What % will keep driving cars instead of feed their families?

[icowden]

That being said, i still don't think people putting an extra £20-30 in their tanks is going to change very much in the grand scheme of things, whether that is for leisure or commuting.

That's the nub right there. Last year is cost me £68 to fill the car. A few months ago it cost me £75 to fill up the car. Then that went up to £82. Soon it will be £90. At what point does it become prohibitive? Confused.com reckons that the highest diesel price today is £1.99 a litre - so £105 to fill up the car.

The price could escalate a lot more.

The more it rises, the more likely people are to start not using the car for short journeys. That said, it isn't people like me who are going to be most affected. Sure, I will be annoyed by the rise, but I can still afford to use the car and feed my family. It tends to be the very poorest where the car is essential for getting to a job after dropping the kids at school etc that will be most affected. Plus there will be a point where food prices rise to cover the fuel costs of getting it to the shop in the first place.

Not all jobs can be done over zoom.

 

[PaulB]

What about the people who have to drive 3 miles with a piano every day. Eh? You bloody facist. You must be in dreamland!!!

Well said! I'm embarrassed to admit I'd completely forgotten about these people, the very foundation of our great nation.

 

[fozy tornip]

You're forgetting the people who need huge SUV's to move their child's football team around. Public service SUV ownership.

 

[MrGrumpy]

You're forgetting the people who need huge SUV's to move their child's football team around. Public service SUV ownership.

Your average SUV owner seems to always get in the neck. SUV size ranges from Dacia Duster/Nissan Juke to any of your Range/Land Rover , X5 type thing. To be honest for a do it all car for me , I’d pick that over some totsy wee puddle jumper with you all looking like the ant hill mob getting out of it .

 

[glasgowcyclist]

Only anecdotal evidence, not very scientific but, I live in a “deprived area”:
1. Our street is a cul-de-sac of 11 houses, there are 20 vehicles. Of those 11 houses, I have never seen the occupants of 8 of the houses walk out of the street. One woman takes the car to visit her daughter, in the next street (perhaps 500 metres away), another, drives her child to school each day (the school is in the next street, about 750 metres away).
2. My two eldest grandchildren (23 and 26yo), have never been on a bus, metro or train. They were ferried everywhere by car, by their parents, now, they drive their own cars. They do go for “long” walks occasionally, say, 1.5 miles, according to Strava.

I think car use is very well established.

I think car abuse is very well established.

 

[Fab Foodie]

Your average SUV owner seems to always get in the neck. SUV size ranges from Dacia Duster/Nissan Juke to any of your Range/Land Rover , X5 type thing. To be honest for a do it all car for me , I’d pick that over some totsy wee puddle jumper with you all looking like the ant hill mob getting out of it .

All of which can be done with a half decent estate car with more internal space, better handling/less body roll, better aerodynamics and hence fuel economy.... I've driven many of them.
So called SUVs are a triumph of marketing over common sense.
Today's hire car is a Lynk & Co 01. What an abomination.....

 

[FishFright]

Course it depends on your definition of 'saintly' or even 'interesting'


But I've just done a very brief survey of one person.

She tells me she's had a very rich, interesting, exciting, eventful and even fun life whilst attempting to do what she felt was the 'better' thing'.

Including, lots of adventures involving trains, bicycles, and yes even pointy, fall-offable mountains too -

Although in all fairness, betting shops figured not so much, in this whirly gig of a life well lived.

What a fun sponge eh .??

That's how I've tried to live my life , at times successfully!.

One thing that has always been missing from my life choices is a 'lifestyle' because that's always been an expensive con.

 

[MrGrumpy]

All of which can be done with a half decent estate car with more internal space, better handling/less body roll, better aerodynamics and hence fuel economy.... I've driven many of them.
So called SUVs are a triumph of marketing over common sense.
Today's hire car is a Lynk & Co 01. What an abomination.....

don’t disagree , but why do the anti car mafia have it in for SUVs , swap that for any car ? Geez there is even a mob going about slashing tyres on SUVs apparently?? I’d break their fingers if it was my car

 

[slowmotion]

You've got me thinking ...

Yesterday I got home from work [by bike, as it happens] to find 4 bags of compost and 3 (3L?) tins of paint (assorted) in the back garden. AND YET no-one living in the house had travelled anywhere except on foot or by bike.

HOW DID THIS HAPPEN?? Am I in dreamland? Did I sleep-walk, and unconsciously steal a neighbour's car to fetch this from the WIck's depot??

[Disclosure: no cargo-bikes or trailers left our garage either.]

It was Father Christmas in a huge PM2.5 spewing, non-compliant diesel lorry driven by a Millwall-supporting, cyclist-hating maniac?

 

[Deleted member 28]

Off topic a bit but vaguely connected, what about Lpg vehicles?

My Camper was converted years ago for purely cost reasons but are they more 'acceptable ' among the Green elite?

 

[BoldonLad]

don’t disagree , but why do the anti car mafia have it in for SUVs , swap that for any car ? Geez there is even a mob going about slashing tyres on SUVs apparently?? I’d break their fingers if it was my car

For many of the “small” SUVs, they could be any car, since they share engine, floorpan, suspension with saloon versions. Emissions and mpg are as near as make no difference the same. It is the equivalent of hating red bikes.

 

[matticus]

Geez there is even a mob going about slashing tyres on SUVs apparently?? I’d break their fingers if it was my car

Fair point.
So I guess you'd support breaking fingers punishment for anyone that (badly)* damages a bike? How about the bike and its owner?

*To be fair, lets assume the damage has to be equivalent to the cost of a SUV tyre**
**p.s. I think the SUV tyre campaign was just letting the air out through the valve. Just FYI.

 

[Mr Celine]

Your average SUV owner seems to always get in the neck. SUV size ranges from Dacia Duster/Nissan Juke to any of your Range/Land Rover , X5 type thing. To be honest for a do it all car for me , I’d pick that over some totsy wee puddle jumper with you all looking like the ant hill mob getting out of it .

I have a colleague who drives a monster truck. (Her description). She is 5'2". My work runabout is a Ford Ka. I'm 6'0". She laughed at my car until I pointed out that there is considerably more headroom in my car than there is in hers.
From a cycling POV I assume all SUV and pickup drivers to have no sense of spatial awareness and ride accordingly.

 

[Rusty Nails]

Driving one of these ‘monster trucks’ (and I don’t mean family SUVs) if you are not a farmer or builder using it for lumping crap around is quite a pathetic choice of motoring, especially in a country that doesn’t have wide open prairies or mountains of note.
If they could change the model names from stuff like shogun, warrior or big-gonads to names of flowers like daisy, pansy or petunia it might at least make it bit more embarrassing for the owners, and make other drivers smile.

 

[mjr]

don’t disagree , but why do the anti car mafia have it in for SUVs , swap that for any car ? Geez there is even a mob going about slashing tyres on SUVs apparently?? I’d break their fingers if it was my car

SUVs are easier to spot because they are taller? Same reason their aerodynamics suck fuel.