I almost never even see those tiny little “smart” cars anymore, and they were about as common as seeing a Tesla is now for a while.
What, a cheap car that is perfect for commutes and milk-runs, gets stellar mileage, zero unnecessary frills, with no over-engineered electronic crap? I can’t even get a new car w/o a crappy electronic center console if I throw money at the dealership. Who cares if it’s like driving a mail truck: sign us up!
Many of us want these, but cannot obtain them new or even register them in our home state(s).
That said, ending the Chicken Tax might turn companies like Ford inside-out in the process. It’s an economic Jenga tower of automotive suck over here.
Never.
While not in Japan, I live in Taiwan and we have some Japanese imported Kei cars.
The majority of Taiwan driving is city. We don’t have many highways.
In Japan and Taiwan, esp in the city, the average speed is like 35mph. Even on the highway, most cars are not driving faster than 55mph.
In some parts America, it’s mostly highway driving. Those Kei cars are death traps.
Those tiny cars don’t meet American safety standards. And Americans don’t like bottom-of-the-barrel cars at any price.
Give them European fuel prices, and they’ll convert quickly.
Can USians stop being dependent on cars for transportation?
Can we unfuck our infrastructure and bring all of our jobs/utilities/amenities closer?
Would if I could
Public transit stops running by the time I’m off work
I generally like mine (Nissan Dayz Rooks HS ~2018). My two biggest complaints are lack of power for certain driving (like with 3 passengers and luggage uphill) but some have turbochargers, and secondly that the smaller footprint does make them feel much more flimsy in windy conditions. I’ve been blown around the expressway and felt like I was going to get blown over on a couple of occasions. Otherwise, I am quite happy. I still try to walk/train/cycle/motorcycle first, but sometimes that’s not possible or practical.
I have wanted a Kei truck since I first saw one. It’s me sized and I love them.
How about huge overweight and expensive kei cars?
I drive a manual Miata. I’d absolutely love an Autozam AZ-1 (Autozam is a Mazda brand). I also ride motorcycles. The Miata is actually harder to use than the motorcycles in American traffic due to its height. If you want to turn and a truck/SUV pulls up on your side you’re just stuck staring right at the middle of their door panel, zero visibility. On the motorcycles my head is at least high enough to see through their windows. Obviously this wouldn’t be an issue if the other driver didn’t pull forward to the absolute limit but that next to never happens.
For reference:
Waste of a story. Kei cars would be terrible for most American commuters. Small cars would be good, but not kei. Too small, too dangerous, too bad in the snow, too likely to break down, too slow for expressways.
I love my kei, and I would never suggest it for the average American. This is common sense, too. Anyone who researched the matter a little would say the same.
Too small, too dangerous, too bad in the snow, too likely to break down, too slow for expressways.
As someone who lives in rural northern Japan and drives his kei car on the expressways and in the snow: what? I’ve also never broken down. I don’t think kei cars are perfect, especially not mine, but this makes no sense to me as most people, including those living in Aomori which is the snowiest major city on earth, drive kei cars all year round. We do have winter tires here, unlike the all-seasons I used in the US.
Right? I always viewed them as local runabout trucks. This is for trades people doing urban/suburban stuff. Not commuting on freeways - though of course people would do that with them. Kei cars are no different than say one of the small Smart or Fiat cars. Not great choices for safety at speed on freeways, but doable for local use.
Everyone I know has been begging for smaller cars for years. Idk why everyone thinks people don’t want them. No one said they didn’t want them it was just decided for us by some CEOs. That seems to be how all of the opinions of “Americans” are formed. Same way the CEO of my company says we all love to go into an empty office and do all of our work online. It’s just bullshit
Not just CEOs. Tax and emissions law in the US discourages smaller vehicles and encourages personal vehicles large enough to qualify as “light trucks”. https://publications.lawschool.cornell.edu/jlpp/2024/11/25/the-unchecked-rise-of-trucks-and-suvs-in-america/
I bring this up every time people talk about vehicle sizes and people always treat me like a conspiracy theorist.
You’re 100% right tho. It just means other people aren’t interested in the truth. I used to be ignorant too until someone made that comment and i looked into it a little. Between emissions and safety standards we really push the prices of vehicles up ourselves with all the rules we’ve put in place.
I think the thing is when they do make them, they’re a shitty American car and nobody wants that so the Detroit execs blame us and go back to making luxury tanks for the wine moms.
I think the REAL issue is that when they sell those little cars people do buy them, but they are people who would have bought a larger more expensive car if that little car wasn’t available.
We have a little Honda fit. Great car. Also a pretty popular car that you see on the road all the damned time. Honda still sells the car globally, but they stopped selling it in the US. Not because it wasn’t selling, but because it was selling to people that would have bought HRVs or Civics (which cost more) instead.
That not true, the Fit started off strong at 80,000/yr sales but by 2020 hit 30,000/yr. Everyone is driving pickups now.
Best selling cars of 2024:
Ford F-Series: 732,139 Chevrolet Silverado: 542,517 Toyota RAV4: 475,193 Tesla Model Y: 405,900 Honda CR-V: 402,791 Ram Pickup: 373,120 GMC Sierra: 340,946 Toyota Camry: 309,876 Nissan Rogue: 245,724 Honda Civic: 242,005 Toyota Corolla: 232,908 Jeep Grand Cherokee: 216,148 Chevrolet Equinox: 207,730 Hyundai Tucson: 206,126 Chevrolet Trax: 200,689 Ford Explorer: 194,094 Toyota Tacoma: 192,813 Subaru Crosstrek: 181,811 Subaru Forester: 175,521 Toyota Highlander: 169,543 Honda Accord: 162,723 Kia Sportage: 161,917 Subaru Outback: 161,814 Toyota Tundra: 159,528 Nissan Sentra: 152,659https://www.caranddriver.com/news/g60385784/bestselling-cars-2024/
Yeah. I want to blame car company executives and do when I’m cranky but ultimately much of this is a problem with drivers. People want big, pedestrian-slaughtering, gas-guzzling planet-killers and as long as we allow don’t take a more aggressive regulatory approach to SUVs and bloated pavement princess pickups it’s going to stay bad.
rare point of view here… that people are responsible for themselves and not everything is some psyop conspiracy wherein people have no agency.
