I love saving money and I enjoy recycling because it’s good for the environment and better for the pocketbook long term. However, here’s an article about the safety of the smart car.
I have to say I love the smart car and would love to drive one. However, I really question it’s feasibility of driving it in the US. Mostly because people in the US have a love affair with large SUVs and trucks. Perhaps if I lived anywhere else, where people drove smaller cars I’d easily hope into a smart car. But here in the US I don’t think it’s a wise decision.
When you read the article it states that while the smart car gets excellent safety ratings, it’s only for it’s class of car. Across all classes of cars it doesn’t fare so well. And obviously because of the size of the car when compared to people driving Expeditions, Suburbans, F-150s, etc. And the truth is in the US you aren’t driving in areas of only small cars.
People here love their big trucks and SUVs. And perhaps they need transportation so large. But the truth is until we as a society in general start downsizing in across the board, I feel it’s very dangerous to be riding around in such a tiny car. Right now even in my corolla I sometimes feel tiny compared to the many large SUVs and trucks next to me.
But maybe with rising gas prices people will become more concerned about larger cars. And maybe I’ll be able to steal a deal when the time comes I start looking for a larger car. But for now I guess I’ll appreciate my super tiny putt-putt car and wince when I see my fill up bill, but laugh when I see everyone else’s.
5 responses so far ↓
1 Mom @ Wide Open Wallet // May 15, 2008 at 6:47 pm
My sister in law has one and she LOVES it. She even got into a head on collision in it and walked away. The car was repaired. I don’t know the details as far as how fast she was going or the type of car that hit her.
One bad thing I know is that almost no car insurance company will insure it since parts are so expensive. The only company she could find was Progressive.
2 Rete // May 15, 2008 at 7:16 pm
There are a couple of smartcars being driving in the Austin area. I usually see them on the streets, not the highway, so I don’t know if I’d feel comfortable driving one when everyone’s going 65, but then again, if I was driving for my commute we never go that fast b/c of traffic.
3 zen // May 16, 2008 at 5:17 am
I’m seeing more and more smart cars - and I’m glad.
The more people that adopt them can turn around your view (and others) that “it’s not feasible because it’s an SUV world.” That thinking needs to be changed - it’s not an SUV world - it’s a pedestrian world.
4 LivingAlmostLarge // May 16, 2008 at 2:19 pm
LOL, I live in a pretty pedestrian friendly cities and I know for a fact more people aren’t driving them because of SUV. Most people I know have one car and it’s usually a subaru.
Because they want AWD and space.
5 DebtDieter // May 19, 2008 at 9:53 am
I can vouch for the Smart car, a friend of mine with a 300 series Mercedes had an accident with a Smart Car, the Smart Car drove away, his big Merc was a write off!
We’ve been teasing him about Smart Cars for years now…
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