To irrationally resent SUVs ?

[SavoirFlair]

For those who have impossibly avoided the term, I’m talking about “fake 4x4s.”

A car that would have been a hatchback a dozen years ago, but is now wider, higher up, with fake 4x4 styling (flared wheel arches, roof rails, big plastic moulding).

I can’t stand them.

As someone who has owned two generations of Range Rovers when we lived off a track a mile or so from the main road, I realise people are free to lob back at me. but those cars had a purpose. We wanted to be comfortable; but we absolutely needed the traction and clearance that vehicle gave us.

Does anyone need what a Grandland X offers? A Mokka? (Jesus save me from that awful car. Worst on sale today - just buy a Corsa and stop being previous). Who needs a Sportage or a Qashqai? (the hallmarks of the aspiring, when years ago a Focus or a Golf would have done just fine).

The worst offenders for me are actually the so called luxury ones. BMW X5 is an abomination - can’t do anything off road, is massively wide on road, and two mums at our school park terribly with them and block the road for the other direction.

And that’s the thing - a large segment of folk who own them, can’t drive them properly. I go to the hospital car park twice weekly with my DD. If someone is careless (often are) and parks close to or on the white line… renders the next space completely useless. Which when hunting for the one or two spaces available for my vulnerable DD, can be infuriating.

We don’t need these things, but I get people love them for

• being “high up” (still doesn’t make the drivers any better at driving)

• Being “high up” to load DCs and allow elderly parents to get in and out without bending back

• some of them have a big boot

Ok, but my answer to all these three is..

an MPV. Cars like the Ford Galaxy, S Max, Touran, Alhambra - all high up seating, easy to get in and out of, massive boots.

But no.. the truth is fashion. Why buy a Corsa when you have a jacked up version. Why buy a 5 series when you can have an X5 and dominate the school run.

Meanwhile the greater fuel consumption, the materials cost to make the thing …

AIBU to irrationally hate these stupid wide massive things?

Most of all its the bullying I hate, the self-important expectation that all other road users must make way for their massive cars.

Is it intentional bullying, or just your own sense of insecurity when faced with a bigger vehicle?

"The bullying of other road users, the abysmal parking and blocking of roads and pavements and the inability to reverse a few feet in a straight line forcing me to reverse a mile around corners etc! Most of all its the bullying I hate, the self-important expectation that all other road users must make way for their massive cars."

But I don't do any of these things. Also, my car isn't bigger that what I might otherwise chose given our requirements (MPV or estate).

I have explained why I chose the car I chose - the reasons, not the excuses. We all make our own decisions. I think it's pretty short sighted and narrowminded to not be able to imagine that people make different choices to yourself (or - per previous exchange - have difference experiences) and therefore that their choices must be due to arrogance and wanting to show up.

Agreed. They're not massive and not blocking the roads. They're not that bigger than Ford Galaxy, for example. I parked near my work colleague's enormous BMW X5, I felt like I was Golf/Seat Leon driver.

I have a similar experience with farming family and friends' cars, the only people I know who have land rovers these days certainly don't have them for any practical reason

I have a Volvo SUV. I live rurally. It's lovely to drive with a great safety record. It's the best car I've ever owned.

It actually does. The more box shaped a car, the more air resistance and the greater the full consumption.

The higher up you are the more fuel you will use, because it is mostly about the front surface area you present to the oncoming air.

This, and the fact that SUVs tend to have more boxy and less streamlined fronts. If you look at modern saloons the windscreens are all aggressively sloped to push air over the top of the car and reduce the air resistance.

So saloons generally have a much lower drag coefficient than SUVs.

Yes it's intentional, when somebody in a landrover sees you coming down the road and then drives straight past a great big passing space and forces their way up the narrow line knowing you wont be able to pass without needing to reverse that is definitely intentional! Something which happens frequently to me, on occasions I've refused to reverse for them some have become very aggressive with me, having children in the car makes me feel that it would be unwise to try to stand my ground with these people any more.

Not in all cases I'd say....

Yeah, I've also spent most my life well off the beaten track and managed just fine in my ancient little clio. Is it ideal? No, a lovely big Land Rover would be much more comfortable. Any 4x4 would be better. But it's hardly essential, and if I had some sort of strong moral views against SUVs then I wouldn't really see how I'd have a leg to stand on.

As a lifelong country bumpkin, I know lots of people who manage just fine without 4x4s (but of course lots who have them too). Let's not pretend it's essential though.

What car do you drive @SavoirFlair ?

@BubziOwl No, they aren't essential. But are we only allowed to make car choices on what is?

I stand my ground as much in my electric supermini as in my XL 4x4, if that helps you.

@Slowingdownagain no certainty not. That was my point really - OP is criticising other people's car choice because she thinks it's unnecessary, but defended her own because she lived in the country. My point is that if she feels so strongly about big cars then she should recognise that it wasn't essential for her to drive one either. Personally I couldn't care less what anyone else drives.

I hardly think a qashqui or sportage are aspiring or fashionable. Presumably, people get them because they like them. Why does this bother you so much?
I’ve been driving for almost 15 years and I’ve never looked at other cars or drivers and tried to work out why they bought the car they did.

Not really no! It's not the cars that intimidate me its the large aggressive men inside them that do, the ones who get out and march over to my car screaming and swearing and waving their fists when I dare to refuse their god-given right to barge their way through all other road users. This doesn't happen to my large and angry looking partner when he drives my car, only me!

Ok, so it's a driver problem rather than an SUV one.

I don't really understand why MPVs are acceptable but the SUVs aren't? Similar engines, similar sizes so surely you'd have the same issues if everyone driving an SUV was driving an MPV?

I drive neither for reference, just curious why SUVs are always slaughtered on here and owners told an MPV would also meet their needs as if there's any true difference other than aesthetics.

Because she's typical mumsnet user- her car is fine, yours isn't 😅

I'm usually a generous driver but never let Range Rovers in. You drive a dickhead car, you get treated like a dickhead.

(I know, it's pathetic. But you take your meagre victories where you can.)

No idea, but MPVs are very out of fashion now - you don't see them much, which probably helps. I suppose the logic is that, unlike SUVs, they're actually spacious on the inside.

I think that having these big SUV's and 4x4's does make some drivers more bolshy and aggressive though, because this is not something I regularly encounter with people driving regular sized cars but I do regularly see it with the big cars.

I've driven loads of different types and sizes of car over the years and my driving doesn't change, I'm still curteous and considerate of others and obey the rules of the road whether I'm driving a Fiat Panda or a minibus! I've never jumped behind the wheel of a Landrover and thought "right, I own the road now, all must move aside for me"!

I love my quashqai

I agree OP, I hate them.

I particularly hate how much space they take up in car parks, even on the rare occasions when they're parked well.
I comfort myself that they'll be more bothered about little dents in car parks than me, with my ancient small hatchback.
But they're essentially arrogant statements - look at me, how big and special I am, how much money I have etc . Sad really.

This!!

I see OP has mentioned the SEAT Alhambra as a better choice. I have had 2 of these (they no longer make them) and both had 2L diesel engines. My smaller SUV has a 1L petrol engine and is by far a better choice environmentally.

Wow! Says a LOT more about what a dick head you are than anything.

Hmmm, they are not the ones acting like dickheads...