I do still think corporate decision makers bear a portion of the blame. They’d rather make big cars, too, and are doing nothing to use their advertising to help shape consumer demand to be in favor of smaller cars or promote fuel economy. Individual demand exists and people bear responsibility, but it doesn’t exist in a vacuum.
But we blame car companies for not making vehicles OTHER PEOPLE should buy.
The fit isn’t a great car for highway driving. Yeah, they are popular for city drivers would also into mini coopers and SMART cars. There are plenty of ‘little cars’ on the market, but people don’t genreally like them because they are impactical and sucky to drive compared to compact suvs and sedans, that are more or less the same price and offer a way more comfortable experience.
after you go over 65mph it feels like the wheels will fall off, and it’s low weight and box frame makes it blow around like a leaf in any substantial winds. I chose a civic because it was so much safer and more comfortable for highway driving at 70mph+. it is a much stiffer chasis, my civic can hit 110mph before it starts to feel sketchy.
Civic and HRV and CRV are way more stable and comfortable vehicles and get the same mileage, and have more storage space.
A modern Mini Cooper is nothing like a Smart car. It’s comparable in size to a Golf, or a Corolla hatch.
which model? the countryman is bigger, but the basic one is still barely a 4 seater. the 2 door is tiny.
The normal Cooper.
The 4 door Cooper is the same width as the 2 door, 1cm taller, and 16cm longer, based on a 2013-2018 model since that’s what this tool has available:
Compare a 2 door Cooper vs 2 door Golf and it’s barely different:
Or 2 door Cooper vs Smart Fortwo:
The Smart is clearly a smaller size. The Cooper and the Golf are basically the same. There’s definitely a lot more cross shopping of Coopers and Golfs than Coopers and Smarts.
The 40mpg highway mileage that the Fit gets tells me that you have different priorities than I do on the highway.
I’ve also never experienced the “wheels wanting to fall off” bullshit or the wind buffeting it personally.
The only thing I don’t like about highway driving is the revs get higher when you go fast.
Which AFAIK is because the fit is geared more towards lower speed driving, but honestly it is not a problem.
Ours is perfectly stable at highway speeds and is absolutely capable of greatly exceeding the speed limit if you are patient enough.
I also love how much shit can “fit” in it, lol. I have the back seats down often, hauling lots of stuff.
my civic gets over 40mph on the highway. usually 42+
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nobody wants that so the Detroit execs blame us and go back to making luxury tanks for the wine moms.
Exactly why Stellantis is selling this in the USA in 2026:
What is this?
Is this a Fiat?
It’s no hyalux
this is basically a shitty golf cart. golf cart carries more people and cargo and has the same driving distance.
Golf cart can’t legally carry 4 people on the roads and usually has top speed limited to about half of this one.
There’s a much higher markup on large luxury vehicles so no manufacturer wants to waste their time on smaller cheaper ones.
Same problem with affordable housing units :(
I just walked by two people in adjacent cubicles on a meeting with only each other. Boggles.
I guarantee if vehicles were properly regulated here, and the Big 3 here had to suffer actual consequences for their piss-poor choices, smaller cars would be a more popular choice.
Regulations have partly caused the car size problem. Manufacturers have gas mileage targets/requirements, but they’re scaled based on axle length. Essentially this means they can make small efficient cars, or big expensive cars.
Properly regulated, i.e. closing up all the loopholes.
Ford gave up all car production except for the Mustang, focusing on trucks and SUV’s. Since the late 70’s, the US auto industry has shown that it is unable to make small cars with low margins like other countries.
If the Big 3 suffered consequences, they would be the Bug 2 or the Big 1 by now.
Ford actually had the top selling cars with the Focus and Festiva, but the garbage transmissions basically drove that entire demographic to Honda and Toyota.
If the Big 3 suffered consequences, they would be the Bug 2 or the Big 1 by now.
Funny typo aside… I think that’s what should have happened. Let natural consequences follow poor business choices.
Since the late 70’s, the US auto industry has shown that it is unable to make small cars with low margins like other countries.
Oh they can they just don’t want to. GM, Ford, and Dodge have occasionally released small low margin vehicles but they either get discontinued or bloated and made more expensive, typically starting about 5 years in.
It ain’t just US Domestics either. How big is a 2025 Honda Accord vs a 1986 model?
If the Big 3 suffered consequences, they would be the Bug 2 or the Big 1 by now.
I’ve been arguing that same thing for over 20 years. Heck I was just doing it again over the weekend. There isn’t enough space in the US auto market for 3 Domestic Manufacturers anymore. They should have let Chrysler / Dodge die back in the '80s, the entire auto industry would be more healthy if they had.
They kind of are the big 2 by now, I’m not sure Chrysler still counts
Honda fit owners were born ready!!
Best car im thinking of another
Why leave it to car brains to determine if they like it? The people driving F350 GMC Yukon zero visibility death machines will never. Too bad.
Regulate the size of cars and stop pedestrian/biker deaths.
Regulate the size of cars and stop pedestrian/biker deaths.
I think that’s the point of the USA, though. You’re not allowed to indulge in nature, only industry.
Once the electronic industrial dystopia is fully formed, they will start pimping nature for money.
