Cars in the U.K are up to 55% larger today than they were in the 1970s and there are twice the number of cars on the U.K's roads as there were 30 years ago, but the media are still running articles claiming that a handful of cycle lanes and LTNs 'cause congestion' in London...🙄
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The state may interfere in all kinds of ways to make the world more horrible, but the loudest complaints are heard when it tries to make things fairer.
And it's just not people buying bigger cars, the cars themselves are getting bigger.
Posted this 👇 about the Fiat Panda showing how the benchmark for car size is changing.
Cars like Ford Escort / Focus, Fiesta and Mondeo used to be the norm but aren't even made any more.
#autobesity
And anyone else noticed how often people with drives just park on the street anyway these days?
A stationary queue of 20 medium sized vehicles in 1970 was about 86m long.
In 2010 this was a queue of ~50 medium sized vehicles, causing a queue of about 240m.
Cars were so much rarer then that it is likely they were more often used for whole family trips. Now it is quite common for families to have two or more cars (my brother's family has 4), the occupancy must be lower.
In 2009 the UK gov issued guidance.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/permeable-surfacing-of-front-gardens-guidance/guidance-on-the-permeable-surfacing-of-front-gardens
Seems like few care. Building inspection isn't what it was. Tick boxes, rather than a dour inspector visiting to check depths of footings, correct pipework, and permeable drives.
Now we drive behemoths like the one on the right down to the local shops for a takeout.
And we call it progress.
The car nearest the camer is a BMW 7-series that was launched in 1986.
It was a large luxury car at the time, but looks pretty modest next to a modern (top-selling) Mitsubishi ute.
And BMW is, oddly, partly to blame.
I did a deep dive into it on Twitter a few years ago, comparing the E39 5 series weight with the X5 introduced in 1999.
In hindsight, it's the X5 that launched the SUV craze in Euro/Aust/NZ.
Now everything is overweight.
I was struck by the contrast a year ago, when I posted in another place...
Same goes for the lecture-hall seating. Most 2024-sized students don't fit in them skinny seats & tables. 🥴