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this post was submitted on 02 May 2024
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Absolutely. So many sensible sized European cars aren’t sold in the US because bullshit market research says small car bad big truck good.
But the European market is also pushing bigger cars and SUV.
The smart is now a 4 meters SUV
The Volkswagen up (small 4 person car) is out of production and they're selling nothing under 4 meters
The fiat panda (another small 4 person car) is in the process of being redesigned and the mockups look like a huge range rover SUV
Skoda, after retiring the citigo, has the Fabia that's relatively small (almost 4 meters) and the rest are huge
Most automakers are giving up on the cheap and small compact car segment, leaving a big gap for Chinese automakers
Is it? I haven't heard about it, I've seen some weird concept picture, but the Fortwo as currently being manufactured is still the same 2.6m long car as it was in 2014 as per Wikipedia.
They are the same company. The Skoda Citigo and the Seat Mii are both just rebadged Volkswagen Up cars.
Those mockups are actually the redesign of the Panda Cross, which was an SUV-ish thing they introduced in 2014. Fiat still makes the subcompact 500, having recently made an electric version.
Some EU automakers are doing weird stuff, but if you look at the electric car market for example, at lest where I live, locally produced electric kei trucks actually outsold Tesla at some point.
The smart fortwo has been discontinued a few months ago, replaced by the 2 ton smart #1
The fiat panda cross was just a fancy trim of the fiat panda, same size and weight just bigger bumpers and higher wheels
Nope, it's the government's mileage standards. If you make a truck with a shorter wheelbase and track, it has to hit higher gas mileage standards. Easier to make a big truck that's allowed worse mileage.
https://youtu.be/azI3nqrHEXM
Also, I did a brief stint selling cars in the 90s. One of the salesmen explained it like this, "What's the real difference in a big truck and a small truck? Same engineering effort, same production work, all that. Hell, same parts for most systems.
More steel on the big one, and steel is cheap. We can charge a premium for the larger truck."