Fuck Cars
This community exists as a sister community/copycat community to the r/fuckcars subreddit.
This community exists for the following reasons:
- to raise awareness around the dangers, inefficiencies and injustice that can come from car dependence.
- to allow a place to discuss and promote more healthy transport methods and ways of living.
You can find the Matrix chat room for this community here.
Rules
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Be nice to each other. Being aggressive or inflammatory towards other users will get you banned. Name calling or obvious trolling falls under that. Hate cars, hate the system, but not people. While some drivers definitely deserve some hate, most of them didn't choose car-centric life out of free will.
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No bigotry or hate. Racism, transphobia, misogyny, ableism, homophobia, chauvinism, fat-shaming, body-shaming, stigmatization of people experiencing homeless or substance users, etc. are not tolerated. Don't use slurs. You can laugh at someone's fragile masculinity without associating it with their body. The correlation between car-culture and body weight is not an excuse for fat-shaming.
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Stay on-topic. Submissions should be on-topic to the externalities of car culture in urban development and communities globally. Posting about alternatives to cars and car culture is fine. Don't post literal car fucking.
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No traffic violence. Do not post depictions of traffic violence. NSFW or NSFL posts are not allowed. Gawking at crashes is not allowed. Be respectful to people who are a victim of traffic violence or otherwise traumatized by it. News articles about crashes and statistics about traffic violence are allowed. Glorifying traffic violence will get you banned.
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No reposts. Before sharing, check if your post isn't a repost. Reposts that add something new are fine. Reposts that are sharing content from somewhere else are fine too.
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No misinformation. Masks and vaccines save lives during a pandemic, climate change is real and anthropogenic - and denial of these and other established facts will get you banned. False or highly speculative titles will get your post deleted.
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No harassment. Posts that (may) cause harassment, dogpiling or brigading, intentionally or not, will be removed. Please do not post screenshots containing uncensored usernames. Actual harassment, dogpiling or brigading is a bannable offence.
Please report posts and comments that violate our rules.
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I have to drive a freaking pick up truck for professional reasons and even I loathe the freaking thing.
Too long, too wide, too tall, too everything and anything for any road and I drive in country roads.
The craze for ever growing vehicles is going to extremes.
Tax and penalize these cars until it hurts.
Most of my friends that are in the trades prefer small vans over pickup trucks. They can fit more tools, better organized, and easier to secure. Pickup trucks are very niche vehicles.
Unfortunately, to my knowledge, there are no ~~risen~~ raised vans or with 4x4 traction, which I often require to reach some remote locations, especially with rainy weather.
But I would gladly trade it in for a small van.
Either that or a 1990's 4x4 FIAT Panda, with a roof rack.
Pretty sure mercedes has some vans like that. I know of a company that build them into off road & off grid camping vans and they do rock climbing, or whetever one would call it, in them. They are still quite long and big but not like the sheer stupid toys that a modern pickup is.
There are, not sure what your qualifications for a “risen van” are, but Ford Transits and Mercedes Sprinters have an AWD variant. Dodge has had 4wd panel vans since the 90s, not sure if they still are, tho. There’s probably other makes out there, but that’s what I know off the top of my head. I think there’s also aftermarket companies that can mod vans into 4wd, but that’s getting a little crazy for just a basic work van.
At least 20cm of clearance from the road, awd capable, with high torque setting for rough terrain and steep inclinations, as I sometimes need to use trails not even fit to be considered goat paths.
In a van, it's an exotic combination.
Ya, it’d be doable for sure with the craze of all the overland van-dweller builds the last few years. Ive seen plenty that meet all your requirements. But, whether it would be cost-effective or not for a work van would be the major issue, especially considering most trucks can do all that without being a special order for probably less than half the price.
Unfortunately not a lot of demand for such a thing, like you said.
Years ago i was in a spot where i needed the same as you for basically all the same reasons. The old van kept getting stuck everywhere, and then it actually got rolled from hitting a patch of black ice one winter, so it was totaled. These high-top vans had just started coming to market which was great, but I couldn’t convince the boss to spend the extra money for at least an AWD version, nevermind the higher ground clearance or low-torque options. I still got that thing stuck so many times…having a high-top I could stand up in was nice though.
So use that vehicle in austere places, and don't park it in Paris (or any other city).
The issue here is oversized vehicles becoming norm, not exception.
Bruh, my only vehicle for close to two years was a truck that I inherited, a 2002 Chevy Silverado 1500 LS. I believe it got about 8mpg on average, but I dealt with it because I didn’t have any other way to get a different vehicle at the time.
Nowadays I drive a 2018 Ford Fiesta SE. The difference is night and day. Stops on a dime, accelerates quickly, I can fit it anywhere I want, and it gets an average of 34mpg. I went from paying between $75 to $125 every week and a half for gas to spending about $30 over the same time period.
I drive small cars in my personal life, although I currently own 2 station wagons because of family and pets. I usually get an average consumption of 6-7L/100km, which is not bad at all.
My first and most beloved car was a hatchback that could get 5,5L/100km.
I have to drive a pick up for work but I do not enjoy it, to the least degree.