RE: Autocar defends SUVs
Tuesday 31st May 2005
Autocar defends SUVs
They're no bigger, says car weekly
 Porsche Cayenne: no bigger than other cars, says Autocar |
The battle for the 4x4 continues, with Autocar entering the fray this week. It put out a statement in their defence.
Those united against them are convinced that they’re oversized, gas-guzzling polluters that pose an increasing threat to other road users. The truth, as Autocar deputy editor Chas Hallett explains, is that "the vast majority of 4X4s sold in this country pump out no more CO2, use no more fuel and, in fact, are no bigger than their lower-slung alternatives. Some are only guilty of being taller – but that also makes them more visible to the environmental lobby."
"The SUV is an important product for the motor industry," Hallett goes on, "and a desirable one for consumers looking for versatility, towing ability, increased seating capacity and true go-anywhere capability."
"Consumers have the right to choose the vehicle of their choice and must not be intimidated by campaigners – especially when the facts they are using are out of date and misleading".
Autocar busts the myths
"4x4s are bigger than other cars"
In relation to the amount of road space they take up, 4x4s are comfortably overshadowed by big luxury saloons. They are taller than average, and as such harder to see around in traffic, but even in this respect they’re not the worst offenders, Citroen’s Berlingo mini-MPV, for example, is taller than a BMW X5.
"4x4s are less economical than other cars"
The prevalence of diesel engines makes many 4X4s no more thirsty than a typical family car. The Land Rover Freelander Td4 diesel, one of the UK’s most popular 4X4s returns an average 37.2 mpg – identical to that of a 1.8 Ford Mondeo 1.8 petrol.
"4x4s pollute more than other cars"
CO2 levels from 4X4s have dropped by 14.6 per cent since 1997, and a Volvo XC90 D5 4x4 now produces less than the maker’s 2.4-litre V50 estate. Emission free 4X4s will soon appear on the roads – Lexus has just launched a hybrid RX400 – which has both a traditional petrol engine and two powerful electric motors.
"There are more 4x4s in urban areas than elsewhere"
Only 7.1 per cent of cars sold last year were 4x4s –- 179,439 were registered in 2004 in a new car market of over 2.5 million cars. In London, only 3.5 per cent of privately registered cars are 4x4s.
Most importantly of course, once 4x4s have been decimated, sports cars could be next in the firing line.
Discussion
I am pleased that Autocar actually have some facts to counter the sometimes irrational hating of SUVs. However, I'm sure I'm not the only one to notice that the "less economical.." rebuttal is not a particularly fair comparison. In my experience the extra weight and frontal area of SUVs gives significantly higher fuel consumption. Anybody have consumption figures for X5 3.0d vs equivalent 5-series touring to prove me wrong?
I think we should ALL defend the right for people to drive what they want.
If someone wants or needs an SUV, then let them have one.
The moment we attack drivers of SUVs or their right to drive, then we lose all the moral ability to defend attacks on the rest of us.
Drive a classic Bentley like Balmoral? Ban it - its as heavy and thirsty as an SUV after all. Enzo - ban that too, it only does 12 mpg. TVR? Ban those as well - they throw out loads of unburnt hydrocarbons after all.
They are plenty of people who nned SUV's as well. Who are we to judge how much they need one, or if they just want one? SUV owners pay enough for their ownership - consider the taxes they pay through the fuel they buy.
We should all defend SUV's and 4x4's. Its our right to drive thats being attacked.
If someone wants or needs an SUV, then let them have one.
The moment we attack drivers of SUVs or their right to drive, then we lose all the moral ability to defend attacks on the rest of us.
Drive a classic Bentley like Balmoral? Ban it - its as heavy and thirsty as an SUV after all. Enzo - ban that too, it only does 12 mpg. TVR? Ban those as well - they throw out loads of unburnt hydrocarbons after all.
They are plenty of people who nned SUV's as well. Who are we to judge how much they need one, or if they just want one? SUV owners pay enough for their ownership - consider the taxes they pay through the fuel they buy.
We should all defend SUV's and 4x4's. Its our right to drive thats being attacked.
I put together an article for PH on the same lines, though it looks like Autocar got there first.
