> What's worse? A not in use bed, or a not in use back seat?

It's more "what's worse? A huge truck with worse visibility, alone, or a car that has better visibility, safety features, and less likely to kill someone in an accident, driven alone".

Obviously if the bed or the back set were the only swap, none of it matters.

And like... yeah there's the calculus of how often you use it etc.

> A not in use bed, or a not in use back seat?

A not in use back seat takes up far less space in a sane car than a pick-up truck with a bed.

> Much better visibility than any other vehicle I have, too.

At the expense of others. And good luck seeing a small child in front of it if you're driving in a moderately pedestrianized area.

I fail to see how prejudice against waste is a problem.

Prejudice is a bad thing- for things that people can't change, like their race or age. Prejudice against people making bad or wasteful decisions is a good thing.

What's a reasonable scenario where average citizen need to haul 10, let alone 20 tons, on such regular basis that they need to own that capability themselves? Just rent or hire help. I would imagine that to also require special driving license, even if the car technically can handle it? We are not talking about professional use here, for that, use as big of a truck as you want.

> Usually you aren't towing...but when you need to haul nontrivial loads you need a big truck.

That you can probably rent.

"I may need to haul a non-trivial load once 10 years from now" is hardly a justification for buying one

Why are you triggered by the vocal irrational minority? You seem quite defensive for someone who is confident and comfortable in the the truck they own and how they use it and maintain it.

> There’s something about pickup trucks, specifically, that makes a vocal minority irrationally angry and triggered

Because of the cultural coding of pickup trucks, versus say sports cars that might get just as bad mpg.

> I was pointing out that you don’t know what you’re talking about.

This discussion is pretty much done, but I just wanted to note that I’m not the original poster you were replying to.

> You cannot conclude that a truck never goes off-road by observing them on city streets. That was your claim, and I explained why it didn’t make sense.

No, the claim is that the majority of them are not going off road, not any particular vehicle (yours included).

I enjoy cars, and driving a large pickup is fun. I also happen to think they are not appropriate vehicles for the majority of people, should not be a default option, take up way too much space, and make city roads significantly less safe. This is not an emotional response, just an opinion. If your use of a pickup makes sense I don’t think anyone has a problem with that.

And yes, I also agree that 200hp+ ICE cars are wasteful, and even if they are an EV, most people should not be driving something that powerful as it also has an impact on road safety. Similar thing: you enjoy cars, drive well, and own an SRT? Great, have fun! Should the average driver have one? Hell no.

People using their trucks for truck stuff know most others don’t. They don’t have to make shit up

Not sure what you mean by "prove this statement" but answering questions like this is exactly why organizations do consumer research. To wit [1]:

> According to Edwards’ data, 75 percent of truck owners use their truck for towing one time a year or less (meaning, never). Nearly 70 percent of truck owners go off-road one time a year or less. And a full 35 percent of truck owners use their truck for hauling—putting something in the bed, its ostensible raison d’être—once a year or less.

[1] https://www.thedrive.com/news/26907/you-dont-need-a-full-siz...

There’s a quote from some consulting firm that goes around claiming 2/3 of truck drivers don’t “put something in the bed” more than once a year.

It’s a laughable claim for anyone who thinks about it for more than a second.

The way they usually get to these numbers is by redefining what “hauling a load” means to be something extremely heavy or for loose fill materials. So if someone routinely hauls a couple mountain bikes in the bed of their truck or gets a few 2x4s from the lumber yard it wouldn’t count.

> You can also get a 40-50mpg brand new sedan here if you want, but they serve different purposes.

They don't. Your average truck is hauling a person from home to work to grocery store to home 10% of the time. 80% of the time it's parked. 90% of the remaining 10% is also covered be a sedan

[flagged]

Assuming I used the correct gallon (US!=UK), I think it's 9.4l/100km

No, not even close to good.

I'm having to convert to US gallons to Imperial here but...

My old ICE car was getting approx 50mpg (which is approx 41mpg for you) and was considered poor for its age. My new one (hybrid) is 60mpg (approx 50mpg for you).

For a fairly modern car (e.g under 10 years old) in the UK you'd expect at least 40–50 MPG (UK) / 33–42 MPG (US), and even that would be considered on the lower end. Most modern cars are either electric or hybrid here these days so you'd expect 60–100 MPG (UK) / 50–83 MPG (US).

A Toyota RAV4 (the best calling ICE car in the world) is about half that. They do a hybrid model that’s lower still.

The Toyota Corolla (second best selling) is then lower again.

US cultural perceptions on fuel efficiency are bonkers.

Genuinely terrible, a 15 year old Civic handily gets 35mpg highway, a 2025 non-hybrid gets 47+.

25 is terrible highway mileage. When I (USA) had a pickup truck as my daily commuter for a few years 5-10 years back, I got ~22 mpg on "city" roads, and >30 mpg on highways. And that's not considered good.

