Why do people drive unnecessarily large cars (AKA "SUVS")?

What kind of hiviz panels do you have on your car?

No, I'm saying there's zero evidence for anyone making the claim that a particular car is unnecessary.

Posters saying 'there's no reason for anyone in Ranelagh to own one' is provably and demonstrably lacking the info to make that call. If you see someone doing the shopping in a Ranger Raptor, you've no idea if they need that car for other purposes. It might be unnecessarily large for a trip to Lidl, but you don't know how necessary it is for whatever else they get up to during the week.

I collect my little one from creche in a Tucson. Yes, it's too big for that particular job in isolation, but I also use it for other stuff……bringing his bike and/or the dog in the boot so we can get a bit of activity in before bedtime and bringing his grandparents to do the shopping on the way home, for example. It also put the missus at ease when we first brought the wee lad home and started driving him around the place because she has a much, much higher driving position than the previous car.

Anyone observing me in the car park of the creche simply does not have the required information to hand to determine how (un)necessary that vehicle is for my needs. That goes doubly so when you see a car parked on the side of the road and post a picture of it in this thread giving out yards about wankpanzers and chelsea tractors.

I mentioned the 'roads not being able' angle because I remember addressing it months ago. It was as stupid then as it is now. "Sure our roads aren't capable of handling such large vehicles" is hyperbolic nonsense, as are a lot of other claims in this thread (people talking about cars doubling in size, anyone?). So I felt it necessary to address that aspect (hard to tell what's satirical in text format, I suppose).

I've yet to see anyone make the claim you're putting forward in this post, but I will agree that it is equally as ridiculous/stupid.

That's a different criteria though. Remember when you said "everything possible"?

Do you remember your own question? You asked "do you do everything possible to ensure your own safety?". And I answered yes - there's no research or recommendations for such a stupid suggestion,however I follow all safety guidelines and laws to ensure my safety in a car, same as I do when I cycle. Why don't you?

I'm not. Not that point anyway.

You are: that was a "benchmark" you were attempting to pass off as some sort of half baked litmus test for what shall be acceptable.

However, if you want established fact: taller vehicles are more dangerous. That's the fact. What counts at too tall: that's my opinion.

More dangerous than some others, less dangerous than others. There are a number of more pertinent factors/variables that would also have an affect on the outcome.

Given that an average person standing would be able to see over your average SUV - Tuscon/Qashqai/Rav/sportage etc. so your 'benchmark' is already out the window.

Now that's laughable.

You've dodged away from the entire relevance of your "benchmark" in an attempt to make it somehow legitimate.

The whole premise of the benchmark is opinion….it doesn't magically make it a face by twisting an argument to suit your end goal.

One of us is getting the wrong end of the stick, alright. You seem to be misunderstanding me, whether that's deliberate or not is unclear.

I never made any claims about your judgement, specifically. I'm well aware that, yes, there are some people who drive cars that are too large for their particular needs. To use your example, I have a huge issue with someone taking a photo of a car, posting it to boards and going "look at the size of this thing, there's no way he has a bad back". Because that's what has happened, multiple times, by multiple users. Not you, for the avoidance of doubt, but others have. And plenty of others have also chimed in with similar claims….there are loads of "nobody in Ireland needs to drive an X" or "they're obviously making up for their small penis/ego/bank balance" type posts on this thread and every single one of those posters hasn't the first fcuking idea if the owners do need a car that size. Not one. Including you.

63 pages into a thread on unnecessarily large cars and we've yet to see a single case of an unnecessarily large car. Why is that? Spoiler alert: It's because nobody knows what is or isn't necessary.

You seem to think that a specific case of a car being necessarily large renders all discussion of cars in general, moot

No, I don't, that's your interpretation and it is wide of the mark. I think anyone casting aspersions on someone because of the type of vehicle they're driving needs to mind their own fcuking business because they've no idea what anyone's particular needs might be. And I've been saying it for months at this stage.

Some folks just don't like 'em, rightly or wrongly. But framing that dislike as faux-concern/outrage at the lack of necessity because the drivers aren't off-roading 24/7 is intellectually dishonest and downright deceitful. It's almost as bad as parading dead kids around the place to browbeat others into submission. Almost.

So yeah, like I said opinions being dressed up in any manner to equate personal opinion to fact.

Yes, I remember the question clearly, it was about the "everything possible" standard that you set for cyclists, not about safety guidelines or laws.

You see that emergency services and many commercial vehicles use hiviz on their cars. It's certainly possible to put hiviz markings on your car at negligible cost.

Are you too cool to use hiviz on your car?

These are completely separate arguments to the one that was put forward previously by that poster.

If "that poster" you mean is me, then please quote this other argument I was making. You can harp on all you like as to why you have an SUV, but that doesn't take away from the point I made that there are many drivers driving large SUVs that are simply not able to handle their size and you can see this readily in action if you're a regular roads user. SUVs also obscure the road for other road users and are far more numerous than buses or skip lorries. How did we ever bring Timmy and his bike to the park before we ever had SUVs?…ffs

You’re at least consistent in your ability to misrepresent posts but you’re a joke shop of arguments.