This was my article:
This was my article:
I said:
The truth about the anti-4x4 lobby
The anti-4x4 argument has got so far out of hand that it’s more imperative we stop the political cobblers than the ‘gas-guzzlers’
It is inevitable that, at the centre of every opinionated campaign is a grain of truth. Like a conversation about football with a bar room ‘expert’, however, in the worlds of cars and politics, few realities ever hold out to repeated ideological bludgeoning. However, unlike the football bore, who will eventually get drunk and fall off his stool and whose personal recommendations for Fergie or Arsene will be forgotten or ignored, the movement against 4x4 vehicles seems to gather pace in Britain increasingly by the day. Based, it seems, on nothing more than hearsay.
It is true, though, that a grain of truth lies in the centre of the anti-4x4 argument, but unfortunately for UK campaigners, it’s in another country: America, to be precise.
American commercial vehicle legislation is the problem. In America, you qualify for a hefty tax break if you own a commercial vehicle. Makes sense, you would think, in supporting the nation’s economy, to offer those home businesses an advantage. Problem is, of course, that you don’t need a commercial venture for a commercial vehicle, and therein lies the loophole that kicked off the ‘anti’ argument. American commercial 4x4s are exempt from a whole smorgasbord of regulations, from crash protection (many use dangerous old perimeter-frame chassis) to CAFÉ (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) laws.
They are lumbering, excessive, ludicrously (single-figure mpg) thirsty, generally backwards, and largely deserving of the criticism they receive. The anti lobby want the loophole closed, the pro lobby are pleased with the way this outlet for American manufacturers has stemmed the flow – partially – of imports and the decline of the US automobile industry’s sales as a whole. In short, it’s an all-American problem. Outside of the US of A, the vehicles in question are few and far between. In Britain, they need to be grey-imported, subjected to a rigorous SVA (Single Vehicular Approval) test, and by the time they hit the road they have a price tag that rivals Britain’s best luxury saloons, so understandably, the likes of the Dodge Ram, Ford Lariat and GMC truck and van series remain something of a perverse, marginal interest amongst British motorists.
So it’s really an American problem. However, environmentalism isn’t. Environmentalism is a movement that craves activism in order to barge into the mainstream and, regardless of scientific opinion, make itself known. The green movement is impractically, voraciously anti-car, politically biased towards the extreme left, and in short not the best base with which to launch an objective and scientific study and implement its outcomes. The fact that some kind of activism was taking place across the pond on environmental and safety grounds against 4x4s is manna to them, as it provides a crack in the door in which to drive a wedge into motoring as a whole.
This destructive, impractical approach can be seen in their arguments, few of which bear close scrutiny and say more about their wilful lack of car knowledge than any scientific studies. Yet they seem to garner enormous favour amongst the politically undecided all over the country. Let’s have a look at some of these arguments:
“4x4 vehicles pollute more and use more fuel than their saloon counterparts.” This is doubtlessly chanted whilst pointing at a Range Rover. Anything with a 4.6-litre V8 is going to chomp through fuel like there’s no tomorrow. Put a 4.6-litre V8 in a Mini and you’ll see similar thirst. That is about engines, not 4x4s. It would help the likes of the Alliance Against Urban 4x4s to understand that the majority of 4x4s bought in Britain are diesels, so let’s compare within a range:
Toyota Rav4 2.0 D4D – 40 mpg combined.
Toyota Avensis 2.0 D4D – 43 mpg combined.
A total of 3 mpg thirstier. Hardly worth complaining about, really. The same is found in most car ranges encompassing saloons and 4x4s sharing engines. It’s worth stating that the annual emissions legislations, which get tighter every few years, affect every new car built, so a new 4x4 will pollute less than an old supermini.
“4x4 vehicles are more likely to hurt someone in a crash due to their ride height.” I have yet to see a survey that shows a remarkably high proportion of 4x4s instigating fatal accidents. Neither have I yet seen the survey detailing the mortal threat posed by the existence of the Ford Fusion or Rover Streetwise – 2WD cars with 4x4 ride heights. Cars hurt and if they hit a pedestrian, the pedestrian will end up in a hospital or a morgue. The responsibility lies on the behalf of both the driver and the pedestrian. It’s also worth conjecturing that perhaps people buy cars with taller ride heights to clear the proliferation of dangerous, damaging speed humps all over Britain’s roads.
“4x4 vehicles impair the driver’s responses.” Is this why 4WD is used in rallying? No transmission layout inherently impedes a driver’s response times. This again lies with the driver. A good driver will be able to handle and adapt to a variety of machinery.
