A place to discuss problems of car centric infrastructure or how it hurts us all. Let's explore the bad world of Cars!
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Image description:
Text: Amazon's electric cargo bikes have arrived in DC.
Image: A four-wheeled vehicle that appears to be a cross between a bicycle, a go-cart, and a mini-truck
Response text from high t alpha shemale @gluetaster: that's not a cargo bike man that's a loopholemobile
Frankly, it is a loophole mobile unequivocally, but it's a loophole that I would prefer that the laws change to accommodate rather than the other way around. "Deathtrap" is complete bs inspired by the same propaganda car companies use to justify bigger and bigger dangerous gas-guzzlers.
If we want any validation for this we don't have to look any further than every other developed city in the world. This is just a more fuel efficient, quieter, more agile, and safer-for-pedestrians way to navigate a crowded city.
I get what you're saying, and I agree it's technically a good thing. But I have a problem with the fact that as noted, there's no climate control, and no safety features. This will be on the roads with normal vehicles, doesn't fit in a bike lane, and despite essentially being an efficient car, there's no seatbelt. If somebody gets t-boned in one of these, or in any kind of wreck in general with a standard car or truck, they will likely die horribly.
I've no qualms with improving efficiency, but it shouldn't come at the expense of safety for the vehicle operator who is being required to use this for work for likely many hours per day.
I would be fine if we all drove these (and of course the infrastructure was updated to accommodate)
That is exactly the propaganda.
There's the classic example that the car safety score is determined by whether the people inside the vehicle survive a crash. That leads to a perverse incentive in which car companies build a larger and more robust car to ensure their passengers survive crashes with no regard for the people they crash into. Since every car company is doing this they have to get bigger and bigger until we get the cars we have today that have to be registered as trucks.
These vehicles might be less safe for the drivers in our world of super-trucks, but they are magnitudes safer for pedestrians. I would prefer every effort to normalize smaller vehicles and I think every vehicle like this that's on the road means one less pedestrian-killer and an overall safer experience.
From what I read, the reason (at least in US) why we got those big cars was the fuel economy requirements were more relaxed which made automakers who couldn't improve it enough use it as a loophole.
It's both.