holier than though "Europeans better, Americans stupid for buying trucks" stance throughout this conversation. It's not like Europeans are immune to marketing car oversizing with their affinity for SUVs which is why Volvo only makes SUVs for the past 8+ years now.

pmg101 11mo ago

Your first three paragraphs are sound. But surely the problem with the final paragraph is the transition? Assuming the old style of vehicle remains on the road, then my lightweight one is at risk of being crushed. Only a niche minority would choose that (as a cargo bike owner, I'm also one, but I recognise most are not, with good reason.) Unless we built a whole separate infrastructure.... We already see a lot of electric scooters using cycle lanes.

amanaplanacanal 11mo ago
Yes. More separated lanes leads to increased usage. We need to do this anyway.

bastawhiz 11mo ago

I own three electric motorcycles and respectfully disagree. You can't make tube and canvas that let a passenger survive getting t-boned by a Yukon Denali or an F-250. One high-profile accident with a mother and her child getting peeled off the road with a coal shovel are all it'll take to kill such a form factor forever. The problem isn't the form factor you're describing, it's that you can't put those on the road with 1000+ horsepower machines that are 50 times heavier. And on top of that, a lot of people just don't want to give up their heated massage seats and connected infotainment and removable third row or whatever crap they pack in minivans these days.

Zigurd 11mo ago
The elements of the form factor implied here are already on the road. Series hybrid bikes exist today. Fully faired bikes exist today. A fully feared tricycle recumbent could get you to work, clean and dry, on a dimes worth of energy. Cities like Barcelona and Taipei that already move on gas scooters, would smell immensely better if e-bikes took over. American pick up trucks with their butch looking front ends that kill a lot of children are a stupid idea under any circumstances. But evidently we have to live with that death and destruction until they rust out. Kids are already dying because of the stupidity and we have not got what it takes to stop it. It means other places will benefit from better mobility sooner.
- bastawhiz 11mo ago
  A fully feared tricycle recumbent will get you killed in a city with poor bike-ability. I have friends that have been in the hospital for weeks because of bike accidents in SF and NYC, which are arguably the exact kinds of places where you'd want bikes to replace cars. But instead, we have "Vision Zero" projects that still have staggeringly far to go. I don't disagree with you: it would be great if we could replace more cars with bikes, but the reality is that there's almost nothing serious we can do in the US to undo the omnipresence of massive vehicles in most cities.

slurrpurr 11mo ago

Of course ICEs can be tiny. Look at motorcycles, rollers and motorbikes. The demand for small cars is just not there anymore

kakacik 11mo ago

This is a bit out of touch with reality, presumably you don't have a car and seemingly are against any normal sized cars or bigger. A very narrow use case should change the world we all live in? Tiny cars can't do longer distances (aka higher speeds) safely, physics of car collisions won't let you. They have been around for quite some time and popularity is as it is. If you are hit by 50kmh car as a cyclist (seems like frustration/fear of yours thats behind your words), whether car weights 600kg or 1300kg doesn't make much difference to your resulting state. Personal cars have specced brakes according to their weight so breaking distance is cca same regardless of weight. Where I live (also went through kids birthday party today back & forth few times) - somebody with ebike would freeze their ass in windchill of fast moving bicycle would be below -10C (situation 5 months of a year), slip on partially frozen road could be fatal, moving around on rather narrow roads that have very little room for anybody but cars (Switzerland here but no high altitude) would be literal playing russian roulette with rest of traffic, triple that with wide cargo ebike. Alas, all parents came to the party in forest hut just above our village in their ICE or hybrid cars.

EliteGadget 11mo ago

> The only reason why cars are the size and shape they are is because ICE engines couldn't be made smaller. Electric engines on the other hand are small enough that I can have the chassis of a fully functioning car be light enough to lift by one man. You have seen a motorbikes/mopeds, scooters and micro-cars surely? An electric bike is essentially a moped which have existed for like 70-80 years now? A small cars have been around since the 1950s. Cars are the shape they are because normally you want the option of carrying 1-5 people. 5 people is 2 adults and 3 children. BTW cars in the past were much smaller. Compare the size of any car from the 1930-40s in the UK to a modern European car and you will notice it is much smaller they are.

carlosjobim 11mo ago

Episode n# 348 of hackers never having heard about motorcycles. There's almost a billion motorcycles in the world currently.

cindyllm 11mo ago
[dead]

cmxch 11mo ago

They’re called golf carts.

JojoFatsani 11mo ago

Have fun hauling a spouse, three kids, a dog and a Costco load a couple hours up the interstate in February in the Lego Technics car.

bgnn 11mo ago

This isn't correct. There were ICE mini and micro cars. It's just not popular in some countries like the US or Canada, but wildly popular in some (mainly Asia). Nowadays there are electric micro cars too, like Citroën Ami. I believe Renault has sth too, and the Chinese brands too. They are cheap, often cheaper than an electric cargo bike!

ponector 11mo ago

>> The only reason why cars are the size and shape they are is because ICE engines couldn't be made smaller Is it? Microcars are real, with ICE as well. Kei cars from Japan is another example. Small cars like mini cooper and Smart are also out there for decades. Typical EV is a large car/SUV, because that is what people would like to buy.