How likely an urban ban / Fat-SUV tax? (see linked piece)

[Mr Gus]

The European Transport Safety Council called the wimbledon school crash a “terrible and avoidable tragedy” and wants a ban on SUVs in towns and cities in a bid to cut cyclist and pedestrian fatalities.

With three quarters of new SUV sales going to owners who live in urban homes, there are calls for curbs on their use.
“Do people need two and a half tonne vehicles to take their children to school?

In France, a new weight-based registration tax could see the owner of a new Land Rover Defender paying an extra one-off registration fee of €5,610 (£4,790).

The lightest Defender weighs 2361 kg and in France every kg above 1800 kg costs €10 (£8.50) to register.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/c ... t-30418187

(yes, I know, "the Mirror")

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ty-streets

The Guardian opinion has sparked heavy debate with in excess of 800 comments (consider yourselves warned)

[dan_b]

I think it's an excellent idea.
France gets stuff like this right. Like also their law to make SolarPV canopies at car parks mandatory.

[Mr Gus]

Being in the countryside, I see many used as regular cars with not the slightest sniff of off road use, it is as endemic here as in the country.

Wonder how much that would put folk off on the increasingly common lease hire market, especially having to be paid up-front & not allowed to be absorbed into the monthly equation? ..that would certainly nobble a lot of current emissions & parking problems in one fell swoop.

[Oliver90owner]

Where do you draw a line? Slim minibuses? People carriers? Maybe an extra test for a driving license would be good/better?

A fair percentage of drivers, out there, don’t know how to drive properly.

[Mr Gus]

Nice example of driver incompetence of a big vehicle... (ignore title, it starts at the beginning of the parking piece) although the titled topic is prime example of the attitude of chinese construction industry NGAD to a tee.

[Stinsy]

The European Transport Safety Council called the wimbledon school crash a “terrible and avoidable tragedy” and wants a ban on SUVs in towns and cities in a bid to cut cyclist and pedestrian fatalities.

With three quarters of new SUV sales going to owners who live in urban homes, there are calls for curbs on their use.
“Do people need two and a half tonne vehicles to take their children to school?

In France, a new weight-based registration tax could see the owner of a new Land Rover Defender paying an extra one-off registration fee of €5,610 (£4,790).

The lightest Defender weighs 2361 kg and in France every kg above 1800 kg costs €10 (£8.50) to register.

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/c ... t-30418187

(yes, I know, "the Mirror")

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... ty-streets

The Guardian opinion has sparked heavy debate with in excess of 800 comments (consider yourselves warned)

I really don't think we can blame the vehicle for the tragic accident. It is solely the fault of the driver. There is a trend of blaming the inanimate object and therefore letting off the human operator.

And I don't like all this bashing of larger vehicles either. When we had the XC90 PHEV we could take both kids and their grandparents in the same car. Now we have an iD4 the same trip requires two cars. Some people need larger vehicles!

[Bugtownboy]

In fairness to the driver, I understand she had an epileptic fit and was unconscious at the time of the ‘crash’.

Don’t know any details or have seen official confirmation of this.

How heavy’s a Tesla ?

[nowty]

In fairness to the driver, I understand she had an epileptic fit and was unconscious at the time of the ‘crash’.

Don’t know any details or have seen official confirmation of this.

How heavy’s a Tesla ?

My TM3 is 1,847kg.

[Mr Gus]

Am I bashing? (i'm not) though you well know as do I the amount of pointlessly large vehicles on the road is excessive, frequently influenced by design, ego & "deals" compared to actual need from constantly filling space.

The difference when looking to expose your flesh at at junction on a fast driven road with a push bike with a high vehicle (transit van, rangey / landy etc) parked up blocking your view possibly on double yellows or straddling the pavement, increases all sorts of negative outcomes.

City streets (old uk cities) aren't exactly growing to accommodate the bigger physical bulk created by their presence are they, something has got to give.

If we look at the japanese market there are actually a lot of alternatives on smaller wheelbases, which is where Oliver's slim & tall comes into play, tall they may be, but from behind slimmer helps getting around & general visibility, parking, obstruction etc.

We recently had yet more road digging here, 3rd@ lot of internet provider cable laying, idiots double parked, & then when my (nice) neighbour texted me to ask how long we'd be parking the tesla in the street for it was there for an hour, could we move it because the new SUV they'd bought was having trouble getting in & out.

(wife was fuming in general, on a normal day there is inconsiderate parking that makes turning onto the drive "tight" this day the double parking was right opposite out dropped kerb access... cue many, many point turn to get in, park & charge with parking sensors screaming all the while)

But, just cos a license says you are allowed to drive a tractor on it, doesn't mean you can drive a tractor, ..so I would be happy to see better competency for drivers based on vehicle size & capacity at a lower level (standard licence) though it isn't realistically going to happen, it would make folk who really did not need a larger vehicle think twice (Ie "is it worth the extra hassle")

[Mr Gus]

Yup a tesla is heavy mare of a car, much of our collective soul searching here, & decision not to go for an extra lump of a motor & all that it brought with it, which on a chart is another piece of wrangling that needs contemplation.

BTB is it definite she had an epileptic fit? (I have seen nothing following up on that awful occurence)