Smart (?) Car

I read American Way a lot. Not because I want to know where Doris Roberts likes to eat in Memphis, but because when you fly American Airlines it's just kind of there. Either way, the July issue was all about the Earth, recycling, and general up-my-alleyness so I dove right in. This magazine is always surface level fluff about hard-hitting issues (kind of like if the makers of US Weekly tried to write Time- they might talk about the election, but they would focus on what the candidates wear and where they like to eat) but it can contain a nugget of information now and then. Plus, the writers make jokes that they clearly think are witty but just make me think "this was written for dumb people." More on that later.

I flipped through this shallow info without seeing anything I didn't already know until I came to an article on the Smart car (you can find it four spots from the top on this page).


Before I continue, let me give you a mercifully short version of my rant about the Smart car: Yes, it gets great gas mileage and the world would be better off if more people drove them. But my problem is that Smart only gets good gas mileage because it's so small- it's not particularly well designed in the efficiency arena. For instance, the Smart gets 41 MPG, while the Prius gets at least 46. I always tell people to just get a Honda Fit instead. It gets about 38 MPG while being a real car- by which I mean it has 5 seats and a trunk. The Smart has 2 seats and a cubby hole that fits two bags of groceries. The problem with the Smart is that it was designed to address problems (most of) the US doesn't have, like no parking and tiny streets. As such, the Smart is only useful for one thing: getting one (possibly two) people to and from work. Since most families have more than two people (and travel with more than two grocery bags worth of stuff), the Smart car can't be your only vehicle- you'll need another car to be the "family/errand" car while the Smart is you "commute" car. And you know what? You could just get a Fit, or a Yaris, or some other small car that's almost as efficient. This can be your "family" and "commute" car, and you can forget the Smart altogether! Or better yet, get a hybrid (a real one- not an Escape or a Vue) and get even better gas mileage wherever you go! It's not that the Smart car is bad, it's just that it's utility is so small it will only work for like 5% of people in the US. And that 5% would be much better off with a Prius instead. Come back when you get that all-electric version running.

Okay, back the article. What really made my blood boil was this passage:

"The Smart gets up to 41 miles per gallon , due to a skimpy weight of just 1,800 pounds. In comparison, the Toyota Prius gets an average of 46 miles per gallon and tips the scales at a relatively burly 3,000 pounds. Watch out for bikini season, Prius."

WTF? "Watch out for bikini season, Prius?" They're poking fun at the Prius for being heavier, when the only reason anyone cares about vehicle weight is fuel economy. And it tells you that the Prius gets better fuel economy in the previous sentence! I don't know if the author was going for humor, satire or what, but he just ended up sounding stupid. And good for you, you're almost half the weight of the Prius- and you get 5 less miles per gallon. I might be looking too far into this, but that's one of the most maddeningly stupid passages I've ever read. What were they going for?

Moving on to the next item on the list, they give us "An Alternative Fuel Primer," or as I like to call it, "Alternative Fuels for Retards." Not only do they list as side effect of Bio-diesel as "It might make you hungry for a cheeseburger and fries," but they refer to Hydrogen as "The gold standard for alternative fuels." I won't even really get in to this- suffice to say that Hydrogen is not so much a fuel as it is an energy storage method. If we make it with clean electricity, then great. But the main reason industry is pushing Hydrogen is because it keeps the status quo- we'll still need the fuel companies and their stations, their infrastructure, etc. But I said I wouldn't get in to that.

But please, oh American Way, what about Electric Cars?

"Pretty much the same story as hydrogen -- clean, versatile, and practically a rumor. There are plenty of gas-electric hybrids, in addition to a variety of smaller, all-electric models (called neighborhood-electric vehicles) or low-speed vehicles that have been available for several years. But full-speed, purely electric automobiles are a few years from being a common sight on the highway."

I don't know If I should count the things wrong with that paragraph or just bang my head on the desk. First, they're really oversimplifying the Hydrogen/Electric similarity. Yes, Hydrogen cars are just electric cars that get their electricity from a Hydrogen fuel cell, but the whole infrastructure is different. Not to mention that you get to drive around with a tank of highly explosive gas in your trunk. Second, full speed, purely electric vehicles were available in 1999 and they worked great. Do yourself a favor and watch Who Killed the Electric Car.

I guess my point is that pro-environment news is like everything else: now that it's cool to be green, more and more outlets are jumping on the bandwagon- and simple statistics prove that the more articles are written about about a topic, the more of them will be stupid. I'm all about being green, but do some actual research. Don't think a car is good for the Earth just because it's small (or just because it's a hybrid), and always consider the source of news- Exxon and GM telling us that Hydrogen is the way of the future is like when MSNBC reported that the XBox is clearly the best video game console.