Coming from San Diego and moving to Boston has been a hilarious ride. In San Diego pockets of people in every neighborhood own literal battery powered golf carts and use them to drive to grocery stores and such. These things are perfect for the streets of Boston, small, easily maneuvered into small spaces. Instead they are illegal in MA with only very specific exceptions for park services and other municipal works departments.
Every time I ask about it people jump all over “they aren’t safe on the highway”. Okay cool. If you own a golf cart in SD, it’s illegal to drive it on the highway. Problem solved right? I mean we have mopeds, motorcycles, literal bicycles sharing all these streets too. Certainly golf carts and kei trucks can have a special license plate for non highway vehicles?
It is a bit weird. Why do cars have to meet a certain safety standard and motorcycles do not? I try to wrap the logic in my brain and intuitively it makes sense but logically it does not (which is why we see developers making "motorcycle" class cars).
I wonder if we are headed towards of path of two different road systems with ebikes, golf cars, bikes, etc on a separate roadway.
I've always considered it an open secret that the motorcycle industry in the US doesn't get the same kind of scrutiny that the automobile industry does. If they had to comply with even a shred of the same emissions & safety regulations it would instantly destroy the market.
People feel pretty safe in a golf cart, it’s stable and goes slowly, let’s toss in the kids and grandpa.
Then they get rear ended by a one ton SUV or even just hit a pole at 25 mph and it’s fatalities all around.
Agreed a separate golf cart/e-bike line may make sense, but you need wide adoption to justify that much dedicated lanes. People won’t necessarily buy a several thousand dollar vehicle just to run local errands, especially in Boston when it’s a 2 season vehicle
To me personally it appears that difference in speed is a key to safety it the lack of it. Hence I feel comfortable traveling on motorcycle next to car (relatively of course), but I would not dare do the same on bicycle or golf cart on highway. May be the logic here is the same?
In other parts of the country (south and southeast) Side-By-Sides/UTVs are used the same way as golf carts are used as you describe. Motorcycles are allowed and small cars are not because small cars pose a huge threat to the auto-industry.
I believe UTVs are illegal everywhere on paved roads and even on some government maintained dirt roads in California. But I live in a rural part of California where several of us drive them (or ATVs) around town. Occasionally someone will mention getting pulled over and warned (I haven't heard of a ticket). But you rarely see law enforcement driving around our town at all.
I've been in an even more remote part of California, where I was riding my UTV for a few hundred yards on a 55 MPH paved road to get back to my car/trailer after riding in the dirt all day. It was California State Route 182 in Mono County (population density: 4.2/sq mi). A local sheriff saw me and followed me to my car. I was certain I was getting a ticket. He started by asking where I'd ridden and what my favorite parts were. Based on that, he shared some other places nearby that I might like to ride and told me which paved roads I can use to get between them. As he left, he told me to have fun.
This seems so dubious. Safe for whom? If we're talking about the driver, how are motorcycles legal? If we're talking about other highway users, then I'd rather be hit by a kei car than a lifted mega-pickup with wheels sticking out 6" beyond the body.
They're popular with a fairly large portion of the American public who view them as a lifestyle they are committed to, banning them for any reason would be political suicide.
While “safety” may be the justification, I doubt it has anything to do with the motivation.
The motivation will be money. The normalisation of small, inexpensive cars would have a serious impact on the American car industry, which prefers to sell larger, less efficient vehicles as the minimum vehicle. (At roughly 5x the price)
If demand developed for small, inexpensive vehicles they would be at a severe disadvantage to a wide range of manufacturers that currently supply these types of vehicles to nations around the globe.
The rise of electric vehicles would compound this problem, since electric mini vehicles with limited range and speed (but perfect for local use) are common on the global market at the 3000-4000(usd) price point.
There is also a similar class of internal combustion powered vehicles with around 300cc motors at that price point as well.
I would estimate that between the micro-ICE and Electric types, they might easily take over a 10% market segment if allowed to.
It's an extragovernmental organization unbeholden to any sort of transparency or democratic oversight, which sets policy by persistent lobbying and even overt conflict of interest relationships with public officials (as described in the article). That sounds pretty "shadowy" to me!
It's great that our system has ~50 different jurisdictions that can each choose their own regulations, and it makes sense that each of the states doesn't want to spend the resources studying the issues to create their own conclusions and legislation. But these type of organizations should be recognized and regulated for the type of governmental apparatus they most certainly are, rather than being allowed to skate by as "private" entities.
As for kei trucks, I feel like I should be in the target market but I just don't see their appeal. But of course, I don't have to personally see their appeal to believe that others should be able to register them.
A lot of Americans are sick and tired of the giantism in our car market. The automobile press gets glazy in the eyes and repeats like the brainwashed soldiers in The Manchurian Candidate that the U.S. consumer is stuck on large cars but the reality is the car industry is stuck on large cars.
When I was a kid in the 1970s I saw car dealers try every trick in the book to upsell my dad to larger cars. By the late 2010s Japanese brands caught up with American brands: I was looking for a Fit in 2017 but new ones weren't available, I had to settle on a used Fit at new car pricing. Allegedly the factory had been washed out in a flood but the dealer had almost 100 HR-Vs in a line that nobody wanted to buy that are made in the same factory. In the meantime a customer would sell a Fit back to them and they'd sell it to me the next day.
