My current car is an ‘07 Yaris too. It’s also totally bare bones including manual windows and locks and no cruise control (the only feature I sometimes wish it had). It’s economical and much funner to try drive than most bigger cars, trucks, and SUVs. And on multiple occasions I have been able to parallel park it in tight spots that cars in front of me had to pass on.

I drive an Auris station wagon Hybrid (aka, the US Corolla iM with bigger boot). I had a chance to drive multiple Yaris generations and honestly I am always surprised by how roomy it is inside. They made a perfect use of space - way better than VW did with Polo (smaller Golf), that’s for sure…

I can’t even remember what year mine was. It was the first year it was in the US. Was a decent car. Good milage. But it chewed through water pumps so bad. It was either loud squealing belt or too tight causing it to killed the pump. Never could get it “just right”

Got the same model in red but with the 1.5L engine from 2019. Love it. Already got 75k km and it’s still running like a charm.

The actual model is beautiful, and it has Apple Car/Android auto and also a HUD.

The ease of driving and parking in a car that small is insane. I thought my little Outlander Sport was a big difference from my last car, then I saw my buddy’s Yaris easily make a U turn on a narrow 2 lane road.

I mean, I think this is what they’re saying, but yeah.

Make it good and people will use it. It’s really that simple.

we need to push representatives into office that are far more left-leaning and not fucking autocrats who will MANDATE massive increases in taxes on billionaires and legislate much more significant subsidization of public transit

You’re framing it wrong. We don’t need to elect scary commies to massively increase taxes in order to subsidize icky collective things; we simply need to elect Fiscal Conservatives™ who will cease massively subsidizing car dependency. In particular, it’s time to repeal Big Government® intrusive regulations that try to tell Red Blooded Americans© they can’t build a multifamily building on their own damn property or that dictate minimum parking requirements.

This is America, damn it! It’s high time we put the invisible hand of the Free Market back in control!

[insert screaming eagle noises]

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Countries like Japan, Europe and Nordic countries… My man, Nordic countries are Europe and Europe isn’t a country.

It’s more complex than that.

The way the US is spread out makes public transit prohibitively expensive and difficult to achieve proper coverage. To make it effective, you would have to shift the entire way we live. Our entire society is built off the concept that everyone has a car.

Add to the fact that building transit is extra expensive in the US and you arrive at the reality that we will NEVER have a working transit system. That’s why the shift to small cars is needed. We don’t have any more room for roads, so we need more cars to fit in the roads we have

My dude what do you think OP is talking about. That’s what embracing public transit means ya dingus.

Have you ever seen Americans drive? Or the ones that ride motorcycles?

Give everyone a motorcycle and half the country would be dead in a week

I think there should be a separate license to drive SUVs and Trucks over a certain size. And that maintaining that license should be a bit of a hassle - like a required in-person written and practical test every 2 years. If people want that commanding view of the road and “safe” feeling that comes from endangering everyone else on the road, then they should have to put in some extra effort - not enough extra effort that it’s unattainable for those who actually have a need for a vehicle of that size, but enough effort that it would discourage the widespread use we have currently.

I’d love to have a motorcycle that would replace my current vehicle, but it would need to be capable of keeping me warm while handling well in heavy snow. Afaik, there aren’t any enclosed bikes out there

When you need a fucking step ladder to get into your jacked up pickup just so you can commute or get groceries you might have lost your mind.

I am of the opinion that everyone ought to just get a motorcycle.

I’d rather not die tyvm.

I am of the opinion that everyone ought to just get a motorcycle.

But only if it’s a dual sport, right? ;)

I was taxed an extra $150 to register a 2002 Honda Insight last year. It was for a “Hybrid Tax” because hybrid owners buy less gas and therefore are paying less tax on gasoline. Like, that’s the whole point of driving a small car!

Not just that but the standards are also more lenient if the car is larger for its class which is part of why even small cars are bigger now.

USA didn’t start building bullshit suburbs until 1950s. before that it was dense cities.

If anything this means Europe’s cities just can’t accommodate cars, because they weren’t built for them. The weird thing is that American cities were built for cars and yet still can’t accommodate cars. Traffic, lack of parking, road rage… it’s a huge mess, and it seems like the more you commit to cars, the worse it all gets. That’s the trouble with cars. They just don’t work.