My sports sedan gives 25 mpg, and my parent's Toyota hybrid SUV gives 58 mpg.

My 2019 subaru forester only gets 27 mpg.

You don't need to study if grass is green or water is wet, but you're welcome to study why.

Your comfort shouldn’t outweigh the safety of pedestrians. There is a reason those cars do not pass regulations in Europe.

But why is that? Is there any chance it's at least partly to protect yourself from everyone else in giant cars?

… and that’s why I bought a Marauder MPV to go get groceries.

That’s not the safety risk. The safety risk is not being in a big truck and getting hit by one. It’s not so much to do with the vehicle’s safety features as to (1) mass; and (2) height of the cabin.

I've been looking at the GTK Boxer since it was first announced. The modularity means you can bring the kids to school then swap the rear module for one more suited to transporting raw materials, you just need a garage equipped with a 15t crane to do the swap at home in just a few minutes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mn_WblYc4xk

Just wait until 2050 when we all have our own killdozers [1].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Heemeyer

It is much safer to be in a big truck hitting an another big truck, than in a small sedan hitting a big truck. Physics of momentum beats out safety features. Actual studies do show this: it is safer for the occupant of the truck in a two-vehicle collision.

More trucks on the road make the chance of fatalities overall higher. You often find articles saying that fatalities go up when you introduce a truck, and that is true. But that's because trucks are more likely to kill pedestrians or drivers of smaller cars, NOT because of risk to the truck driver. []

It would be better if there were fewer trucks on the road. But if everyone else is buying a truck, it becomes your selfish incentive to do so as well, for the safety of your* family. It is a tragedy of the commons situation.

[*] The exception is single-vehicle accidents, e.g. rollovers. Those are riskier and more likely for the driver of a truck, but also less of a concern in suburban driving.

I admit there are many of you out there, and have no problem with folks who need a truck for truck use cases. That's what trucks are for. I take issue with those buying them for non rational use cases (status, etc), "Pavement Princess" vehicle duty cycles.

Study Claims That Most Pickup Truck Owners Don’t Actually Use Them For Truck Stuff - September 2023

https://www.powernationtv.com/post/most-pickup-truck-owners-...

https://www.axios.com/ford-pickup-trucks-history

> This is a hilarious take for anyone who has spent any time living outside of a big city.

People outside of big city need big trucks about as often as people in the city.

Source: lived in the middle of nowhere in North Carolina.

Living outside of big city doesn't mean you're immediately a farmer who needs to haul tons of forage or lumber. The absolute vast majority of people don't.

I live in a big city and two children under 10 have been killed by large pickup trucks within a half mile of my home in the last five years. Two that I know of anyway, because I'm acquainted with the families. One had been modified with a "bull bar" making it more dangerous to pedestrians.

And 80% of americans live in urban areas.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullbar

Ehh, vehicle affordability rapidly accelerating away as the middle class evaporates solves the problem if people can’t make financially rational choices themselves. As of this comment, the average price of a new full-size pickup truck is around $64,000, while the average price of a new mid-size pickup truck is about $42,690. This is before tariff impacts are baked in. Doesn’t include operating costs (fuel, insurance, maintenance), putting monthly payments around $1k/month (at least). Let them drive studio apartments around I suppose, if they can get financed and not repo’d in the near term.

Would you cry for me if I wanted a Lambo but couldn’t afford it? You would not. This is different? Everyone is entitled to wildly conspicuous consumption? I argue no.

Sure, but large trucks come with a ton of very negative externalities.

Most race cars aren't electric though? That analogy makes no sense.

If you buy a product that comes with a ton of negative externalities and then don't use the single feature that distinguishes it from other products, people will rightly judge you.

> Unbridled ignorance.

Ironically, I don't think ignorance means what you think it means. It simply means not knowing something; it's not, for example, an attitude in itself.

What fraction of modern light trucks do you suppose are ever driven in a technically competent manner off-road, even once, by their original owner?

I bet a larger fraction, albeit still small, are driven around construction sites with crud on the ground, with a driver who pays approximately no attention to what they’re driving over. In which case a monster suspension with a dangly differential is probably less appropriate than a low vehicle without any dangly bits in the middle.

(I’m obviously excluding trucks that are used a loading docks. If you are planning to load and unload at a loading dock, you want your truck to load and unload at loading dock height.)

Fully agreed. Although to add, I literally never met someone with a truck, and in fact never owned a car myself either, but rented a car and also ranted a van plenty of times during a move, even with a driver.

Same reason I don't own an airplane, I just rent one with a driver if I go on holiday trips.

Big caveat: I've always lived in a (capital) city of my country and I have no kids yet.

But by and large I think renting for the 3 day a year use-case makes more sense than owning 365 days of the year, even if you have no friends to rely on.

In most places in the 1st world you can rent a truck if you need one *

For other times, use a car.

* a truck is just a car that misses a roof over the back part of it

>In a sane society "knowing someone with a truck" is all you really need.

