Why is space for cars seen as sacrosanct?

They are a good deal taller even if not much wider or longer, making them more dangerous/lethal to pedestrians (especially children). They are also heavier, when combined with the height (less aerodynamic) this makes them less fuel efficient.

Really - you should tell that to mine, I'm getting better MPG (measured) from it that the Passat I had before it, height difference is a matter of a few inches, not a great deal IMO, we're not talking 4x4 here, the likes of the Qashqai's not much taller than a saloon.

Let those destroying the environment pay.

People going to and from work, taking kids to school, delivering goods to shops for moron greenies to buy. Anything beyond a stone age hunter gatherer existence involves altering the environment, and even then, hunter gatherers are now thought to have radically altered large areas of land through the use of fire.

Let me guess, you think everyone should drive an EV as they are all powered by CO2 free energy. As of a minute ago:

That's 1.87% of electricity being generated from wind, so your non polluting EV is being powered by fossil fuels.

Where is that graph from?

Does it mean we need to build more wind turbines?

Ah, cool. Thanks for the link. I'll have to look at it when the wind is honking in the winter when we need more power!

Right, that's really interesting. Obviously many more turbines needed and some way of storing the power.

Oh cool, wait till the wind is honking in winter:

20-1-22

One of the basic underlying reasons for why gas and energy prices have been so high this year is because multiple countries in Europe 'thought' the wind would be honking this winter, and becuase lots of additional wind generation had come on stream ealier in the year, they thought the extra capacity and piles of expected wind meant they didn't need to buy and stockpile that villified gas stuff during the summer, when prices are cheaper, like they normally would. Then the wind didn't show up and those whirly things were doing a whole lot of nothing for considerable periods this winter - all over Europe - so suddenly everyone needed a lot of gas quick as they didn't have it stockpiled.

All made worse by the Germans who appear to have been bribed by Gazprom who funded the anti-nuclear movement which lead to that daft git Merkel shutting down perfectly good nuclear power stations, meaning those uber energy hogs had their greedy snouts buried in the gas market even more than usual.

The French also had an unfortunate discovery of some weld repairs needed to several of their nukes - after 20-30 years of near continous use - bit like my cars shock absorbers, and had to offline those, meaning more gas needed there too.

Not helped by the Russian Gazprom deliberately running down it's european gas storage so they could enact their Nazi driven invasion of Ukraine.

An absolute perfect storm of stupidity, skulduggery, evil and unfortunate circumstance.

If people only drove when they needed to, we'd be in a much better position. Look at the Census data showing the high number of short journeys, less than 4km, that are driven, when they could be easily walked or cycled.

The issue is that they’re already paying, a modern suv is as efficient as any other regular car, fuel and motor tax already look after that, singling them out is just finger pointing from someone who either doesn’t know what they’re talking about or has a chip on their shoulder.

Yes, they are many who have them and could choose public transport but for their own reasons (there are several legitimate) don’t it there’s also hundreds of thousands who don’t have any viable alternative, punishing them for not being able to live in a city or having needs other than your own is ridiculous.

A 2 tonne SUV will cause 16 times the wear on the road surface of a 1 tonne car.

Hyundi Santa Fe curb weight is 1.65 tonnes to 1.84 tonnes, depending on configuration.

There is effectively no wear and tear on roads from ice passenger vehicles due to their low weight.