I don’t really understand this comment though. It doesn’t take thousands of years to achieve urban density. And what does America’s sprawl have to do with loving large cars? You don’t need a huge car to drive medium distances.

Unfortunately it’s zoning that caused most of this issue. Not size. Dense residential was disallowed for not entirely un-racist reasons, so it spread out enormously instead. On top of car companies lobbying in various ways to make cars essential.

I totally get that fact. I also think that it would not be bad to copy some things from other countries to make the cities in the States more liveable without car dependency. There’s enough space to do that.

I agree and disagree with this. I don’t think the US inherently must be car centric because it’s big. But I do agree that Europe has superior pedestrian infrastructure because it developed for most of its history without cars. Auto and oil industry lobbying has instigated the situation in the US, but their agenda was only achievable because the technology existed to make large scale changes to the terrain, mass produce vehicles, etc. It’s very likely that there were people throughout Europe’s history who tried to monopolize bridges or horse wagons or other forms of transport, but the technology wasn’t sufficient for it to materialize. Warsaw was destroyed during WWII and rebuilt, and it’s developed to be very car-centric compared to other cities in Poland and Europe.

The lack of continuous sidewalks drives me nuts. A developer might put in a sidewalk but the one next to them doesn’t. Sometimes you are walking alongside a ditch or have to cross a busy road to continue on.

Bullshit. Adequate mass transportation is competitive with a car. You don’t even have to leave North America to see an “adequate” mass transportation system: just go to Montreal, Vancouver, or New York.

Most US cities have mass transportation that’s designed to move around poor people so rich people in cars can’t see them.

I never drove into Boston, I always took the train. I still needed a car though if I wanted to go anywhere away from the city. Boston also has an awful spoke and no rim train system. If you want to go from the end of one line to another you can’t go in a ring around the city, you’d have to go all the way in then all the way up the other spoke.

Buses aren’t horrible.

• they feel safer in terms of crime, which might not be an issue you deal with but for over half the population it matters
• they can often go around problems. One bus on the same line up ahead has an issue that has no real impact on the bus you are on
• lot easier for the disabled to go on and off compared to down into a subway
• you have a small degree of privacy
• Mechanical problems? Get off the bus. No biggy.

I do understand, I was a subway guy for the longest time, my wife would take the bus every day and she converted me.

Definitely would love a Honda E, got a Chevy Bolt EV as it seemed like the next best option here.

I’ve only seen one in person once, but I’ve loved it for years.

I’m on desktop, so how I do it is right-click, copy image, then just paste into the post. Not sure how to do it on mobile.

When I was in high school back in the late 70s you’d still see a few of those around. My friend had one, but not for long. Someone had put in a more powerful motor and if she wasn’t careful accelerating she would snap the drive shaft.

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I recommend moving to a city

I moved to Europe, grew up in New York near the City and decided to get a moped here to commute. It’s roughly equivalent to an Ebike but was actually cheaper than one and has a 100km range. It’s not highway legal as it has a top speed of 45km/h but can go on bike paths as long as I watch the speed.

After 3 months since I got the moped I am going to get a car because FUCK going to the office in the rain with that thing. The trains and/or busses go on strike about once a month, maybe a little less, and between delays and cancelations I can’t rely on them for my commute. I’ve literally been waiting for the bus and the driver just decides not to stop to pick me up too. Also packages don’t get reliably dropped off at my front door so I need to go into town or to the supermarket next to the highway to pick up my things which becomes untenable when they are bulky. Instead I’m taking taxis at a cost of €30 each way just to pick up shit that should be left at my door.

The dissonance is strong, I still need a car, and I still need one big enough to move bulky crap at least once a month if not more.

And before someone says rent a car, it’s €70+ a day to do so here and I have a preferred account through my employer. I need to book it in advance so it’s not a “same day” thing. Oh and the places they drop the packages off have weird fucking opening times and are often closed when they should be open so I’ve literally spent €60 on taxis to come home with nothing. That time the seller did me a solid and refunded me the €60 as an apology (it was a €350 item).