Yes, yes, we all know. "You'll own nothing and be happy". Fewer and fewer people believe you.

If this were the case, you’d see more trucks with wear and tear on them and fewer with five years in and pristine paint jobs. Most people buy trucks as a lifestyle choice, not as a practical one.

That’s not to say there aren’t real uses for trucks, or people who use them for their designed purpose.

That’s also not to say people should be required to purchase only vehicles that meet their basic transportation requirements. People drive sports cars even without ever going out to a track.

Trucks (and full-size SUVs) specifically push some pretty crappy externalities onto other road users, so it’s not exactly crazy to be annoyed with people who buy and drive big trucks a personality trait.

I do know that because I see the same trucks driving around my neighborhood with Jerry cans and recovery boards 7 days of the week!

Best case you’re looking at 28.5% weekend utilization which isn’t that bad, much better than the 1% I joked with, but how many people do you know taking an offroad adventure every single weekend?

So what? Yeah I don’t really care. It’s mostly hilarious watching them try to park.

The argument Telo makes is that you can have high utility in a smaller vehicle designed well. I was my own GC for a site-built home and sub contracted out many parts of it. I did it while owning a 2 door Mini SE. Only twice did I need to rent truck from my local Home Depot to haul some unwieldy and heavy debris. Most stores will deliver what you need (lumber, large pipes, insulation, etc) because consumer trucks are rarely large enough. I would not have been able to load any significant amount of lumber into an F250. That leaves large vehicles for recreation or family space. I hope car manufacturers rethink vehicle packaging now that EV motors and batteries allow for different confirmations like putting the motor in the wheel hub.

And, the sub contractors - the ones doing the work (immigrants) - they had a wide variety of vehicles. I took note that some had Camrys, Prius, old Golfs, small picks ups like Rangers, and some older mid size trucks that were visually heavily used. Else, they used commercial trucks or vans. When did I see the prestigious full cab F150s or Silverado RTs? When I originally interviewed GCs which is when I noticed they drove their clean and new trucks.

The vast majority of dirt roads are fine. I put hundreds of miles on my 1996 Honda Civic hatchback in the Cascades with no problems many years ago.

If the road existed in the 1990s, it's quite likely accessible by a mid-size SUV. Similarly, if families of 4 could go camping with cars from 1950-2000, you can today as well. In fact, you can get more compact tents, etc. today.

Trucks and huge SUVs come in handy if you want to bring lots of modern toys like gigantic prestige coolers and 4x4s.

Depending on the survey 63-to-75% of truck owners use it for towing once a year or less (i.e in reality never). So yes, the majority do not use it for towing.

To be fair I'd misremembered the load carrying figure and the load figure for 1 time a year or less is 32-35%

https://www.axios.com/ford-pickup-trucks-history?trk=feed-de...

https://www.thedrive.com/news/26907/you-dont-need-a-full-siz...

If you’re not hauling a cubic foot then why need a truck?

Hm, sounds like you don't really need a truck... The world is racing to +4C and you're over here defending 25mpg gender affirming care mobiles - you're on the wrong side of this one buddy.

Don't shudder, learn about it.

The engine is designed to move based on the design of the frame rails and mounts -- it is pushed under the passenger compartment, absorbing and deflecting more energy.

I'm sure the Telo is designed to modern standards and would perform similarly. I'd be more worried about expensive damage to the vehicle in less personally dangerous collisions.

Decades of research, innovation, crash tests and rule changes have been put into improving safety in head on collisions. It’s not like you’re the first who wonders what will happen with engine block. It’s designed to go down.

Although I don’t know about American trucks. I think they are meant to wreak havoc on every single person involved.

> ...and a moment later, I also realized it's usually a solid engine block that sits there. I shudder to think of what actually happens when that zone "crumples".

I believe the engine drops down and the rest crumples inward, at least in theory.

Same reason I don't want to have dinner in a restaurant next to someone trying to cut their steak with a chainsaw: at best they are being incredibly obnoxious, at worst they are going to maim me. Just because it is better for your once-a-month weekend lumberjack trip with the boys doesn't mean it is an appropriate one-size-fits-all cutting tool for day-to-day use.

Contrast that with someone having a needlessly powerful computer. How does that impact the rest of the world? Not at all, it only impacts the owner's wallet. Someone's needlessly-powerful computer has never killed a child, or taken up four spots in public. Heck, it'll even downclock when idle, so there isn't even any extra power use to be worried about!

Because accomplishing the same task with a more powerful (i.e. larger) vehicle is a) more polluting, and b) more dangerous for other road users; two things that are not true for a surplus of computing power.

Because by and large the apps and programs you are running on your computer requires lots of resources just to open and allow you to do your low-demanding tasks.

Can’t legally register them in my state for now, would need to register it in a neighboring state, which is a lot of trouble for a 25+ year old vehicle.