“4x4 vehicles are not likely to be driven off-road.” Perhaps these antis are overlooking the adaptable nature of the 4x4 vehicle. Most 4x4s are true Swiss Army Knife cars – they can go anywhere and carry anything you want without troubling anyone else’s services. You don’t buy one necessarily because you want to go off road, but because you don’t know if you’ll want to go off-road in the future. Also, some 4x4s with real off-road capability look and work identically to their on-road counterparts. I mean, surely the utilitarian Fiat Panda 4x4 has another world of usefulness over its purely on-road sister model.
“4x4 vehicles take up more space on the road than other cars and therefore cause more congestion.” Isn’t it interesting how something we used to grudgingly accept, called ‘the rush hour’, has become ‘congestion’, a problem, it seems, ‘solved’ by closing roads and painting others different colours, then charging everyone as they’re forced into using the same, limited space to get where they’re going whilst a whole, usable lane is sacrificed for the sake of a few people on a very large, highly polluting bus that is supposed to be at the forefront of so-called ‘sustainable’ transport? Incidentally, the physical size of a car shouldn’t matter as long as it fits inside a traffic lane. I have yet to see the 4x4 deliberately made to straddle two lanes that isn’t called Bigfoot and spends a double life doing stunts and belching flames in spectator shows. While we’re at it, within another range we find:
BMW 5-Series saloon: length 478cm, width 180cm.
BMW X5 SUV: length 467cm, width 187cm.
There you have it. One of the biggest 4x4s for sale in the UK is actually shorter than the saloon it’s based on and only 7cm wider.
“4x4 vehicles reflect the material selfishness of their occupants and their sheer size offends human sensibilities.”
Rumbled.
You see, that is what the non-US anti-4x4 argument all comes down to. It’s an excuse for the extreme left of the ‘let’s make Churchill smoke Woodbines’ variety to get a toe in the door of the politics they’re usually (sensibly) shut out of. It offends a member of the far left to see someone in a comfortable, useful, expensive car. It’s a mixture of jealousy and the academic, cloistered middle class guilt syndrome that tears through middle England. The downsizing argument. The one that, if you followed logically would see you ignoring all the money you earned and living in a single-room bed-sit with a baby Belling oven and an organically-produced mattress for company. It’s a depressing argument, and one that goes against the warm-hearted, generous and friendly aspects of human nature. It’s this argument that wants to abolish the Department for Trade and Industry (presumably in the face of legislating all the British sports car firms it’s supposed to protect out of business), the one that wants to use your hard-earned pension money to pay for bus lanes, then force you to use them at socio-financial gunpoint.
And it has no business discussing cars, something it resolutely knows nothing about.
I drive a Range Rover and I absolutely love it. I have had many cars over the last few decades and IMHO it is a fantastic and very capable car. It may have been designed by BMW, it may be owned by Ford, but I am proud that it is a Landrover built in the UK. I would dispute the hight and roll-over issues raised, at mainroad speed my vehicle is no higher than a Volvo, MPV or Transit etc. But, my main point is this, if a pressure group is allowed to force my 4x4 off of the road, then next it will be my two seat sports car. There is just as much potential in the argument to ban sports cars i.e. no one needs to have a car that can go so fast, it can only carry two people, as car designed for speed must be dangerous and anti-social etc. After 4x4s and sportscars, we should really get rid of Vintage and classic cars, obviously they are more polluting and unsafe than modern cars.
I take the view of live and let live, I would expect most PH's get a lot of enjoyment from cars and driving. The "drive" against enjoyment of the car may start with 4x4s, but it will not stop there. If your fun comes from a Reliant Robin or a Le Mans Bentley, you should be able to do so without being demonized by an unrepresentative, unelected and unaccountable section of society.
Will we only wake-up and smell the coffee when we are forced to fit trackers and speed limiters to the little electric cars that we will lease from our government?
I take the view of live and let live, I would expect most PH's get a lot of enjoyment from cars and driving. The "drive" against enjoyment of the car may start with 4x4s, but it will not stop there. If your fun comes from a Reliant Robin or a Le Mans Bentley, you should be able to do so without being demonized by an unrepresentative, unelected and unaccountable section of society.
Will we only wake-up and smell the coffee when we are forced to fit trackers and speed limiters to the little electric cars that we will lease from our government?
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