Honda discontinued the Fit alleging that sales were poor but in the area around Ithaca it's one of the most popular cars, it is a running gag that another Fit owner will park next to you at the supermarket and I'm sure it would make a great getaway car.
Significantly lower? Probably not. I bet in some ways higher, other ways lower. But different for sure.
Problem is probably the landscape of huge cars proliferating in the US vs smaller cars other places.
But safety is not inherently worse in lower speed collisions [1]:
"Conclusions: Although we are generally concerned that drivers of small vehicles suffer more severe injuries, our results suggest that, for real-world accidents, K-cars provide similar safety for drivers involved in frontal collisions as standard vehicles in low delta V impact conditions."
We have crash tests in the rest of the world too, and Kei-cars match the specs.
But the difference on this side of the big wet bit is that we attribute a big percentage of the safety score to pedestrian safety too - something Americans don't care about.
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Every time I ask about it people jump all over “they aren’t safe on the highway”. Okay cool. If you own a golf cart in SD, it’s illegal to drive it on the highway. Problem solved right? I mean we have mopeds, motorcycles, literal bicycles sharing all these streets too. Certainly golf carts and kei trucks can have a special license plate for non highway vehicles?
I wonder if we are headed towards of path of two different road systems with ebikes, golf cars, bikes, etc on a separate roadway.
Then they get rear ended by a one ton SUV or even just hit a pole at 25 mph and it’s fatalities all around.
Agreed a separate golf cart/e-bike line may make sense, but you need wide adoption to justify that much dedicated lanes. People won’t necessarily buy a several thousand dollar vehicle just to run local errands, especially in Boston when it’s a 2 season vehicle
I've been in an even more remote part of California, where I was riding my UTV for a few hundred yards on a 55 MPH paved road to get back to my car/trailer after riding in the dirt all day. It was California State Route 182 in Mono County (population density: 4.2/sq mi). A local sheriff saw me and followed me to my car. I was certain I was getting a ticket. He started by asking where I'd ridden and what my favorite parts were. Based on that, he shared some other places nearby that I might like to ride and told me which paved roads I can use to get between them. As he left, he told me to have fun.
"Minimum speed 40 MPH. 3 wheels or more requires airbags."
This seems so dubious. Safe for whom? If we're talking about the driver, how are motorcycles legal? If we're talking about other highway users, then I'd rather be hit by a kei car than a lifted mega-pickup with wheels sticking out 6" beyond the body.
Obviously.
> how are motorcycles legal?
They're popular with a fairly large portion of the American public who view them as a lifestyle they are committed to, banning them for any reason would be political suicide.
Speaking of which, it blows my mind that it is legal to lift your truck.
The motivation will be money. The normalisation of small, inexpensive cars would have a serious impact on the American car industry, which prefers to sell larger, less efficient vehicles as the minimum vehicle. (At roughly 5x the price)
If demand developed for small, inexpensive vehicles they would be at a severe disadvantage to a wide range of manufacturers that currently supply these types of vehicles to nations around the globe.
The rise of electric vehicles would compound this problem, since electric mini vehicles with limited range and speed (but perfect for local use) are common on the global market at the 3000-4000(usd) price point.
There is also a similar class of internal combustion powered vehicles with around 300cc motors at that price point as well.
I would estimate that between the micro-ICE and Electric types, they might easily take over a 10% market segment if allowed to.
I see zero substantiation in that the organisation, American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators, is "shadowy".
It's great that our system has ~50 different jurisdictions that can each choose their own regulations, and it makes sense that each of the states doesn't want to spend the resources studying the issues to create their own conclusions and legislation. But these type of organizations should be recognized and regulated for the type of governmental apparatus they most certainly are, rather than being allowed to skate by as "private" entities.
As for kei trucks, I feel like I should be in the target market but I just don't see their appeal. But of course, I don't have to personally see their appeal to believe that others should be able to register them.
When I was a kid in the 1970s I saw car dealers try every trick in the book to upsell my dad to larger cars. By the late 2010s Japanese brands caught up with American brands: I was looking for a Fit in 2017 but new ones weren't available, I had to settle on a used Fit at new car pricing. Allegedly the factory had been washed out in a flood but the dealer had almost 100 HR-Vs in a line that nobody wanted to buy that are made in the same factory. In the meantime a customer would sell a Fit back to them and they'd sell it to me the next day.
Honda discontinued the Fit alleging that sales were poor but in the area around Ithaca it's one of the most popular cars, it is a running gag that another Fit owner will park next to you at the supermarket and I'm sure it would make a great getaway car.
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Dead Comment
Significantly lower? Probably not. I bet in some ways higher, other ways lower. But different for sure.
Problem is probably the landscape of huge cars proliferating in the US vs smaller cars other places.
But safety is not inherently worse in lower speed collisions [1]:
"Conclusions: Although we are generally concerned that drivers of small vehicles suffer more severe injuries, our results suggest that, for real-world accidents, K-cars provide similar safety for drivers involved in frontal collisions as standard vehicles in low delta V impact conditions."
[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24499113/
But the difference on this side of the big wet bit is that we attribute a big percentage of the safety score to pedestrian safety too - something Americans don't care about.
Aside from ride-height, these vehicles are much lower standing.
If safety / standards are an issue just demand these vehicles meet them as well instead of outright banning them.