Sometimes you just have to agree with politicians.

[den]

FOUR-wheel drive vehicles (SUVs in the US) have become a "pox" on cities former prime minister Paul Keating said yesterday.

4WDs on farms, or in the bush, are fine with me. But city-based 4WDs whose only off-road experience is driving onto the front lawn to be washed should be BANNED.

Comments

[julesong.livejournal.com]

We have two 4-wheel drive vehicles and we live in the city.

One is a Subaru Legacy, the car I most often drive. It has gotten me out of some sticky situations in the unpredictable weather here in the Pacific NW, including times when the police were not allowing any vehicles to travel a road unless it had 4-wheel drive.

The other is a Chevy Silverado truck. I used the 4-wheel drive on it two days ago when we drove up in the mountains on some forest service roads. We take it off-roading in the summer. We have a trailer that we tow often, as well, and end up using the truck to help people when they're moving.

Please do not assume that all owners of 4-wheel drive vehicles are the same, or that everybody uses them the same, OR that everybody drives them the same. Such broad generalizations are not truly useful, nor fair.

[julesong.livejournal.com]

To note: if I need to drive into downtown Seattle, however, I don't take the truck. That's just plain stupid.

It's the stupid owners of useful 4-wheel drive vehicles that should be banned, not the vehicles themselves.

It's not all 4WDs

[dewhitton.livejournal.com]

But the chevy is a ute and Subarus aren't huge, petrol-burning things. Here, the vehicle labled "4WD" are Range Rovers, Nissan Patrols, Holden Jackaroos, Jeep Cherokees, Toyota Land Cruisers and such. Subarus are labled as "all-wheel drive" and are nice. Are Subarus classed as an SUV?

I don't have a problem with people who use their 4WD. They're great for towing heavy things like boats, caravans and trailers. Farmers use them all the time.

I do have a problem with people who use them to go shopping, or to pick up kids, or who buy them "because they're safer."

Yesterday, at the mechanics, a man drove in and asked that better tyres be put on his new Pathfinder. The tyres that came with it were, he said, "Too hard!" and he could feel every bump in the road. I left as the mechanic explained to the man that 4WDs are like that.

Stupid people.